Adele’s “Skyfall” is a conscious recreation of those early Bond ballads. It helps that “You Don’t Know My Name” feels like it’s from the 2000s without being constricted by a time period. “Casino Royale” needed an reinvention that attracted a newer, fiercer Bond for the post-9/11 age, but one that was still conversant with the iconography of the character.
(“The mericless eyes of deceit,” if you will, as Cornell rumbles in the opening.) It’s something that Sam Smith echoed less effectively in his “SPECTRE” song, an attempt to recreate, in song form, the endless tug-of-war between Bond’s personal and professional entanglements. Switching back and forth between octaves, “You Know My Name” is a man effectively in a duet with himself, plumbing the lower, sultry half of the melody (“when you return to the night”) just before hopping up into a full-voiced falsetto (“the game that we have been playing”). The song is also an impressive showcase for Cornell’s four-octave vocal range.
