Lana Del Rey once wrote a James Bond theme – but they turned it down

Lana Del Rey has revealed that she wrote a song for the James Bond film Spectre, but it was rejected by the franchise’s producers.

• READ MORE: Lana Del Rey talks new album ‘Lasso’, the world going country, and her plans for Reading & Leeds

The singer was speaking backstage at the Ivor Novello Awards in London this week (May 23), where she picked up the Special International Award.

As the BBC reports, she was asked about the prospect of recording a Bond theme, to which she said she had already given it a shot, before beginning to sing her song ‘24’, from her fourth album ‘Honeymoon’, released the same year as the film.

“I wrote that for them,” Lana said. Listen to the song below:

The eventual theme for that film, ‘Writing’s on the Wall’, was recorded by Sam Smith and became the first Bond theme to reach Number One on the UK Singles Chart.

“Sam, you did a wonderful job,” Del Rey quipped, before saying she had not given up hope at making a song for the film series.

“But I’m going to continue to do my little Nancy Sinatra thing every now and then and just pretend it’s the title track,” she added.

It was not the only time that Bond producers turned away a stellar music name for the choice of Spectre’s signature song. In 2015, Radiohead revealed that they had been asked to write the theme. The band subsequently gave the song away for free, which you can listen to below:

“Last year we were asked to write a theme tune for the Bond movie Spectre,” the band wrote at the time. “Yes we were. It didn’t work out, but became something of our own, which we love very much.”

In other Lana news, she also spoke to NME at the Ivor Novellos this week (May 23).

After having just announced her first ever stadium show – and after a packed 12 months that saw her headline Coachella and London’s Hyde Park off the back of her critically-acclaimed ninth album ‘Did you know that there’s a tunnel under Ocean Blvd’ – NME asked her if she now felt vindicated against her detractors.

“No, maybe three years ago there would have been a sense of vindication, but now it just feels playful. I don’t know why,” she replied. “If you hang in long enough, it just feels easy. There’s no vindication, no nothing – I’m just kind of happy to be here.  It’s easy-going in that way.”

She also spoke about her upcoming country-inspired album ‘Lasso’, which she announced in January and is currently schedule for a September release.

Speaking about embracing the country sound, she said: “Oh geez, what can I say now? When I gave Jack Antonoff his award for Best Producer Of The Year [at the 2024 Grammys], I said, ‘Welcome Nashville to Hollywood and Hollywood, welcome to Nashville because the music business has gone, gone country. And it went silent; 5000 people, dead silent. Then the next week, we had three major artists announce big country albums.

“So where’s ‘Lasso’ going? I really have no idea now!”

Lana is set to be one of the headliners at Reading & Leeds 2024, alongside Liam Gallagher, Blink-182, Fred Again.., Gerry Cinnamon and Catfish & The Bottlemen.

The festivals take place from August 21-25 and tickets are on sale now for both locations; purchase here (for Reading) and here (for Leeds).

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