7 Days 'Til 007: "Surrender"

Each weekday until November 9, enjoy a post about a standout vocal theme or instrumental piece from the official Bond movies.

Originally written for the Tomorrow Never Dies opening titles and filled with references to the film's Rupert Murdoch-inspired plot about media empire mindfuckery (but replaced in the opening titles with Sheryl Crow's not-as-great "Tomorrow Never Dies," which doesn't acknowledge the film's plot at all, so what's the point of having it in the opening titles?), "Surrender" is David Arnold's finest moment as a 007 film composer and perhaps k.d. lang's finest moment as a singer.

Tomorrow Never Dies' closing credits theme remains the best Bond song since Duran Duran's "A View to a Kill" (Arnold co-composed it with singer David McAlmont, who performed a solid cover of "Diamonds Are Forever" for Arnold's Shaken and Stirred, an album of Bond song covers that landed Arnold the gig as Tomorrow Never Dies composer). "Surrender" has everything that lesser '80s and '90s Bond opening title themes like "All Time High" lack, particularly playfulness (songwriter Don Black wrote it from the point of view of Jonathan Pryce's villain character Carver, who threatens Bond with lyrics like "The news is that I am in control") and an appreciation for the film series' musical past, the biggest thing that was missing from Madonna's much-maligned "Die Another Day."

I wouldn't consider the Madonna track an epic fail, but it wasn't the best choice for the 2002 film's clever, Daniel Kleinman-designed opening titles because it doesn't tie into the film it was written for and the series as a whole as effectively as "Surrender" does. "Die Another Day" would have been better suited for some other action franchise that's not 007. By the way, I hate it when Bond nerds bash "Die Another Day" producer Mirwais, who composed the awesome "Disco Science," and call him a hack (just like how fans of Richard Donner's 1978 Superman movie lamely hurl the words "incompetent" and "hack" at Richard Lester, who was a bad choice to direct the Superman sequels because of his contempt for the source material, but outside of Superman, Lester's a way more interesting filmmaker than Donner, simply because of A Hard Day's Night, The Knack... And How to Get It and Juggernaut).

During "Surrender," lang channeled Shirley Bassey but brought her own stamp to the vocals. She deserves to sing another Bond theme. Hell, let lang sing two more like the Broccolis did with Bassey.

Hold your breath and count to 10 as Skyfall covers "AFOS Prime"

Beginning today, A Fistful of Soundtracks is streaming selections from Thomas Newman's score to the new Bond movie Skyfall--as well as the Skyfall theme song performed by Adele and produced by her "Rolling in the Deep" collaborator Paul Epworth--during the "AFOS Prime" and "New Cue Revue" blocks. The score album doesn't drop until November 6. The film doesn't come out until November 9 here in America (England, of course, gets dibs on the film this Friday before we do--those limey bastards).

I'm more of a fan of the 007 music than the movies themselves, although I love the more grounded and gritty direction the series has taken ever since Daniel Craig's Bond had that messy, nearly Dan-vs.-the-Captain-like fight with his first kill in the men's room. As someone who digs that John Barry/David Arnold Bond sound, I knew Adele's "Skyfall" would be a good Bond song right when I started hearing a guitarist strum the first four notes of the Monty Norman-penned (and Barry-arranged) "James Bond Theme" at exactly one minute into Adele's single. That's something that's hugely lacking from Madonna's "Die Another Day" (or a much worse track, Rita Coolidge's yacht-rock-y "All Time High" from Octopussy, not exactly one of Barry's finest musical moments) but is present in Adele's tune: an appreciation for the Bond series' storied musical past.

As for the score by Newman, who has regularly worked with Skyfall director Sam Mendes since American Beauty (except for Away We Go) and isn't the first person who comes to mind when I think "action movie composer," it's exactly how I imagined a 007 score by Newman to be: not as flashy-sounding as Arnold's 007 scores and more heavy on percussion than brass, which Arnold's scores were awash in. Newman came up with clever ways to work in bits and pieces of Norman's "James Bond Theme" throughout his score. "She's Mine," one of the Skyfall tracks I've added to rotation, expands upon the old Norman melody with stunning results.

Meanwhile, I'm hard at work on upgrading AFOS from mono to stereo after 10 years of the station being in mono, a format I chose over stereo in order to be able to carry more than 50 hours of music. Since October 1, I've been going through the AFOS music library and re-converting five station playlist tracks per day, this time into stereo mp3s instead of into mono mp3s. The slightly bigger file sizes will mean less music in the library, but far better sound quality. It's time for an upgrade. I've penciled in January 1 as the date of the station's conversion from mono to stereo because by then, I'll have enough tracks to fill several hours, but I wish the upgrade would begin tomorrow, so that tunes like "Skyfall" don't have to sound kind of tinny anymore.

"Mr. Sunshine, yay": The five best original TV themes of 2011

(Photo source: The Art of the Title Sequence)

5. Mr. Sunshine (Rob Cairns? Matthew Perry's musician dad? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?)
The broadcast networks' elimination of theme songs from most of their programming is a trend that depresses veteran TV theme composers like Happy Days and Wonder Woman theme maestro Charles Fox, who briefly expressed his displeasure during a recent interview on the podcast TV Confidential. But when a quick and minimalist theme like the one that opened Matthew Perry's short-lived single-camera comedy Mr. Sunshine makes every one of its five seconds count--it sublimely nailed the sardonic tone of the title character in just three words--maybe these skimpy themes on the broadcast networks aren't so awful (plus non-commercial HBO, which doesn't have to worry about the advertisers that are partially to blame for theme songs becoming an endangered species, is keeping the art form alive, as you'll see later).



4. Lights Out (Thwak! Music)
I'm glad the crew behind this short-lived FX boxing drama didn't go with "Lights Out" by Santigold (a sweet tune, by the way, but it would have been too on-the-nose) and opted for something original and appropriately brash and brassy a la The J.B.'s to open their show.



3. American Horror Story (César Dávila-Irizarry and Charlie Clouser)
If creepy old-timey photos of long-dead babies and creepier split-second images of pickled remains of dead babies or fetuses are your thing, then you're going to get a kick out of the American Horror Story opening title sequence by famed Se7en title designer Kyle Cooper. The rest of us find the titles unsettling to watch. I actually often turn my head away from the screen when the titles begin. They're accompanied by an eerie and effective industrial theme by sound designer César Dávila-Irizarry and Saw series composer and former Nine Inch Nails member Charlie Clouser. Together, the titles and the Dávila-Irizarry/Clouser theme are the only genuinely scary part of American Horror Story.

AFOS: "Dance Into the Fire" live-tweet recap

Yesterday on Twitter, I live-tweeted an afternoon re-airing of the 2008 Fistful of Soundtracks: The Series episode "Dance Into the Fire." (Repeats of AFOS: The Series air Wednesdays at 10am and 3pm on AFOS.)

Below is the recap of my 90-minute "Dance Into the Fire" live-tweet. (My typos during the live-tweet remain unchanged, like "Madonna referenced the Luke/Vader duel... Uh, what does that have to with 007?" and "The hiring of Daniel Craig and the grittier writing of Craig's 007 movies has really reinvigorated David Arnold's 007 score music." Oh Twittersphere, why do you infect me with absent verbs and subject-verb disagreement?)

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I'll be live-tweeting my own Fistful of Soundtracks: The Series episode in 30 min., for the two of you listeners out there who give a shit.
2:30 PM Oct 14th from web

Technically, #100 ("Dance Into the Fire") was the final AFOS:The Series episode, so I wanted it to involve a genre I enjoy: 007 score music.
2:31 PM Oct 14th from web

On my blog in '08, I said #100's the last AFOS ep b/c I got tired of the format. What I didn't say was it was also due to monetary reasons.
2:32 PM Oct 14th from web

I can't say I love the 007 series (only 7 of the 22 installments are actually good movies), but I love the music from those films.
2:33 PM Oct 14th from web

My AFOS live-tweet will be like Pop-Up Video. A tweet with a factoid or opinion about the Bond song will pop up while it's being streamed.
2:34 PM Oct 14th from web

An hour and a half of all 22 of Eon Productions' 007 opening title themes, right now on the Fistful of Soundtracks channel!
3:00 PM Oct 14th from web

Monty Norman's Bond theme in Dr. No is classic, but good God, the rest of his Dr. No score isn't as listenable as John Barry's scores.
3:03 PM Oct 14th from web

The version of the FRWL title theme that's on disc is missing the film version's organ solo. What a kick to that poor musician's solo organ.
3:04 PM Oct 14th from web

John Barry was da man during the late '60s, shagging Jane Birkin and if the rumors were true, Shirley Bassey.
3:07 PM Oct 14th from web

The Goldfinger opening theme is kind of an overplayed song. I'll fess up to overplaying it myself on the radio too.
3:07 PM Oct 14th from web

007 guitarist Vic Flick said Tom Jones fainted after hitting the high note at the end of the recording of the Thunderball theme.
3:10 PM Oct 14th from web

Somewhere, a Jones fan reads this and wishes she were there to revive him by putting her panties up to his nose. "Are you OK? Sniff these!"
3:11 PM Oct 14th from web

My favorite part of the You Only Live Twice theme is the electric guitar riffs. John Barry originally wanted Aretha Franklin to sing "YOLT."
3:13 PM Oct 14th from web

The On Her Majesty's Secret Service theme is one of 3 instrumental 007 opening themes b/c it's hard to find a word that rhymes w/ "service."
3:17 PM Oct 14th from web

They could have rhymed "service" with "nervous," but no one's ever nervous in a Bond song. They're always confident about their lovemaking.
3:17 PM Oct 14th from web

I like the Shirley Bassey Diamonds Are Forever theme more than Bassey's more famous Goldfinger theme because it's fonkay.
3:20 PM Oct 14th from web

"Live and Let Die" is the only 007 theme with a reggae beat, unless you count Bob Marley's rejected song about shooting Sheriff J.W. Pepper.
3:25 PM Oct 14th from web

Sheriff J.W. Pepper, who epitomizes everything that's lame about Roger Moore's Bond movies, is one sheriff no one would mind shooting.
3:26 PM Oct 14th from web

Not all the themes J. Barry touched turned to gold. His Man w/ the Golden Gun theme sucks. That's partly b/c Lulu sung it w/ a sore throat.
3:28 PM Oct 14th from web

Alice Cooper's rejected Man w/ the Golden Gun theme, which wasn't sung w/ a sore throat: http://bit.ly/2rOvAK
3:29 PM Oct 14th from web

I'll forever associate Carly Simon's Spy Who Loved Me theme with the badass parachute jump by Roger Moore's stuntman that precedes it.
3:30 PM Oct 14th from web

Safeway killed whatever smidgen of coolness Carly Simon's Spy Who Loved Me theme had left by playing it to death in an ad campaign.
3:31 PM Oct 14th from web

@JavierHernandez Thanks, man. This might sound crazy, but LALD is actually one of the few 007 score CDs I don't own yet.
3:34 PM Oct 14th from web in reply to JavierHernandez

I've never seen Moonraker, but a movie w/ laser gun battles shouldn't open w/ a ballad so tepid, even though Shirley Bassey brings it again.
3:35 PM Oct 14th from web

@JavierHernandez I didn't know that. I gotta hear that version!
3:39 PM Oct 14th from web in reply to JavierHernandez

I like Bill Conti's For Your Eyes Only gunbarrel music because of the cowbell.
3:40 PM Oct 14th from web

The For Your Eyes Only theme was the first 007 song that had a music video on the then-new MTV. Roger Moore, side-by-side with Billy Squier!
3:41 PM Oct 14th from web

I'll admit to being one of the millions of viewers who wondered if Sheena Easton was naked during the the For Your Eyes Only video.
3:41 PM Oct 14th from web

Yeesh, the Octopussy theme "All-Time High" is so yacht-rocky I keep expecting Michael McDonald to sing backup.
3:45 PM Oct 14th from web

Duran Duran's A View to a Kill theme is my favorite 007 theme with lyrics even though some of the lyrics are nonsensical ("A sacred why"?).
3:49 PM Oct 14th from web

@JavierHernandez Thanks. That was sweet. Thom Yorke would be a great choice as a future Bond opening title theme singer.
3:50 PM Oct 14th from web in reply to JavierHernandez

Like Safeway did with "Nobody Does It Better," Chris Kattan killed whatever smidgen of coolness a-ha's "Take on Me" had left, so...
3:52 PM Oct 14th from web

... the only a-ha songs I like are "The Sun Always Shines on TV" and the Living Daylights theme, John Barry's final 007 theme.
3:52 PM Oct 14th from web

The 007 music went through a bit of an identity crisis during the years between John Barry's departure and the addition of David Arnold.
3:56 PM Oct 14th from web

Gladys Knight's awesome and there's a nice Goldfinger reference, but the License to Kill theme sounds more like The Bodyguard than Bond.
3:57 PM Oct 14th from web

The GoldenEye theme was sung by Tina Turner, written by Bono and the Edge, produced by Nellee Hooper, and catered by Taylor's Fish & Chips.
4:05 PM Oct 14th from web

When Sheryl Crow tries to hit high notes in "Tomorrow Never Dies," I keep thinking of the Citizen Kane opera singer wife singing in pain.
4:09 PM Oct 14th from web

k.d. lang's "Surrender," restored to the Tomorrow Never Dies opening credits by a YouTuber: http://bit.ly/k7yjn
4:10 PM Oct 14th from web

"Surrender," the World Is Not Enough theme and the Casino Royale theme were all produced by David Arnold, which is why they don't suck.
4:13 PM Oct 14th from web

Woops, I spelled it "License" instead of "Licence." Colour me ignorant.
4:16 PM Oct 14th from web

In her "Die Another Day" video, Madonna referenced the Luke/Vader duel from The Empire Strikes Back. Uh, what does that have to with 007?
4:17 PM Oct 14th from web

A lot of 007 fans hate on Madonna's "Die Another Day." It's not a shitty song. It just doesn't sound very 007-like.
4:17 PM Oct 14th from web

Aw, Chris Cornell and David Arnold's Casino Royale theme "You Know My Name." Now that's more like it.
4:22 PM Oct 14th from web

The hiring of Daniel Craig and the grittier writing of Craig's 007 movies has really reinvigorated David Arnold's 007 score music.
4:23 PM Oct 14th from web

@pfunn GoldenEye is actually the only PB 007 flick that I think has held up well. His other three movies are so schizophrenic in tone.
4:24 PM Oct 14th from web in reply to pfunn

A lot of 007 fans also hate on "Another Way to Die," but at least it sounds more like a spy movie theme than say, "All-Time High."
4:26 PM Oct 14th from web

I like Jack White's shout-out to the On Her Majesty's theme during a brief guitar riff in "Another Way to Die." End of AFOS ep live-tweet!
4:29 PM Oct 14th from web

AFOS: "All This Has Happened Before" playlist

Airing this week on the Fistful of Soundtracks channel is the 2008 Fistful of Soundtracks: The Series episode "All This Has Happened Before" (WEB93), which features the most memorable season finale cues from Battlestar Galactica, as well as selections from scores to other remakes that outstripped their predecessors like Galactica has (Casino Royale, Buffy). jim.aquino.com is no longer online, as are all the pre-WEB97 playlists I posted there, so I'm reposting each playlist as each pre-WEB97 ep reairs.

1. Bear McCreary, "Passacaglia," Battlestar Galactica: Season One, La-La Land
2. David Arnold, "Blunt Instrument," Casino Royale, Sony Classical
3. David Holmes, "Boobytrapping," Ocean's Eleven, Warner Sunset/Warner Bros.
4. Christophe Beck, "Suite from 'Hush': Silent Night/First Kiss/Enter the Gentlemen/Schism," Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Once More, With Feeling, Rounder
5. Bear McCreary, "Prelude to War," Battlestar Galactica: Season 2, La-La Land
6. Kronos Quartet, "Heat," Heat, Warner Bros.
7. Bear McCreary, "Something Dark Is Coming," Battlestar Galactica: Season 2, La-La Land
8. Marco Beltrami, "Bible Study," 3:10 to Yuma, Lionsgate
9. Bear McCreary featuring Bt4, "All Along the Watchtower," Battlestar Galactica: Season 3, La-La Land

Repeats of A Fistful of Soundtracks: The Series air Monday night at midnight, Tuesday and Thursday at 4am, 10am, 3pm, 7pm and 11pm, Wednesday night at midnight, and Saturday and Sunday at 7am, 9am, 11am, 1pm, 3pm and 5pm.

"AFOS A-Go-Go" 11/18/08-11/24/08 playlist

1. David Arnold, "Time to Get Out," Quantum of Solace, J
2. David Arnold, "Somebody Wants to Kill You," Quantum of Solace, J
3. Edwin Astley, "High Wire," Secret Agent, Razor & Tie
4. Laurie Johnson Orchestra, "Theme from The Avengers," Top TV Themes, Castle
5. John Barry, "The Ipcress File (Main Title Theme)," Mission Accomplished: Themes For Spies & Cops, Hip-O
6. Jerry Goldsmith, "First Season Main Title," The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Film Score Monthly
7. Irving Szathmary, "Get Smart," NBC: A Soundtrack of Must See TV, TVT
8. Jerry Goldsmith, "Mince and Cook Until Tender" (from In Like Flint), Jerry Goldsmith at 20th Century Fox, Varèse Sarabande
9. Cyril Stapleton, "Theme from Department S," Top TV Themes, Castle
10. Laurie Johnson, "Jason King Theme," The Sound Gallery Volume Two, Scamp
11. George S. Clinton, "Hit & Run/Heroic Austin" (from Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery), Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery & The Spy Who Shagged Me, RCA Victor
12. Michael Giacchino, "On the Train," Alias: Season Two, Varèse Sarabande
13. Isaac Hayes, "Give It to Me" (from Truck Turner), MGM Soul Cinema Volume 1, Beyond/MGM Music
14. Charles Bernstein, "Laying the Trap" (from Gator), Do You Pick Your Feet in Poughkeepsie?, Paul Nice
15. David Arnold, "Pursuit at Port Au Prince," Quantum of Solace, J
16. Ennio Morricone, "Svolta Definitiva" (from Citta Violenta), More Mondo Morricone, Colosseum
17. Chops, "Chinese School," Ping Pong Playa, Lakeshore
18. Vince Guaraldi Trio, "Thanksgiving Theme" (from A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving), Charlie Brown's Holiday Hits, Fantasy

"AFOS A-Go-Go" airs every Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday in November (except the week of Thanksgiving) on the Fistful of Soundtracks channel.

Alicia Keys and Jack White record Quantum of Solace theme

And we have a winner--or rather two. After months of rumors about the search for an artist to perform Quantum of Solace's opening theme tune (Beyonce, Leona Lewis and Duffy are some of the names that have been most recently bandied about), Bond producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli announced today that Alicia Keys and Jack White have recorded the tune.

The Keys/White collabo is called "Another Way to Die," which spared the White Stripes frontman from having to visit RhymeZone.com to find words that rhyme with "quantum" or "solace."


It's funny that White (who was last seen on the big screen in a cameo as Elvis Presley during Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, one of my favorite movies of the year so far) thought he'd never be able to pen music for the Bond flicks. The main guitar riff that he came up with for "Seven Nation Army" was something he planned to use for a 007 theme if he ever got the opportunity to write such a theme.

"Another Way to Die" will be the first duet in Bond theme history. It will also be the first Bond song that was performed by somebody who once was a Cosby Show kid.

The other day, I happened to catch a YouTube clip of Alicia's appearance in one of The Cosby Show's most famous episodes, "Slumber Party" (the clip was removed right after I watched it). During the "bucking horse" game sequence in which the kids took turns riding Cosby's leg like a horse (whoever stayed on the saddle the longest was the winner), Alicia was the little girl with the boyish-looking haircut--the one whom Cosby jokingly called "my wife," in what I assume was an in-joke about her Camille-like hairdo. It's no surprise that Alicia the skilled pianist was the most coordinated one out of all those kids--she didn't fall off Cosby's leg and kicked those other kids' asses at "bucking horse."

Crap, it looks like David Arnold--the composer of the Quantum of Solace score, as well as every single 007 score since Tomorrow Never Dies--isn't involved at all with "Another Way to Die." Whenever the producers allowed Arnold to participate in writing the opening theme, one thing I would always look forward to was Arnold's awesome John Barry-style instrumental version of the opening jawn during his score ("Blunt Instrument," track 4 on Arnold's Casino Royale CD, contains a sweet version of "You Know My Name," which Arnold co-wrote with Chris Cornell). Color me disappointed.

But in the race for the Bond house, a Keys/White ticket is more promising than a Racist Crack Whore Winehouse/Ronson one.

Winehouse quits Quantum of Solace

Amy "Spill the" Winehouse is officially out of the running for the theme to the next 007 movie (did her latest bender arise from her inability to handle the pressure of writing a Bond theme?).

Oh God, I hope Eon doesn't go with some emo D-bag a la the closing credits of the Spider-Man movies.

Here are my dream choices for the singer(s) of the Quantum of Solace theme:

-Editors (their introspective lyrics are perfect for the darker tone of the Daniel Craig movies, plus this band, which has been called "an edgier Coldplay," rocks)
-Interpol
-Portishead

Other dream choices (these artists either have been past David Arnold collaborators or would make for perfect Arnold collaborators--but they won't be hired by Eon because of their CD sales in America):

-The Cardigans (Nina Persson sang the single version of Arnold's Randall & Hopkirk theme)
-David McAlmont
-Chrissie Hynde
-Shirley Bassey

Hynde contributed two great original songs to the Living Daylights soundtrack (and should have sung that film's opening credits theme instead of a-ha frontman Morten Harket) and covered "Live and Let Die" on Arnold's Shaken and Stirred tribute album. I wouldn't mind hearing Hynde or Bassey record another theme for the series. I know Bassey's voice doesn't sound like it did in the '60s, but she's still quite the belter, and it'd be cool to see her croon another Bond theme before she plays her golden harp.

In other blockbuster franchise-related news, I just couldn't resist... Yahoo! News has made it sound like The Dark Knight will depict a romance between Batman and the Joker a la the late Heath Ledger's most popular movie: