SickthingsUK

John Barry, who scored eleven Bond's, was unavailable for Live and Let Die which preceded TMWTGG. He had a big say in who sang his Bond songs and is unlikely to have ok'd Alice (unfortunately). It was being pressured to work with Duran Duran and particularly A-Ha in the 80's which led him to walk away from the franchise. Even if he had ok'd Alice, it would have been to sing John's composition. Orchestral variations of the theme song regularly popped up throughout the score (or did in John's day) and John would not have been happy weaving in someone else's music. He was in such demand at the time that he rushed TMWTGG score and subsequently admitted that he hated the song he wrote for Lulu!

Always carried the thought that connecting Alice Cooper's image at that time to the slick more mainstream profile of the Bond franchise was a step too far. Maybe after WTMN, but not when Alice was still killing babies, loving the dead and singing about his muscle of love.

when Alice did the Muppets, some here thought he was kind of selling out, losing his hard image( and that was after WTMN when he was already straying away from his "old" image..
imo the bond song may have come too early to mean something for this -at that time- still hard rocking band with a reputation....

patrick wrote: ↑

Sun Jun 09, 2019 9:48 am

when Alice did the Muppets, some here thought he was kind of selling out, losing his hard image( and that was after WTMN when he was already straying away from his "old" image..
imo the bond song may have come too early to mean something for this -at that time- still hard rocking band with a reputation....

That's a great point. The Bond people went with a more "friendly" choice. McCartney after all was a Beatle and had positive mass appeal. Alice the band still were not a family friendly safe commodity.

That gives further credence as to why Alice and Shep wanted to mainstream the character. The band had reached their pinnacle and were now saddled with that image which by that time was preventing them from breaking through to the mass market.

Even though Billon Dollar Babies was a huge success the band still maintained that subversive image. Im sure this did not help with getting the Bond movie.

The information posted earlier in this thread regarding john Barry likely was THE reason. Thank you for posting that info...it was enlightening and informative.

tommycooper wrote: ↑

Sun Jun 09, 2019 8:20 am

John Barry...had a big say in who sang his Bond songs and is unlikely to have ok'd Alice (unfortunately). It was being pressured to work with Duran Duran and particularly A-Ha in the 80's which led him to walk away from the franchise.

I think it's plausible that John Barry wouldn't have been comfortable with choosing the ACG to compose and peform the theme song for TMWTGG. Interestingly, A-Ha's Bond song for The Living Daylights is my favourite theme song in the history of the franchise, but if the ACG's Man With the Golden Gun had been chosen as the theme song for that movie, it would definitely be my favourite instead.

Ted

The Bassey songs were awesome as was YOLT by Nancy Sinatra. With a new Bond on board and after Live and Let Die which is a classic song with amazing production they could have easily gone with Alice Cooper.