Rank all the James Bond soundtracks!

Which are your favourite Bond soundtracks? Which do you rank least?

1. Tomorrow Never Dies
2. On Her Majesty's Secret Service
3. Quantum of Solace
4. Diamonds Are Forever
5. Goldfinger
6. The World Is Not Enough
7. Thunderball
8. For Your Eyes Only
9. The Living Daylights
10. You Only Live Twice

I can't go further. I love pretty much all the Bond soundtracks and it is very difficult to rank them. My top ten would probably look something like mentioned above.

the scores i've ranked from 2-5 could probably end up in any given order, heck the whole top 10 and maybe a couple after that are pretty majestic IMO. the only complete certainty would be my number one. 8)

1. ohmss (utter perfection in every possible area IMO)

2. hmm.... tld?

3. avtak (film form, not the criminally short soundtrack lp - criminally underrated darkness to the score, great use of the title song as romantic cue and a terrific main action cue)

4. mr (again, film form)

5. tb (perfect, love it both in film and expanded score cd)

6. fyeo (i love this score, especially in it's expanded release, and i think it's very unfairly panned, i think conti did a great job of bringing his own sound to it plus also succeeding in bringing a lot of what barry brought to the table in terms of variety and piles of good melodies - the action cues are memorably "celebratory" toe-tappers IMO and the darker, more "traditional" stuff late on is very good with it's fairly distinctive use of the twangy guitars - a bloody humdinger of a gunbarrel too)

7. daf (a bit underrated, though i'm not too big on the "showtune" aspects)

8. gf (as with daf, not too big on the overly "showtune-ish" aspects, but it's a great score and probably a real key one in the franchise to be fair)

9. yolt (i do admire the lushness etc of the score, though i find it a bit too "straight ahead" in some areas - "bond as astronaut" is awesome though, as are some of the romantic cues later on)

10. op (a bit underrated this one, IMO - i like the "militaristic" vibe it sometimes has, the romantic cues are big and elegant, and this one too could use a slightly longer album release)

11. frwl (pretty much perfect for the film, maybe just not as expansive as some of barry's later work)

12. lald (i dig the funky sh*t of this score, plenty of good melodies too. obviously if not for john barry i'd love to rank this one higher - the song's a belter too)

13. dn (i don't hate this as many others do - sure, the album release is a near non-entity in that most of it isn't even used in the film, but i actually like the "classic 50s b&w thriller" vibe of the creaky old score which occasionally works very well for me given the more grounded 'tec-like nature of james bond and the film itself here)

14. tmwtgg (i do like it, but maybe it just lacks something somewhere - some form of real sharpness or inspiration perhaps. feels a tad perfunctory in places, if i dare venture to say that about barry, though maybe that's more just testament to how brilliant so much of his work is in other bond films more than a slant against this one)

15. tswlm (not great or anything, though it at least has a certain amount of distinction and melody - possibly the score to suffer most from the passing of time in some places as well. the pyramids stuff is off it's head, whether that's a good thing or not i'm yet to decide. and i'd have liked "anya" from the soundtrack album to have been used in the film)

16. ltk (i like kamen's job on the bond theme and there's a few good strong moments here and there - a perfectly good score in it's own right i guess. overall though, i missed barry a bit here and found kamen's appointment a bit too much of a "can't beat 'em, join 'em" reaction to the die hard/lethal weapon craze)

17. ge (while it has it's clunkers, i really like it's highlights - the kettle drum bond theme at the start, a distinctive gunbarrel, big bold and melodic romantic cues and the overall cold, industrial and steely vibe of the score which IMO works wonders in establishing some atmosphere for the film)

18. tnd (perhaps the best arnold score, some good use of the "build the melodies around the song" approach often employed by barry. i don't mind techno as much as many others seem to, but i miss the score providing real individual distinction here the way i felt it did with ge)

19. dad (a bit underrated this one IMO, even though i'm still not over the moon with it. as i said, i don't mind techno - if it's done ok then it's a potentially decent way of making the score more contemporary, heck barry himself was getting there with some cues on tld. i'm probably in a minority of one in liking the title song on this one, and the havana stuff plus the prisoner exchange are well scored IMO. i like the pulsing techno pts cue as well. i think there's just an energy to this score which gets it by, even if it's formulaic in places. as much as i may dislike arnold right now, my REAL problems with him actually only really started big time AFTER this film as there's still some decent bits of melody here and on the whole it's listenable to an extent as a soundtrack album - i'm not leaping for the skip button too much. it's consistently passable, though nothing too special. good to have the classic gunbarrel variation back on this one too)

20. twine (i do like the boat chase techno bond theme, but i struggle to really embrace much elsewhere - i find the song to be awfully by-the-numbers and "ice bandits" inexplicably segues off dangerously close to sounding like the theme from "who wants to be a millionaire" in places, which is a real low. and i love scott walker, but he's done a heck of a lot of better songs than the one on this soundtrack IMO - every effort should have been made to come up with a great title song for him instead of garbage IMO. what a waste, we could have had one of the best title songs in years)

21. qos (i find it hard to choose between cr and qos. strangely enough, both scores don't exactly harm their respective films much, but they don't really bring any big level of improvement to the films either IMO. the odd snatch here and there aside, it's dull cinematic wallpaper to me. qos inches it over cr as there's a couple of bits here and there on qos which progress just a tad from it's predecessor, but it's still a "listen to about three tracks, skip the rest" experience for me as a soundtrack album. too much filler and nowhere near enough melody or originality to keep me listening on this one)

22. cr (again, it's mostly just dull cinematic wallpaper to me and sounds very similar to a lot of other "this'll do" scoring out there right now. as with qos, two or three decent tracks, but the skip button gets hammered a fair bit again here. "city of lovers" is decent and actually outdoes the scenes it accompanies, though it's so much an attempt to replicate john barry that i end up missing barry rather than appreciating arnold here. his little piano motif for bond and vesper is probably my favourite little thing in this score, to try and end the write-up on a good note)

My current list would look like:

1. YOLT
2. OHMSS
3. MR
4. DAF
5. AVTAK

TLD would follow...

My top 3 soundtracks are YOLT, TLD and OHMSS.

Top 5

YOLT
OHMSS
AVTAK
MR
DAF

TLD and LALD just miss out

Top five:

OHMSS
TB
TLD
YOLT
DAF

I'll just rank Barry's music.

OHMSS
YOLT
TB
TLD
GF
FRWL
MR
DAF
OP
AVTAK
TMWTGG

Honorable mention goes to Eric Serra's work on GE.

Mr. Brown wrote:

My current list would look like:

1. YOLT
2. OHMSS
3. MR
4. DAF
5. AVTAK

TLD would follow...

My current list wouldn't be too different from this.

I really haven't given this much thought. I only own a couple of scores on CD (DAD, TND, DAF, GE, TLD) and I purchased the CR complete score off iTunes. If I had to rank those:

DAF
TLD
GE
TND
CR
DAD

1. YOLT
2. OHMSS
3. MR
4. GF
5. AVTAK
6. TLD
7. FRWL
8. TB
9. DAF
10. DN
11. LALD
12. OP
13. TMWTGG
14. GE
15. TND
16. QOS
17. TSWLM
18. CR
19. FYEO
20. LTK
21. TWINE
22. DAD

1. OHMSS
2. TLD
3. YOLT
4. DAF
5. MR
6. FRWL
7. TB
8. GF
9. OP
10. AVTAK
11. TMWTGG

The rest we can pretty-much forget about. Not that I am in any way a Barry purist you understand...

Worst offender for me is DAD. Bloated noise - it's both over scored and overblown. I want to scratch my ear-drums out just thinking about it..

Casino Royale....I love chris cornell and audioslave and soundgarden :D
View to a kill
Quantum of Solace
Living Daylights
License to kill
Live and Let die
Diamonds are forever
Tomorrow never dies
Gold finger
For your eyes only

I will go with my top 5:

1) OHMSS
2) DAF
3) TB
4) YOLT
5) TLD

I'll rank the Barrys.

1. OHMSS
2. DAF
3. TLD
4. TB
5. GF
6. MR
7. AVTAK
8. Gun
9. FRWL
10. OP
11. YOLT

My ranking:

Great
1. DAF - Barry
2. TLD - Barry
3. FYEO - Conti
4. YOLT - Barry
5. FRWL - Barry
6. MR - Barry
7. QOS - Arnold
8. CR'67 - Burt Bacharach (movie is shit, but the soundtrack is great!)
9. GF - Barry

Good
10. LALD - Martin
11. OHMSS - Barry
12. AVTAK - Barry
13. TSWLM - Hamlisch

OK
14. OP - Barry
15. TMWTGG - Barry
16. TND - Arnold
17. TB - Barry
18. TWINE - Arnold
19. DAD - Arnold

Noble Failures
20. GE - Serra (has some good ideas and good moments, but doesn't work as a whole)
21. NSNA - Legrand (again, some neat tracks, but doesn't work overall)

Crap
22. CR - Arnold
23. DN - Norman (the Norman/Barry James Bond theme obviously isn't a problem though)
24. LTK - Kamen (utter musical incompetence)

1. GE- this soundtrack generally gets a lot of hate/dislike, but I personally think it's a Bond legend (it also helps that GE is my #1 favorite!)
2. LALD- in the absence of Barry, George Martin does a bang-up job. This soundtrack is toe-tapping perfection!
3. TLD- Barry bows out with his finest soundtrack for a Bond movie. Tracks like "Necros Attacks" and the African rooftop chase track are excellent.
4. AVTAK- Much like TLD, it seems that Barry got even better during his later soundtracks. "Snow Job/He's Dangerous" speak volumes for the entire soundtrack as a whole.
5. DAF- A treat for the ears! Barry outdoes himself with this one. Such tracks like "007 and Counting" prove that DAF has one of the best soundtracks in the series.
6. FYEO- Bill Conti was a fantastic choice for the FYEO soundtrack; it's a shame he didn't get to make more contributions to the Bond music, because FYEO's soundtrack is pure class. "Runaway" has to be the greatest track ever to play during a ski chase.
7. FRWL- for Barry's first soundtrack, he opens up his tenure with a big explosion of amazement! I'm a big fasn of "James Bond with Bongos" and "007 Retrieves the Lektor"
8. TND- David Arnold had a great opener here. "White Knight" and the tracks played during the stealth boat battle and the parking lot car chase are some of his finest Bond music work!
9. TWINE- Some might disagree here, but Arnold came back for his second time and didn't let up! "Caviar Factory" is incredibly epic!
10. TSWLM- Marvin Hamlisch's soundtrack for 007 is really funky and '70s style epic. I love "Bond '77" and the tracks played during the Lotus car chase and the Liparus battle.
11. MR- for all of Moonraker's cheesiness and cringe-worthiness, Barry helps us out with an awesome soundtrack. "Flight into Space" and the tracks played during Bond's walk through the jungle and the centrifuge aftermath present some of his finest work.
12. TB- once again, Barry shows the true color of the movie he's playing for; all of the tracks go neatly hand-in-hand with the underwater action and the classy Bahamas feel.
13. CR- another spectacular entry from Arnold, with some amazing tracks like "African Rundown."
14. DAD- contrary to popular belief, I do enjoy Arnold's work on DAD. The Cuban version of the James Bond theme and the version played when he drives into Iceland are very classy and stylish.
15. GF- even though the movie is my least favorite, I do enjoy some elements of the soundtrack, like "James Bond is Back", "Into Miami", and the rendition of the Goldfinger theme played during Felix and Johnny's search for 007.
16. LTK- despite its lack of that classic Bond feel, this soundtrack by Michael Kamen in decent.
17. YOLT- "007 Averts World War Three" carries this soundtrack for me, along with some other track which I can't remember the name of, but it was good too.
18. TMWTGG- I enjoy "Let's Go Get 'Em" quite a bit, and the track played during Bond's flight to Scaramanga's island is really good too.
19. OHMSS- The theme music is great, but the rest of the soundtrack is pretty worthless if you ask me.
20. OP- nothing sticks out in my mind, so it goes down low.
21. QoS- Much like the above, I simply don't remember much about this soundtrack, which is evidence enough to put it down low on the rankings.
22. DN- horrid, simply horrid!

Interesting choices there. Nice to see some GE love, but:

Quote :

9. TWINE- Some might disagree here, but Arnold came back for his second time and didn't let up! "Caviar Factory" is incredibly epic!
13. CR- another spectacular entry from Arnold, with some amazing tracks like "African Rundown."
19. OHMSS- The theme music is great, but the rest of the soundtrack is pretty worthless if you ask me.

:evil:

#19 hurts... :|

Mr. Brown wrote:

#19 hurts... :|

Haha, sorry about that. I just can't stand the instrumental renditions of "We Have All the Time in the World" (or the song for that matter), and the Bond theme used for OHMSS is kind of out of line with the others and doesn't get the job done for me.

00Beast wrote:

the Bond theme used for OHMSS is kind of out of line with the others and doesn't get the job done for me.

It's very different (out of line) but it's IMO easily the most badass incarnation of the theme, with the sliding 6 string bass and Moog synthesiser. Pure analogue testosterone.

00Beast wrote:

Mr. Brown wrote:

#19 hurts... :|

Haha, sorry about that. I just can't stand the instrumental renditions of "We Have All the Time in the World" (or the song for that matter), and the Bond theme used for OHMSS is kind of out of line with the others and doesn't get the job done for me.

What's your reasoning for #17?

I love the score for YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE. It's rich, exotic, and exciting. Stand out tracks, for me, are: #3 Fight at Kobe Dock/Helga, #6 Death of Aki, #7 Mountains and Sunsets, #11 Bond Averts WWIII, #13 James Bond in Japan, #14 Aki, Tiger, and Osato, #19 Twice is the Only Way to Live

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tz8Y0n1jAg&t=4m13s

Mr. Brown wrote:

00Beast wrote:

Mr. Brown wrote:

#19 hurts... :|

Haha, sorry about that. I just can't stand the instrumental renditions of "We Have All the Time in the World" (or the song for that matter), and the Bond theme used for OHMSS is kind of out of line with the others and doesn't get the job done for me.

What's your reasoning for #17?

I love the score for YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE. It's rich, exotic, and exciting. Stand out tracks, for me, are: #3 Fight at Kobe Dock/Helga, #6 Death of Aki, #7 Mountains and Sunsets, #11 Bond Averts WWIII, #13 James Bond in Japan, #14 Aki, Tiger, and Osato, #19 Twice is the Only Way to Live

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tz8Y0n1jAg&t=4m13s

It's just not as good as the others above it, quite frankly. #11 is great I agree, and there's one similiar to it played I think during the capture of another space shuttle in the middle of the film, but overall, it just sounds blah and dull to me. Also, I prefer the harder-edged Bond soundtracks, not the soft instrumental "symphony" sounding stuff, if you know what I mean.

00Beast wrote:

Also, I prefer the harder-edged Bond soundtracks, not the soft instrumental "symphony" sounding stuff, if you know what I mean.

No, I don't know what you mean.

Love the support for TND and TWINE's scores, but OHMSS, YOLT and GF are way too low!

Over the past couple of days, I've returned to the scores of the 90s and 00s.

Now, I'd rank them as:

GOLDENEYE: Lots of great tracks on this album. "Ladies First" is goofy, but forgivable. Severely underrated.

THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH: If you get past the electronic shit, there's some good music here. Actually, even some of his electronic-based tracks work well, like "Body Double".

QUANTUM OF SOLACE: After the boring and cliched CASINO ROYALE album, Arnold moves toward something a bit more interesting. Plenty of garbage here, but a few stand-out tracks, too. I like his "Inside Man" theme that's used through out the score.

TOMORROW NEVER DIES: Some interesting elements, but really plays out like a poor man's John Barry score. Or maybe the term "wannabe John Barry" would work better. "Kowloon Bay", "Bike Shop", and "Helicopter Ride" were my favorite tracks.

DIE ANOTHER DAY: Messy, overall. Some tracks are tedious and others hurt my ears, literally. Definitely has some stylish moments, though--none found on the official soundtrack release, however.

CASINO ROYALE: Bland, uninspired, and the complete opposite of what EON and Arnold told us we'd get. "Going back to basics" my ass. :roll: "The Tell" is the only track I truly enjoy.