Above: Concept art of James Bond and Mya Starling in "Everything or Nothing".

Did you work with the sound mixers when they tied the music to the game?

A little. Jennifer Lewis was the Audio Director on both games, and so I was in close contact with her for the duration of the project.

I also worked a little bit with Jason "Olo" Ross, who did a great job of making it interactive, and I spent a couple of weeks mixing the cues with Francois Lafleur, who took my little home studio recordings and made them sound huge.

What are the main differences with composing music for a recognised franchise game compared to an un-franchised game? How challenging does it make the process?

In many ways it's easier, because you have such a well-defined palette to work with. After (at that time) 19 movies, you pretty much know what a Bond score sounds like, in the same way you know what a Beatles record sounds like, even though there's been quite a lot of variety within the scores.

On the other hand, you don't have quite the freedom to go nuts and do something completely out of left field, because it still has to sound like Bond, or at least not unlike Bond.

Everything Or Nothing

How did your contribution/the creative process differ between "Nightfire" and "Everything or Nothing"?

The experiences on the two were quite different. I spent close to six months on Nightfire, and pretty much took the approach that I was trying to approach the David Arnold sound from the last few movies.

With EON, not counting the E3 stuff I had around two weeks to do it, and I was trying to blend with Sean Callery's style much more, so the cues weren't as orchestrally heavy. I also ended up doing less music for EON than Nightfire.

How were you approached to return to work on the next game, "Everything or Nothing"?

I was asked to do a couple of the missions for the E3 Expo presentation of the game. Sean Callery was on board at that point, I think, but he was tied up with his work on 24, so I got the call. And then after his work was finished, they added a couple of missions to the game, so I got to come back and add some supplemental stuff.

Did you work directly with Sean Callery? How involved was the process?

No, unfortunately I didn't get a chance to work with him at all. I did have access to some of his tracks, percussion beds and so I got to use them on the New Orleans mission and the opening Peru bit, which was a lot of fun.

I was watching the first season of 24 while mixing Nightfire, and so getting the chance to work, even indirectly, with Sean, was pretty cool.

Were you given any direction on the work, or was it more of a free role?

Basically I was trying to match what he was doing as best I could. There was still room for me to sound like myself, but it was a little more specific than on Nightfire.

How did your E3 Expo work differ from that used in the final game?

The E3 music was for the opening missions of the game, all the Egyptian levels, and although I knew at that point that Sean was going to be doing the game, I just went for broke on it and did whatever I felt like.

Of the music for E3, only the gunbarrel and the Train Chase made it into the final game, with the Train Chase cue being reworked to fit in more with Sean's stuff and getting moved to later in the game. It was a great surprise to see my gunbarrel bit when I finally got to play the game!

Above: Katya Nadanova

Which of the seven EON tracks are you most proud of? Did they turn out exactly as you imagined when you started work on them?

Everything or Nothing Track Listing:
Intro
Train Chase
Train Fight
Helicopter Chase
Big Truck
New Orleans
To The Rally Car

I really liked the Big Truck tune, it had some of the Bond theme in it, but it was kind of slow and funky. The original Train Chase tune from E3 was also a lot of fun in a drive-like-hell sort of way.

Jeff Tymoschuk Official Website (click to listen to the above tracks)