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Your Favorite 'One and Done' Composer...Poll
HASEROT
has returned like the tedious inevitability of an unloved season---
(i am not sure if this is already a topic - forgive my laziness for not looking deep into the pages to find it if it is)
as we stand currently, John Barry and David Arnold are the only composers to grace a Bond film with their scores more than once.. John Barry has 12 films, and David Arnold has 5 (6 if he indeed comes back for Bond 23).. but what about the "other guys"? - the composers who only contributed to one Bond film... who is your favorite out the bunch that went one and done?..... i'll get the ball rolling with mine...
mine is a tough one, because for me, it's a struggle between George Martin's score to "Live And Let Die" and Bill Conti's score to "For Your Eyes Only"..... Martin's score definitely full of attitude, that reflects the title theme - and it fits right in with the Black-xploitation and gritty urban feeling the film has - as well as some nice tribal and island touches for the scenes in the Caribbean..
but even though i love the score to Live And Let Die, Bill Conti delivers a score that is (dare i say) more memorable... while Conti's might not have the "soul" of Martin's score, it has a richness and savvy - and a nice balance between upbeat synth tracks and traditional orchestrated melodies, with an occasional electric guitar riff thrown in for good measure.. for 1981, it had the best elemental hangovers from the 70s, as well as a blend of things to come from the 80s.. it's a score that i find myself usually throwing on more than the others - and one that is fun to drive to as well :)
as we stand currently, John Barry and David Arnold are the only composers to grace a Bond film with their scores more than once.. John Barry has 12 films, and David Arnold has 5 (6 if he indeed comes back for Bond 23).. but what about the "other guys"? - the composers who only contributed to one Bond film... who is your favorite out the bunch that went one and done?..... i'll get the ball rolling with mine...
mine is a tough one, because for me, it's a struggle between George Martin's score to "Live And Let Die" and Bill Conti's score to "For Your Eyes Only"..... Martin's score definitely full of attitude, that reflects the title theme - and it fits right in with the Black-xploitation and gritty urban feeling the film has - as well as some nice tribal and island touches for the scenes in the Caribbean..
but even though i love the score to Live And Let Die, Bill Conti delivers a score that is (dare i say) more memorable... while Conti's might not have the "soul" of Martin's score, it has a richness and savvy - and a nice balance between upbeat synth tracks and traditional orchestrated melodies, with an occasional electric guitar riff thrown in for good measure.. for 1981, it had the best elemental hangovers from the 70s, as well as a blend of things to come from the 80s.. it's a score that i find myself usually throwing on more than the others - and one that is fun to drive to as well :)
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Comments
Serra. Oh, dear. My opinion changes on him from time to time. The overture is a great piece. But the action music leaves a lot to be desired for, save for "Run, Shoot and Jump" which compliments the action on screen fairly well. The score is atmospheric, undoubtedly. "That's What Keeps You Alone" is one of my favorite pieces simply because it evokes this feeling of loss, hope and so on. However, IMO, this score pales in comparison to Conti's and Martin's which are so memorable.
I believe I'd choose Martin's Live and Let Die. I find myself playing it far more often than the rest of the "one and only" members. The great Bond Theme on the album is just simply... badass. Obviously the title track is phenomenal and Martin integrates it well into the score itself. It's a big and brassy score compared to the disco-y feel of FYEO which is the only reason Martin overtakes Conti. It's a slight turn off to me at times to listen to on its own. Conti's gunbarrel is one of my absolutely favorites though, so he does deserve that mention.
It's an unpopular opinion, but never mind 'one and done', Kamen is my favourite Bond composer.
OK Poll attached
I do love some of Kamen's score, and agree with those above who loved his gunbarrel music - it actually made me sit bolt upright in the theatre because it was so different and dramatic. At that moment I knew I was in for a treat.
I also took a lot of heat for defending Serra when GE came out. I think the problem with him is that his bad tracks are so bad (like the music during the car race when Onatopp first appears) that it erases the goodwill generated from his other tracks. I agree with ONS above that there's a beautiful lonliness to parts of the score that fit in perfectly with BrosnanBond's "core of sadness" characterization.
I will give Kamen's score to LTK an honorable mention as well - the gunbarrel music is the best of all the films especially and I think he did the James Bond theme better than anyone besides Barry!
I'd rank them:
1. George Martin - Funky and quite Barry in it's own way
2. Thomas Newman - One of the best scores in ages, since The Living Daylights in fact.
3. Eric Serra - Very unique and all the better for it
4. Bill Conti - A great effort but sometimes a bit too Rocky-light
5. Monty Norman - A score out of date even for the 60's, more fit for a 30's B movie in my opinion
6. Michael Kamen - In so many places it's not Bond enough, it's more like Die Hard
7. Marvin Hamlisch - Just awful in every way, it doesn't help it's dated so much over the years either
DaltonCraig007 - a bit of background about what I like in Bond scores. The 12 year old me that was first introduced to Bond loved the travelogue aspects of the films, the lovely ladies, and the lush lifestyles depicted. So to me, there was an air of...romance about the films that I liked being carried over into the themes. The first Bond film I saw was GF, and I was amazed at how powerfully the score augmented the film. I loved how the title song was worked into the score, and how it was modified and repeated in several tracks (something that Barry did a lot). This gave the film a real cohesion to me, and the score was almost like an additional character. Also, with most of my music, I prefer music and melodies that are what I call "hummable". In other words, they have distinct and memorable melodies that you can hum afterwards. As a bit of a sideways example, West Side Story has several memorable, different, hummable songs. Phantom of the Opera has two. Or, compare any of the Barry title songs with something like Tomorrow Never Dies.
The idea of the title song being integrated into the score of the Bond film was best encapsulated (by someone on alt.fan.james-bond) as the technique of leitmotif. As I said, that really ties the film together and gives it a lot of character. I loved the title song You Know My Name from CR, and found it very "hummable" with a distinctive and memorable melody (and a kick-ass, propulsive arrangement). I loved how Arnold was able to use elements of it in the chase music in both Madagascar and the Miami airport, and have both tracks similar but different. And then he was able to have a lush, romantic sweep of the melody for the establishing shot of the train to Montenegro. Beautiful. And also the powerful, confident music when Bond arrives in Miami which includes parts of You Know My Name as he approaches the Ocean Club.
The other nice theme was Vesper's theme. Having two strong, main pieces of music that he integrated throughout the score made it much more memorable, unlike the all-over-the-place score of DAD or the how-the-hell-can-I-possibly-use-the-title-song score of QoS.
I personally have no problem at all with Arnold, especially after his last 2 scores for QOS and CR... very true, that his scores lack anything memorable, or a catchy hook the way that Barry's did - but Arnold has turned out a couple beautiful pieces - it's just very spotty...
filling the shoes of Barry is a hard one - and no matter who would've replaced him - we'd be having these same compare/contrast/better/worse arguments... much like we do with the Bond actors themselves....
for me, unless the music is so technoized and garbage level trash (as was Arnold's score to DAD, except for 1 or 2 songs) i can live with it, until he decides to hang it up...
In response to the later side-tracked discussion here, dare I say that I think David Arnold should be replaced for Bond 23. I loved his scores for TND and CR, but I think he's bogged down in film score cliche. Far too much electronica now, rather than letting the instruments do the work. And there are very few memorable melodies in QOS.
I'd like to see most of the rest of the Bond team back in 23, but Arnold replaced by someone a bit more traditional (and a more offbeat choice, like perhaps Alexandre Desplat).
2. Eric Serra - GoldenEye
3. Bill Conti - For Your Eyes Only
4. Michael Kamen - Licence to Kill
5. Monty Norman - Dr. No
6. Marvin Hamlisch - The Spy Who Loved Me
but as i said earlier, Arnold isn't as gifted as Barry was in creating those memorable melodies, ones that really stood out from film to film... Arnold's scores kind of all run together - but he does have his gems.. "Paris & Bond" - "Kowloon Bay" - "Elektra's Theme" - "Going Down Together" (which was just a recycled track from TWINE) - "Vesper" - "City Of Lovers" and "Camile's Story" ... those tracks to me evoke so much emotion, that I am not worried about how memorable they are, or need to be - it's all about how well it plays off what is going on onscreen - but these I find to be his standout tracks..
Maybe CR doesn't have as much electronics as DAD... but my god is the CR soundtrack just filler tracks for 2 hours.
I'm also going to defend Marvin Hamlisch's score. I couldn't care less that it's dated. It's distinctive and fits the era in which it was made.
did I ever say that Arnold was capable of creating memorable melodies, much like Barry did? No..
did I ever say that Arnold was an amazing composer? No..
did I ever say i prefer Arnold's scores over Barry's or some of the previous composers? No..
did I say that Arnold's scores kind of run together - meaning they all sound the same? Yes..
did I say that Arnold does on occasion create a gem or 2? Yes
I preferred the score to CR over DAD because of exactly what I said in my previous posts - DAD was nothing but rehashed themes from his previous works, but with a techno filter... it was putred, horrid, garbage.. CR at least HAD melodies in it - memorable or not, they worked in the context of the film.. on their own, they are average - except for the aforementioned tracks i stated previously..