You Only Live Twice (novel) was released in 1962, and Bond's personality was somewhat skewed towards the screen persona rather than simply to Fleming himself; Sean Connery's filmic depiction of Bond affected the book version, with "You Only Live Twice" giving Bond a sense of humour and Scottish antecedents that were not present in the previous stories, although Fleming himself was part Scottish. Correspondence dating back to 1960 shows that Fleming contacted a Scottish nobleman to help develop Bond's family history, in particular seeking a Scottish "Bond" family line. Fleming's first trip to Japan was as part of the "Thrilling Cities" trip undertaken for "The
You Only Live Twice (song) in Bayswater, London. Sinatra later recalled that she was incredibly nervous during the recording, and it took around 30 takes to acquire enough material. Producer John Barry eventually created the final product by incorporating vocals from 25 takes. Roy Wood described Barry's string introduction to his song "You Only Live Twice" as "absolute perfection". Mark Monahan of "The Daily Telegraph" described the lyrics as "mysterious, romantically "carpe diem" ... at once velvety, brittle and quite bewitching". David Ehrlich of "Rolling Stone" ranked "You Only Live Twice" the third best James Bond theme song, calling it "a classic." The song is