> Moonraker on its original album program barely felt like a Bond
> score at times, something La-La Land’s new expansion helps rectify. The
> album nearly doubles the score runtime (including several pieces which
> were either mangled in or completely excised from the film), and those
> additions include the Bond bravado for the early freefall sequence as well
> as the more playful version for the mid-movie boat chase through Venice. A
> brief bit of music for the Hang Glider Crash foreshadows the
> grandeur of Out of Africa. The inserts of prior works including the
> theme from The Magnificent Seven (likely all new arrangements from
> Barry’s pen, though the credits aren’t clear on this) are amusing if not
> exactly essential. I’ll admit some disappointment that the incremental
> tracks from the climactic space sequence are largely reprises of
> previously released material, though the slow intoning of Barry’s space
> motif in Launch Program Command is a marvelous lead-in to the
> score’s famed Flight Into Space track.

> I also completely forgot that Frank Sinatra was originally slated to sing
> for this.

> ****, up from ***½ for the original album program.

I concur that the expanded Moonraker is now easily a **** album. More action music and more of the sweeping space music from the third act both really help elevate the soundtrack. I'm a fan of this one!