Don Black Isn’t Counting on a Sixth Bond Theme: “It’s Always Gone to Whoever’s Popular”

Don Black has written the words to five James Bond themes, along with work for musical theatre, Meat Loaf, Quincy Jones and Robbie Williams. Asked in a new Telegraph interview whether a sixth might come his way, he was polite but unsentimental. He would be “thrilled,” he said, before adding that the decision tends to follow visibility rather than pedigree. His prediction for the next film: Harry Styles, Taylor Swift, “or something.”

The recent record supports the reading. Adele took Skyfall in 2012, Sam Smith sang Spectre in 2015, and Billie Eilish and Finneas wrote No Time to Die in 2021. The Bond theme has become a slot for the most prominent pop voice available, and Black, at 88, is not pretending that a six-decade résumé changes the calculation.

He also returned to a subject he has raised before: streaming income. Black called what he receives “a terrible rate, there’s no question about it.” As an example he cited his late colleague Herbert Kretzmer, who wrote the lyrics to I Dreamed A Dream. The song, Black said, reached a billion plays. Kretzmer’s return was around £1,500.

His Bond history comes with its own friction. Working with John Barry on Diamonds Are Forever, he ran into producer Harry Saltzman’s objection to the line “touch it, stroke it and undress it,” which Saltzman considered filthy. Barry defended him: “What do you know about songs?”

The authority over a Bond song has always been negotiated between composer, producer and market. Black’s assessment is simply an admission of where it now sits.