Richard Overall

A Gibb brothers song isn’t it?

I gave Crow and extra e. Apologies

And to top it off the singing in the chorus isn’t effortless. It’s pretty effortful.
Great opening though, plenty of drama, and lots to enjoy throughout.

The orchestration goes a little counterculture psychedelic in places, which is not a part of Bond’s world. But the biggest whoopsie is that when it does hone in on specific 60s detective fiction, it chooses the wrong person - the chorus seems to reference the Perry Mason theme!

I enjoy this song. But it suffers from a double folly - it tries to sound Bondy, and then pastiches the wrong sound. Its lyrics are a tabloid-eye view of Bond films (‘martinis girls and guns’). Its orchestration seems to reference the sixties ‘in general’.

#24 ‘Tomorrow Never Dies’, performed by Sheryl Crowe, written by Crowe and Mitchell Froome. 1997

I’m ignoring whether it is ‘Bondy’. I think trying to make a Bond theme sound ‘Bondy’ is a fool’s errand because nobody can really distill what it is (brass? twangs? coolness? bombast?) and you end up with muddled pastiche songs without their own identity. Which leads us to:

I’m basing it on lyrics, melody, the production, the vocal, the tone in relation to the film, the point of view of the singer, ‘drama’ and the all important opening

All a matter of opinion of course, take it with a pinch of salt, but I will just say I’ve been thinking about this since February 1991.

There are 24 days of advent. There are 24 James Bond themes. There is a many who enjoys ranking. Here we go.