Given that Chris Cornell was the man in front of Soundgarden and has been working with Audioslave for the last few years, we somehow expected something a little… well… tougher from his Casino Royale theme tune.
But it’s music for a Bond film and while the producers have been gabbing away about how they want to make this “rebirth” of the franchise a raw, tough experience, they’ve still got a billion-pound franchise to protect and can only go so far.
So while this is pleasingly free of electronic noodling and vampy vocals, it still feels about as cutting edge as Paul McCartney’s Live And Let Die – and features none of that tune’s catchiness. Aside from Cornell’s deep-throated howl, this could have been performed by any passable rock band.