Gutbrain Records

Friday, 26 September 2008

Some people are saying that "Another Way To Die", the Jack White/Alicia Keys song for the upcoming James Bond movie Quantum of Solace, is the worst Bond theme ever. I'm a little out of touch with the themes for the last half a dozen or so movies. According to some who are more up to date, Madonna's "Die Another Day" is "Another Way To Die"'s only serious competition.

I've just listened to both of them. They're both really bad but it seems to me that "Die Another Day" is much, much worse than "Another Way To Die". I listened to "Another Way To Die" first and thought it was pretty awful, but then I checked out "Die Another Day" and got a whole new perspective on the thing. (Is "Another Way To Die" the first big pop single to feature the Zvex Fuzz Factory? I'm pretty sure I hear it in there.)

The only interesting thing about Quantum of Solace is the title. It's the title of an Ian Fleming short story, a very close relative to Somerset Maugham's "Ashenden" secret agent stories. "Quantum of Solace" has always been a favorite of mine.

What's interesting about the title is that I can remember when The Licence Revoked was changed to Licence To Kill because the film's producers worried that Americans wouldn't understand "revoked" in this context. Americans presumably either wouldn't know what it meant or would assume that it referred to James Bond's driver's license.

This is one thing that's different now. If they can call a Bond movie Quantum of Solace, they can obviously call a Bond movie anything. Nobody cares. As long as it's clearly a Bond movie, you can go ahead and call it something like "James Bond returns in: The Metonymic Accidie".