Bond...James Bond...Music

Ongoing History of New Music

When a movie is successful, someone somewhere wants more…that’s when we get a sequel…if that follow-up does well, then the sequel gets a sequel…and if that film has traction, well, then you reach the level of franchise…

We’ve seen many movie franchises over the decades, Star Wars and Star Trek being among the most famous…but then we have all the Fast and the Furious films, Harry Potter, Rocky, Mission Impossible, Planet of the Apes, Toy Story, Lord of the Rings, and so on…

And I haven’t even mentioned the marvel cinematic universe, which has something like three dozen movies and the dc extended universe, which has almost 30…

Studios and producers love movie franchises because they’re reliable sources of revenue forever…fans will flock to any new release while they’re still bingeing on all the older movies…and don’t even get me started on things like merchandising…

What’s the oldest movie franchise?...that would probably be King Kong…the first Kong movie came out in 1933…the first Alice in Wonderland movie came out the same year…

The Wizard of Oz fits our definition…there have been four films since 1939…that counts…Godzilla…first one was 1954…and then we finally get to James Bond…

There have been 27 Bond films, starting with Dr. No in 1962…box office grosses are now around $14 billion U.S. dollars…that is just the movies…

Then we have the music…there are few crossover points between music and film that are more prestigious than being tapped to do the theme for a James Bond movie…

Every time a new chapter in the franchise is announced, tenders go out for someone to do the theme…and the competition is furious…

Sounds like there’s some interesting music history here—and there is…

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