Rob Price
Gutbrain Records
rob + gutbrain.com = email

2026 May 18 • Monday

James Bond became a global phenomenon with the success of the movies, though I don't think this happened immediately. The first movie was set in Jamaica, though, and appears to have had a pretty big impact there right away. Certainly this could be inferred by local musical reactions. Case in point: Studio One 007 Licensed To Ska: James Bond & Other Film Soundtracks & TV Themes, the 909th Soundtrack of the Week.

This compilation is a mixed bag, as you'd probably expect.

The famous "James Bond Theme" is given a pleasant but unexciting runthrough by Jackie Mittoo & The Soul Brothers. Roland Alphonso & The Studio One Orchestra's take on the From Russia with Love theme is simiarly sleepy but benefits from interest generated by the harmonic structure of the song.

"Thunderball" is another under medium tempo skank, by The Soul Brothers, and the blend of the horns as well as their staccato phrasing is a good idea but the general feeling of listlessness is here, too, which is odd, considering that this is all action music.

The Soul Brothers take the same approach with "Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" but the energy and the tempo are raised just a little bit and the song is a little more interesting, so this is one of the more successful interpretations here.

The same group does the "007" cue that's in many of the movies. This is one of my favorite pieces but this presentation of it didn't do much for me. It's similar to the other Soul Brothers tracks. This is just how they do things. Their original called "James Bond Girl" plays around with some of the familiar aspects of these cues.

Lee Perry & The Wailers have a song called "Pussy Galore" but this has very little, if anything, to do with the character of the same name from Goldfinger despite "Goldfinger" being sung a few times.

A song called "James Bond Danger Man" by The Soul Brothers is actually "Thunderball" again but features organ and guitar to good effect.

The other numbers on this compilation basically have the same feel but depart from the James Bond world for other pop culture properties: "Dick Tracy" (only the title seems to connect to Dick Tracy, "Guns of Navarone", "Hang 'em High", "Mr. Flint" (more a cover of "On Broadway" than anything from the Flint movies), "Ball of Fire" (not sure hos this is supposed to fit in with the theme here), "Lawman", "Black Orpheus" (this is familiar but it's not the theme from Black Orpheus, "Exodus", "Dr. Kildare" and "Fiddler on the Roof" (sure, why not).