Sam Smith - "Writing's on the Wall" - To be released on September 25

Yeah, Smith seems to be more of a thing in the UK. Over here it's all about Justin Bieber. God help us all.

Control wrote:

Let dat sky fo. Let it crumbo.

Still better than Smith sounding like he asked to be strapped to Goldfinger's laser table for inspiration, but then someone forgot to turn it off in time.

Indeed, Adele has pipes whereas Smithy sounds like his need oiling.

Stamper wrote:

Why get a MAN if the song sounds like it's sung by a woman?

This need BALLS!

Exactly my thoughts after unavoidably hearing the whole song for the first time at the weekend while stuck in a store which had it on the radio. An unselfish artist would have recognised the suitability of this song for a female artist but, as it stands, we now have a tough Bond in Daniel Craig being given a theme which would only work if Bond were female or gay. That said, it may also have worked well for TWINE... One can easily imagine Brosnan stroking Electra's screen image and doing painfaces in the music video as Smith wails away in self-pity, and one can imagine with equal ease Electra unconvincingly spouting "I could have given you the writing", to which Brosnan would reply in painfaced, exaggerated anguish and full volume "THE WRITING'S ON THE WALL!!!"

Sadly, for the once solid bastion of quality which once was the James Bond title song, the writing's been on the wall for some time now.

I'm actually warming up to it after more listens. I'd probably give it a three now if I could vote again.

Not sure if this is news but it will be included on the soundtrack CD, along with an instrumental version.

Lazenby. wrote:

Exactly my thoughts after unavoidably hearing the whole song for the first time at the weekend while stuck in a store which had it on the radio.  An unselfish artist would have recognised the suitability of this song for a female artist but, as it stands, we now have a tough Bond in Daniel Craig being given a theme which would only work if Bond were female or gay.  That said, it may also have worked well for TWINE... One can easily imagine Brosnan stroking Electra's screen image and doing painfaces in the music video as Smith wails away in self-pity, and one can imagine with equal ease Electra unconvincingly spouting "I could have given you the writing", to which Brosnan would reply in painfaced, exaggerated anguish and full volume "THE WRITING'S ON THE WALL!!!"

Sadly, for the once solid bastion of quality which once was the James Bond title song, the writing's been on the wall for some time now.

We've gone from THUNDERBALLS to no-balls.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Lazenby. wrote:

Exactly my thoughts after unavoidably hearing the whole song for the first time at the weekend while stuck in a store which had it on the radio.  An unselfish artist would have recognised the suitability of this song for a female artist but, as it stands, we now have a tough Bond in Daniel Craig being given a theme which would only work if Bond were female or gay.  That said, it may also have worked well for TWINE... One can easily imagine Brosnan stroking Electra's screen image and doing painfaces in the music video as Smith wails away in self-pity, and one can imagine with equal ease Electra unconvincingly spouting "I could have given you the writing", to which Brosnan would reply in painfaced, exaggerated anguish and full volume "THE WRITING'S ON THE WALL!!!"

Sadly, for the once solid bastion of quality which once was the James Bond title song, the writing's been on the wall for some time now.

We've gone from THUNDERBALLS to no-balls.

...

The 007 YouTube channel labeled this video "The Music of SPECTRE", which made it disappointing that it only focused on the Smith song and nothing about Newman's work.

Total aside but seeing the words "music vlog" above, find myself wishing if only such things has been about when Louis Armstrong worked with John Barry for OHMSS.

Anyway gang.

The instrumental version of Sam Smythe's song:


Not any better than the vocal version, to be honest.

My only complaint is the compression on that link. I always liked the production of the song more than the vocals, so this works for me.

Makeshift Python wrote:

My only complaint is the compression on that link. I always liked the production of the song more than the vocals, so this works for me.

I agree, but I still don't like how the instrumentals never really seem to have any real oomph. That said, they're still better than Smith's vocals.

Still very hyped for the movie, but the song is in my bottom 5 for sure.

I heard bits and pieces of this early this morning during the red carpet premiere. It sounded woeful.

And then, the fuckhead who composed the damn thing had the audacity to say this:

Sam Smith wrote:

“I’ve only actually sung the song once, really. Because I did the demo in the studio, and they used that. It is horrible to sing. Horrible. I almost regret — no, I don’t regret… It’s just so high. I have to grab my balls; it’s awful.”

http://www.ew.com/article/2015/10/26/sam-smith-bond-theme-hard-to-sing

Oh boy.

Just listened to this. What dreck. A crime that they picked this over Del Rey's bang on '24'.

FieldsMan wrote:

I heard bits and pieces of this early this morning during the red carpet premiere. It sounded woeful.

And then, the fuckhead who composed the damn thing had the audacity to say this:

Sam Smith wrote:

“I’ve only actually sung the song once, really. Because I did the demo in the studio, and they used that. It is horrible to sing. Horrible. I almost regret — no, I don’t regret… It’s just so high. I have to grab my balls; it’s awful.”

http://www.ew.com/article/2015/10/26/sam-smith-bond-theme-hard-to-sing

His earlier comments about writing the song in 20 minutes is something I can let slide, but this one here is simply infuriating to hear him say. What a dope.

In contrast to this misfire of a song...Adele's new single "Hello" is getting a lot of play over here in the States. There's a lot of hugely positive buzz about it (and her new album) on social media right now, not only from casual fans but celebrities at well (compare that to Smith, who's Bond tune I have yet to hear anywhere besides a few listens on Spotify). Kind of makes me wonder if EON are kicking themselves at the moment for choosing Smith.

dr. strangelove wrote:

Kind of makes me wonder if EON are kicking themselves at the moment for choosing Smith.  

Maybe not. Even if Eon had persuaded Adele to reprise her role (and with a new Adele album imminent I think we can see why she said no), it wouldn't have meant anything. Most of the Skyfall team came back for Spectre and could not recapture what made that film so special.

It's very clear now that Skyfall was a fluke rather than a brave reinvention.

Erica Ambler wrote:

dr. strangelove wrote:

Kind of makes me wonder if EON are kicking themselves at the moment for choosing Smith.  

Maybe not. Even if Eon had persuaded Adele to reprise her role (and with a new Adele album imminent I think we can see why she said no), it wouldn't have meant anything. Most of the Skyfall team came back for Spectre and could not recapture what made that film so special.

It's very clear now that Skyfall was a fluke rather than a brave reinvention.

I haven't seen SPECTRE yet, but to me it seems that it's going to top Skyfall.

Walecs wrote:

I haven't seen SPECTRE yet, but to me it seems that it's going to top Skyfall.

Well, in that case, I'm wrong and I apologise most sincerely, folks.

Quote :

And as I noted last Friday, this is the first Bond song I can recall in ages that doesn’t include the title of the movie. It sounds like the theme song for a movie called “Writing’s on the Wall.” Didn’t Smith like the word Spectre?

Not defending the song... but it's one song removed from Another Way to Die and two from You Know My Name. Sloppy journalism.

This is Del Rey's rejected theme by the way, as reported by NYPost and others.

Lana's 24 is stronger than Smith's effort, but she needs to move on from the ubiquitous Rick Nowels. I liked her work with Tim Larcombe and Justin Parker better, but she seems to have left English songwriters behind her.

"24" intrigues me, which is more than what Smith's did. Just add that to the list of rejected titles better than the ones EON approved.

Vesper wrote:

Quote :

And as I noted last Friday, this is the first Bond song I can recall in ages that doesn’t include the title of the movie. It sounds like the theme song for a movie called “Writing’s on the Wall.” Didn’t Smith like the word Spectre?

Not defending the song... but it's one song removed from Another Way to Die and two from You Know My Name. Sloppy journalism.

This is Del Rey's rejected theme by the way, as reported by NYPost and others.

This is great! I'm not sure how well it would weave into the score, but from what I hear about Newman's score, that wouldn't matter.

They really missed the mark here. If they wanted a female sounding vocalist, why didn't they actually get a female? Why didn't they get Lana?!