Buy it... if you seek arguably the best score in the history of the James Bond franchise, with a superior mix of jazzy 1960's throwback nostalgia and hard-nosed, techno-thrilling style.

Avoid it... on all albums prior to the outstanding 2022 set if you demand a fair and comprehensive presentation of music from the film.

Tomorrow Never Dies: (David Arnold) If one thing is certain about Pierce Brosnan's tenure as British agent James Bond, it's the superiority of Tomorrow Never Dies. Everything clicked in this, the second of his films as 007. His performance reached back to the confidence of Sean Connery, the love interest came packaged as Michelle Yeoh (who is more Bond's equal than just another conquest), a previous flame's death provokes a malice in Bond loyal to the books' original intent, the villain is charmingly enthusiastic and has a cool new stealth weapon as a toy, and David Arnold's score combined the best of the John Barry years with the younger composer's techno-saavy sensibilities. While Goldeneye had revived the series by becoming the first $100 million grossing Bond film, Tomorrow Never Dies was far better packaged and a drew greater response from hardcore fans of the franchise's classics. With John Barry now out of the picture (despite his seeming renewed interest in scoring another Bond film during the Brosnan years), Arnold was a perfect successor. His love of the franchise and knack for imitating the expansive style of Barry in his early scores, not to mention his British heritage and a friendship he had cultivated with Barry, made him the logical choice. He had also recorded covers of Bond songs for an album that attracted the attention of the franchise's producers. And fans weren't disappointed. The score than Arnold assembled for Tomorrow Never Dies is a sophisticated and intelligent tribute to the classic Barry scores while pushing the envelope with synthetic rhythms and drum pads to aid the traditional orchestra in joining Bond in a rapidly evolving technological age. The trademark action style that Arnold established in Stargate and Independence Day is combined with a distinct return to the flamboyant style of the jazzy Bond scores of the 1960's, and with the presence of the synthetic elements native to Arnold's roots in the rock genre, every variety of Arnold fan had something to like.

Arnold become the franchise's regular musical voice through the Brosnan and early Daniel Craig entries, allowing the stint with Bond to really define his career alongside a few notable scores for non-Bond films mixed in between. He continued pushing the synthetic side of his music for the franchise until a somewhat dissatisfying score for Die Another Day, the composer pulling back to the better balance of tradition and electronics in the superior Casino Royale. He was obviously keenly aware that the Bond franchise's scores had their own unique formula while Barry was in the lead, and that sound would return here at the request of filmmakers who hadn't been entirely satisfied with the direction Eric Serra had taken with Goldeneye. There are times when Arnold's percussion, electronic loops, and manipulation are excessive, but these moments are restricted to just a few action cues that are somewhat overwhelmed by sound effects in the film anyway. The franchise theme by Monty Norman is quoted liberally in Tomorrow Never Dies, with its incorporation ranging from full-blown three-minute tributes to clever counterpoint against the new themes for the film. Arnold's full expressions of the Norman theme are extremely astute in an instrumental sense. Even the opening fifteen seconds of the score offers brass and cymbal accents true to Barry's introductions. The muted trumpets, solo flute, and electric guitar performances in "Company Car" provide the most entertainingly true and modern performance of the Norman concept available during the Brosnan era. This three-minute cue established a standard at the time by which fans and students of the franchise could worship and study. Acoustically, the recording is largely flawless when not dominated by synthetic layering. Aside from the statements of Norman's theme throughout the score, Arnold wrote one of the franchise's best title songs and integrated its theme extremely well throughout the entire score. With all the wailing brass flair of Goldfinger, his main theme is both seductively alluring and strikingly defiant, an easily memorable aspect of the film.

The main theme for Tomorrow Never Dies is incorporated nearly everywhere in the score, itself reduced to counterpoint duties at times for quick references. In the opening action sequence of "White Knight" before the opening credits, Arnold introduces the theme with nobility at 7:10 in between ample development of Norman's theme. This theme punctuates many of the action sequences with traditional action style but informs other purposes, too. It's afforded an Eastern personality in "Kowloon Bay," for instance, before a romantically monumental statement for strings and bold brass counterpoint at the resolution of the film. Arnold masterfully alternates between the primary and secondary sequences of the song's constructs in his references, helping galvanize the theme's entirety as the score's identity. A theme for Teri Hatcher's role as the villain's wife and former Bond lover is provided in only one extended sequence encompassing several cues in Tomorrow Never Dies. As they reunite, Arnold allows the Barry-like idea to flourish with the full ensemble (once again in layered strings under brass counterpoint) before a solo woodwind echoes to accompany her demise. A deliberate, pounding motif for the villain, Elliot Carver, and his stealth ship is sparsely utilized throughout the score, its initial appearance impossible to miss at 3:55 into "The Sinking of the Devonshire." The idea receives some intriguing, less obvious exploration in "Underwater Discovery" and becomes intertwined with the action at the climax. If the themes for Tomorrow Never Dies have a weakness, it's in the largely unfocused musical representation for Carver, as well as other villain elements such as in "Doctor Kaufman." To counter the theme for Carver's wife earlier in the film, Arnold writes one for Michelle Yeoh's agent and the Eastern locations of the story. It receives only brief treatments, but it is quite gorgeous on solo guitar and piano in the early portions of "Bike Shop Fight" and "Kowloon Bay." A full rendition in the latter cue, merging with the title theme, is a highlight of the score. Faint hints of this idea come through in the very last minute of the score, though this progression seems to be a nod to Barry's You Only Live Twice as well.

Another important aspect of the music for Tomorrow Never Dies is its many references to previous scores in the franchise. In the opening battle, Arnold states a fragment of From Russia With Love. The following cue offers brass wails identical to later action sequences in Goldfinger. In both "White Knight," more obviously at 0:45 into "Hamburg Break In," and in a few other cues, he quotes the five-note bass sequence that defined the start of Tina Turner's song for Goldeneye, arguably the most memorable element from the soundtrack of that film. The upbeat militaristic material in "Okinawa/HALO Jump" harkens back to times when nothing could go wrong for Bond when naval or air force elements came into play, sometimes humorously. He did not make the same number of references in his scores for the subsequent Brosnan Bond films, though he does make a clever allusion to the title theme for Tomorrow Never Dies during a conversational cue after Bond's early rescue in Die Another Day. Narratively, this score succeeds brilliantly, applying tone-perfect attitude through most of the work. The conclusive "All in a Day's Work" is a monumental release that pulls back aspects of "White Knight" before its epically romantic final two minutes. In retrospect, Tomorrow Never Dies is a much better score than many gave it credit for being at the time of its release. Some listeners were turned off by the extensive synthetics and percussion used in "Back Seat Driver" and "Hamburg Break Out," among a few others, and these cues are indeed less effective outside the context of the film, where they come in conflict with the better balance of the surrounding material. But the varied, slapping percussion of "Bike Chase" is a perfect combination of both worlds, and its highly effective sound set the stage for the highlights of The World is Not Enough and the opening chase sequence in Casino Royale. For the most part, the balance of mixing in Tomorrow Never Dies is outstanding, and the gorgeous piano solos in several cues are testimony to this clarity. The horn performances late in "Station Break" are particularly splendid. Subsequent Arnold scores tended to get muddy in their rowdy action passages, especially in Die Another Day, the nuances not quite a compelling in their layering.