Goldfinger

Goldfinger was Barry's second foray into the world of 007 after his work on From Russia With Love and with it, he cemented his reputation as the Bond composer of choice. The film itself is often reckoned to be the best of the series and certainly contains the right balance of humour, action and seduction which compares favourably to the increased comedy and gadgets for Roger Moore and the highly charged and explosive outings of Pierce Brosnan. The main title song is the benchmark against which all Bond songs are measured and it set the brassy and brash tone that has never quite been recaptured since. Even Barry's later efforts didn't quite hit the nail so squarely on the head as here. The combination of Barry's music, Bricusse and Newley's seductive lyrics and Shirley Bassey's piercing voice make for a heady concoction, the intensity of which has been hard to repeat.
Of course there is more to the album than just the song, although the song melody makes itself heard often, along with several deftly woven in appearances of the Bond theme. Into Miami brings the album alight with a swinging 60's jazz tune of the kind that Barry used to write in his sleep, but the pleasingly enthusiastic performance of the orchestra bring it to life perfectly. This being a spy film, there are a few sections of suspense such as Auric's Factory which utilizes brass hits and percussion to mimic all the creeping about. The most enjoyable sections are almost always going to be the action cues where the Goldfinger theme is mixed with the Bond theme. This is no more evident than in cues such as Oddjob's Pressing Engagement and Bond Back in Action Again. The most sustained action outing of the album is the undeniably exciting Dawn Raid on Fort Knox which takes a fairly minimalist approach as Barry takes a repeating phrase and builds it up mainly with brass and percussion that is economical thematically, but hugely exciting.

This new release only includes the bonus tracks included on a rare double CD release several years before, most notably the luxuriant Pussy Galore's Flying Circus which looks forward to Barry's epic, sweeping style for which he later became famous. The sound quality is generally good given the age and there only is the occasional moment of distortion during the louder passages, most notably during the song. My only minor criticism against the music would be that the suspense sections (most notably Auric's Factory) aren't always terribly exciting. Trying to create understated tension musically is difficult, but these sections seem to be drowned out by the excitement and superbly vibrant remainder. However, these sections are very short indeed and against the sheer quality of the rest find little to mention other than the fact that Barry's efforts are rightly the very high benchmark by which all Bond scores are measured and no-one has quite pitched them as well as he. Although I would suggest that Barry's Living Daylights score is my favourite of all the Bond scores, Goldfinger epitomizes everything that a Bond score should be and such is highly recommended.

With thanks to Neil at John Barry - A Life in Music, the correct track order is:

5, 1, 2, 3, 12, 13, 14, 15, 6, 7, 4, 9, 10, 11, 8.