Billie Eilish's 'No Time To Die' complements the last two Bond songs, and will likely reinforce some sense of thematic unity between the new movie and the Sam Mendes Bonds. Though I'm no fan of breathy 'mumble vocals' I'd rate the song as a rather engaging if minimalist B-side 'answering note' to Adele's 'Skyfall', lacking 'Skyfall''s complexity and clever negotiation with orchestral vintage Bond music (it would have taken an additional writer to help 'No Time To Die' get to that) but marginally trumping Sam Smith's entry (from which it also derives). I tend to be partial to Bond songs which convey a wounded or heartbroken female perspective, whether blatant - as here - or implicit/'in denial' (I'd count 'Diamonds Are Forever' as coming from that place, and probably also 'Tomorrow Never Dies': both superior songs). It remains to be seen whether the POV in the lyrics of 'No Time To Die' is gender-fluid in its alignment, relating to the swan-song Bond or the villain rather than, or as much, to Madeleine Swann or another female character.
It's certainly a contemporary piece, but more like background music than the main event. Dare I say it, it would exactly fit as a background track to an emotional 'recoupling' sequence in 'Love Island', the reality TV show which manufactures romantic bonding and betrayal between glamorous, vacuous wannabes in their 20s, mixed and matched against cheeky samplings of music like this. Maybe the Eilish song is reaching out to the same demographic as 'Love Island' viewers, but with a nu-emo vibe as well, and a built-in awareness of the broader interest it commands as a Bond/Craig-Bond song.
I'll happily be able to include this one somewhere in my personal, John Barry-dominated, mixed-up playlist of Bond music, as maudlin relief to other, 'bigger' Bond sounds. In that way, it'll work like Katie Melua's strikingly melancholic, acoustic guitar performance of 'Diamonds Are Forever', or even like Natacha Atlas's wistfully enigmatic 'You Only Live Twice' as arranged by David Arnold.
Here is my personal ranking of Craig-era Bond songs (subject to revision after I've listened a few more times to the Billie Eilish song and seen the new film):
1. 'Skyfall' (deservedly Academy Award-winning; a moving fusion of the contemporary with classic Bond sounds)
2. 'Another Way To Die' (the track about which I've had the biggest, favourable change of mind: it's experimental but Bondian; muscular but skittish, as was 'The Man With The Golden Gun' in its day)
3. 'You Know My Name' (well structured grunge rock which rips into the raw energy of a tortured masculinity for the new Bond era)
4. 'No Time To Die' (the downbeat, feet-gazing tone has some appeal, but it's rather 'B side' in scope, which is why I can't rank it higher in this list, as I'd wish to do.)
5. 'Writing's On The Wall' (I still don't like this. Bond and self-pitying falsetto don't go.)
Last edited by Shady Tree (15th Feb 2020 17:24)
Critics and material I don't need. I haven't changed my act in 50 years.