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Arild Brøter — A Spectre of Sounds: James Bond Music Reimagined
(Apollon Records AP196, 2024, CD / 2LP / DL)

by Henry Schneider, Published 2024-12-11

A Spectre of Sounds: James Bond Music Reimagined Cover art

Arild Brøter, Norwegian drummer, founder, and composer for Pymlico, is a long time fan of both James Bond movies and their scores from the past 60 years. As opposed to the vast majority of James Bond albums released over the years that basically only included the iconic title songs, Arild took a different approach. Skipping over the title tracks, he meticulously dug into the scores themselves, wove themes together from all the films to produce twenty tracks that blend progressive rock music with Bond’s world, while paying homage to composers Monty Norman, John Barry, George Martin, David Arnold, Thomas Newman, Eric Serra, Paul Waaktaar-Savoy, and Hans Zimmer. The result is symphonic prog that does not sound cinematic, even when the iconic Bond theme pokes its head up from time to time. The album’s production quality and attention to detail underscore Arild’s commitment to delivering a fresh perspective on the beloved classics. Though this is primarily a solo album, Arild enlisted a number of musicians to produce the full-bodied sound across the album including some of his Pymlico bandmates and other musicians from the Norwegian prog scene: Øyvind Brøter, Bjørn Riis, Mattias Krohn Nielsen, Filip Brekke Steigedal, and Petter Lien, to name a few. For the first time in history, A Spectre of Sounds:  James Bond Music Reimagined is an album composed entirely of new arrangements of classic James Bond film themes. This is a fun album, especially for Bond fans. You won’t be disappointed.

Filed under: New releases, 2024 releases

Related artist(s): Bjørn Riis, Pymlico, Arild Brøter

 

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