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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6NUEFVzi1 Uh, because of the hysterical fan response to Serra's score. EON wanted to keep them happy, so they had to find a new composer. Thanks partly to Barry's suggestion, they went with with the trendy and safe choice of David Arnold, who'd just released Shaken & Stirred, and had scored STARGATE and INDEPENDENCE DAY. Respecting and understanding are two very different things. We all love Bond movies here, but how any of us could direct one? QED.
..even though he gets hate on his score to TND - because of the overuse of the Bond theme, I can write that off to beginners overcompensation..
Re the synth voices. I love that. "Dating" is good in my book. Nothing wrong with a score from 1995 sounding just like a score from 1995.
Dating in terms of score can be a tricky roll of the dice... sometimes, it works - but often times, it doesn't... imagine if Lucas has made the score for Star Wars disco heavy beats like the studio pressured him to do, instead classical style - would it hold up as well?... my guess would be no - because doing something like that is meeting the demands of a fad.
Also after listening to Serra's work, I do think he had what David Arnold lacked, a stamp of his own musical personality in his work. It is clear that Serra has a better hand in creating broader, sweeping moments that DA. Furthermore, I think I have to retract my Beatles analogy. For as talented and culturally impacting Lennon/McCartney were, none of those records would have had the magic without the graceful touch of George Martin. I doubt very highly that, despite writing the theme, McCartney could have scored LALD on his own. So I do honor and respect composers that have thorough formal musical training under their belt. In a rock n roll/popular music world, it's less important, but in the film score composer world, it seems essential. I do respect what David Arnold has done for his Bond contributions: he's brought a modern flaire, while alluding to the history of Barry. But to me he comes across more of a sampler/producer. He's not cut from the same cloth as Barry or Serra or Conti, so that I don't think at this point he possesses the tools and musical vocabulary to create a score of their calibre.
Speak for yourself! Personally I have found several of those "moments" in Arnolds work:
(from 4:00-5.00)
(from 3:40-4.30)
(from 6:03):
(from 6:06):
But I still wouldn't mind someone else stepping in...
what separates Arnold, is the fact that he has a lot of filler arrangements, that aren't that memorable at all - and the fact that he can be terribly inconsistent.... but when he wants to create sweeping melodies, he has shown that he can do it... I like and prefer the vast majority of Barry's work over Arnold's - but I am not going to sh** on Arnold because of it... Arnold is a fine composer, and never once, while watching a Bond film he composed, did he arrange something so bad, that it took me out of the moment... if he is up to it - I hope he does the next 10 films............. meaning, that I hope he leaves the franchise with dignity, and on his terms.
like.. Sean, George, Roger, Barry, Campbell - they were all unjustly ousted right?
throw Pierce in that same category too... he fulfilled his obligations and contract.. and rumors were circling that he was going to get the axe, he came out and publicly said he was done with the role.. which gave EON the greenlight for a reboot with CR..... something that Cubby had wanted to do since the 80s with Dalton.
It's no secret that Arnold is a great admirer of Barry (most people get their inspiration from somewhere). But arguing that Arnold doesn't know how to put his "stamp" on movies, or that he has a hard time "being unique", when he has won several awards for his work? I'm not buying that argument! Arnolds greatest strength, IMO, is his talent when creating good melodies. Melodies that from his very beginning back in 1993 to me sounded very Bondish. When I heard this back in 1993 for the movie "Young Amercans", I, like John Barry himself, thought that he would be a perfect composer for the Bond-movies:
I understand that much of the criticism regarding/hate towards Arnold is because his work sound too much like John Barry. Hey! - that's exactly why I want him to do the score for Bond 23,24,25 and soforth!
Here's another opinion: George Lazenby was the worst actor ever to star in a Bond-movie.
And, what do awards mean ? Hitchcock has no Oscars, so surely you must think he is a hack ? GE is the biggest box office hit Brosnan had.
But I guess John Barry really did have no idea what he was talking about when recommending Arnold? You are wrong!
(from http://boxofficemojo.com)
Goldeneye, worldwide gross: $352,194,034
Die Another Day, worldwide gross: $431,971,116
Goldeneye sold more tickets than TND, TWINE and DAD. So check the facts first, sir.
http://www.mi6-hq.com/news/index.php?itemid=2113
Read how he bashes modern composers and doesn't put Arnold in the 'good category'.
Admissions (USA):
GE, 24,450,000
TND, 26,700,000
...
So your point is, that TND, DAD, TWINE sold less tickets because of Arnold? Are you serious? And exactly WHERE does he mention Arnold? And exactly WHERE does he "bash" Arnolds Bondmusic? In 2003 he actually praised the DAD-soundtrack - especially the track "Welcome to Cuba."
So if one praises Daniel Craig for his Bond-delivery without mentioning the other Bond-actors, it must mean that all the others - from Connery to Brosnan - suck, right?
That's kind of a lame argument, IMO! Kind of like "you're either with us or with the terrorits."
And you still seem to deny the reality that Arnold is not responsible for a large portion of the work on his soundtracks. He is one of the composers that relies the most on his orchestrator. He has a very limited orchestra range, and instead of learning about new instruments, he also have an over-reliance on sound mixing, another proof of his laziness and/or lack of talent. He has close to no musical complexity. The only soundtrack of his entire career where he started to show basic musical knowledge was QOS... And he was near 50 when he scored that. So either Arnold is very slow learning, or he is very, very lazy.
You're right though about Arnold. His music isn't crap, it's just mediocre, with very occasional moments of brilliance.
Look, I understand that you don't like Arnold. I respect your distaste in him. Truly I do. Some people also prefer vanilla-shake over strawberry-shake.
But you have no case against him. None what so ever! And now you are speculating and using an article in order to support your own conclusions - that Barry turned against him, because "if he's not defending him, he must be attacking him", right?
Barry speaks highly of only three composers in the article - Miklos Rozsa, Franz Waxman and Bernard Herrmann. I guess you will not be happy unless one of the three replaces Arnold? Or what's your point?
Yes... Barry does not mention Arnold in the same positive terms. Nor does he mention Hanz Zimmer, James Horner, John Williams etc.
But that does not mean that John Barry are "bashing" these fine composers now, does it?
You can Arnold what you want ("lazy", "lacking in talent" and so forth). It just doesn't make your argument any stronger. On the contrary!
Serra composes, orchestrates and conducs his own work, meaning he does much more work on his soundtrack than Arnold. I can't understand how much you refuse to see the facts.
You are living in denial and refuse to face reality.
I am not saying you can't like/love Arnold, but saying he is a good/great composer just isn't true. He is a mediocre composer at best, with, as Shark said, very occasional moments of brilliance.
I would welcome any of those over DA, since they are composers and not posers.
To make a real classic great 007 movie with Bond 23 they need a different composer, that will create something new and exciting instead of a musical actionwallpaper.
Mr DA hasn't created anything new for the 007 movies, no real sound of is own but John Barry greatest hits on drum 'n Beat. Which is not composing bute remixing great music.
In order to evolve the movieseries it is time for the music to step up again. And I do not see DA in that position. He has shown little progress over the last movies imho. His soundtracks are very poor standalone efforts. When I listen to the Bondsound it mostly involves the pre GE soundtracks, because they are exciting. Not just pumped up music.