The making of Billie Eilish's Bond theme “No Time to Die”

Billie and Finneas spoke to BBC Music Correspondents Mark Savage and Louise Minchin:

How do you get to write a Bond theme? Do you just bombard Daniel Craig with texts?

Billie: We'd always wanted to write a Bond song – even before it was an option.

Finneas: We'd been writing motifs and thinking of melodies for a couple of years, just as far as like, 'Wouldn't it be cool if one day we got to do a Bond song?' And when we got wind that they were making the 25th, we immediately set out to meet with Barbara, the producer, and plead our case.

When you started writing, did you revisit any of those old ideas you'd stored up?

Billie: We started from scratch, fully. We had a meeting with Barbara and then she sent us the first scene of the script – the part before the opening credits.

Finneas: And that was all we had to reference, as far as the plot.

Billie: I think that actually made it easier for us. We always write the quickest when we have a story or we're writing about something that's happened.

Lyrically, the song's about a double-crossing lover – and there's a scene in one trailer where Bond confronts Madeleine Swann about her betrayal. So was that the inspiration?

Billie: We're not allowed to say anything about it − but I mean, in the trailer, something happens, you know? Somebody is betrayed and somebody is betraying...

Finneas: The character arc of someone like Bond is a cycle of smoke and mirrors and betrayal.

At one point you sing, "Was it obvious to everybody else?", that's the sort of thing you ask your friends after a breakup… "Did you guys know all along?"

Billie: And a lot of the time, they all did! It's what everybody says: love is blind. Every red flag is gone. We didn't want to just make a song that only made sense with the movie. We wanted to make a song that made sense in the world and in people's lives.

How did you feel when you finished it?

Billie: Beforehand, I was anxious. I was like, "This isn't Bond enough." And once we wrote it, I was super happy with it.

Johnny Marr: Before I'd even heard the song, I thought Billie was a very intriguing choice. And when I heard the song, I was like, "Oh, this is fantastic." Even the demo sounded very intense to me.

Available in: https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-58680995