WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 1219 - Tom Jones

Episode Date: April 19, 2021

Tom Jones doesn't feel like resting on his laurels. He tells Marc there's one main reason he's going strong, recording new music and performing live at the age of 80: Because he still has a point to prove. Tom and Marc talk about his big hits like It's Not Unusual, Delilah, and What's New Pussycat?, how he learned to belt them out by listening to gospel music, and the secret weapon he calls The Push. They also discuss his friendship with Elvis, his musical heroes, and his new album Surrounded by Time. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis store and ACAS Creative.

Lock the gates! Alright, let's do this. How are you, what the fuckers? What the fuck, buddies? What the fuck, nicks? What's happening? I'm Mark Maron. This is my podcast. Welcome to it. Today on the show, Tom Jones is here. Tom Jones. I mean, come on. Everybody knows Tom Jones. There's not a person listening who doesn't know a Tom Jones song. And he's still out there. He's recording music and he's doing his thing at 80 years old and his new album is called Surrounded by Time and it's an album done by an artist who knows where he's at in his life, in his career, but he's still swinging, man. He's still swinging. Is beer can chicken necessary? Is shoving an open can of beer into the cavity of a chicken and throwing it into the grill, arranging it so it stands up straight to cook, is it necessary?

I didn't have a great experience with it, and I bought a thing that you could put the beer can in and shove the chicken on to. But maybe, I don't know, maybe I'm not adept enough or experienced enough at the barbecue. How do you get the fucking can out of the chicken's ass? I mean, it's like you get this thing. What do you got to carve it or cut it up, holding it up right? I mean, you got this mess of a beer can in there. Is there some trick? There's got to be some fucking hillbilly trick to pull the can out of a chicken's ass after you make the beer can chicken.

I didn't know it. It's sort of like not having a Valium connection when you're strung out on cocaine. It's like now I'm frustrated, I'm upset, my heart is pounding, I might die, and I got no way to come down. Now I got this chicken, I was excited about it, but now I can't get the can out of its ass,

and I barely want to eat it. Oh, fuck, there's beer spilling everywhere. Now what? But buying beer? Buying beer? Like, see the drug drug talk it's a little unnerving uh i got to talking about it well you know a few weeks ago i had hunter biden on and then we talked to you know the drug talk and then you know i got you know i got my own people in the uh you know in the secret society in the sober racket, we do the drug talking. Then Dino and me were talking about a Bay area drinking and druggy experiences from our youths. It's weird. It seems so far back. Can you imagine, man? I'm so fucking relieved that I don't have the burden

of needing drugs at this age. Fuck this coffee's good. God damn it. So close, man. I was so close to fucking doing some nicotine. It's so stupid. The persistence of the fucking bug, the brain, God damn it. Oh, so buying beer as a sober person, like 22 years sober. First of all, you get into that thing. Like I don't pay attention to the fucking liquor section. I don't go shopping for liquor, but I needed beer for putting the chicken, but I need beer to shove into the chicken. One can, a regular size can of beer.

Nope. Only tall boys available. No one's fucking around anymore. It's like, you want value? You want to get a buzz on? You ain't going to get it with one can. You know it. And two cans is a lot for lunch. Why not just have a tall boy? Just a bunch of tall boys. So many brands I don't understand. I don't know. I spent like 25 minutes looking at fucking beers, wrestling with the idea where I was like, well, if I want a small can,

it looks like I got to get a six pack or a 12 pack. Do I want that in the house? What's the excuse of that in the house? Oh, for friends, for people come over. No one's coming over. Do you want to have beer sitting in there for fucking a year? It wouldn't bother me. Is it necessary though, dude? Is it necessary?

Can't you just fucking taste it? You get that little pull in your chest, that little weird hunger, the pang of the monster awakening, the pang of the monster, the pang of the monster awakening, the pang of the monster, the pang of the demon going, what are we doing? What's up? I've been fucking sleeping for so long. I am so thirsty. Oh, fuck. What have I been doing? I've been like a coma i'm ready i'm ready i gotta get out of this supermarket man i gotta get out with one fucking tall boy and i gotta figure out how to put a tall boy into a chicken and not have a bunch of fucking demon food around the house so i got some uh corona premium tall boy and i poured it into a Zevia can.

Zevia soda, which I'm addicted to. Put it in the chicken and, you know, it was fine, but it was unnecessary. I figured out how to cook chicken. These are not important issues. There's fucking police killing people, systemic racism. Tucker Carlson is a fucking Nazi.

You know, there's problems. Problems persist. And I'm hung up. I'm beating myself up for not knowing how to extract a goddamn half-filled can of open beer

out of a cooked chicken that's still hot. People are dying, man. What the fuck is wrong with me? I'm so thirsty. What are you doing? The game is over. I'm thirsty. Let's go. You don't need a life. Feed me. Not happening. Relax. I'm acting. Don't freak out. Don't get too concerned. But let's talk about something. I'll be honest with you. I talked to my booking agent and this is, I guess this is relevant.

I'm kind of concerned all of a sudden that when we come out of this pandemic, if and when we ease out of it, you know, just how paralyzed with fear I might be and how much perhaps unresolved grief I might have and, and how just fucked up my chops are my you know do I still have them how out of shape I am now what I learned before the pandemic and before Lynn's death and before you know whatever happened over the last year monkey's gone the fond is gone was that the audience I had built for myself were good people, grown-up people, nice people, good tippers, people who knew how to behave in a fucking theater. And I want that. And that's the space you carve out for yourself. Now, I've got to kill the sort of more weirdly competitive,

spite-driven part of me and just sort of embrace what I've built in the world for myself. sort of embrace what I've built in the world for myself. All this from saying, you know, as we ease out of this, I talked to my booking agent. Yeah, I know people are rushing out to book and people are excited to get out and do things, but I don't want to go out with anything half-baked. I don't want to go out and do an hour of workshop material for big theaters. So, like, I just told my booking agent, I said,

look, man, if we're going to do a big theater run, let do it in the spring next year let me fucking ease back in let's do a residency at a theater you know at dynasty typewriter someplace in town i'll start doing the comedy store we'll do some club dates over the you know few months in the fall maybe i'll be able to showcase the whatever's becoming the hour at the New York Comedy Festival. I don't take this shit lightly. And I've got to figure out what is life or death for me now. I've got to figure out what I need to resolve on stage as a funny man. I've got to figure out what is funny to me at this juncture.

I guess all that to say that I'm probably not going to do a major tour until next year. But I'll be popping up places and I'll let you know where. Workshopping stuff, maybe at some clubs for four nights, doing that kind of stuff. Just trying to figure out what is life or death for me when it comes to comedy, because that's the only way I know how to do it. But I got to engage. And between you and me, seriously me seriously maybe a little music i'm not saying i'm putting a band together i'm just saying maybe there's a show to do with some music i've been i've been enjoying that maybe i could do a show a live show where i cook a bread maybe

there's a live show where i i roll out of you know a viking range and i i uh i do a live irish soda bread with some slightly distorted echoey blues tunes riffing then some observational comedy and then uh you know some eating and then some you know sober reflection and then a big closer with uh some large riffs thatiffs. That's the live show. I just got to figure out how to tour with a professional-sized range and also the equipment and a refrigerator. What's Mark doing? Have you seen his show? It's wild, man. He's got a full kitchen up there and an amp and a guitar. And he's kind of moving through those things stand up amp guitar uh kitchen it's weird but it's interesting i haven't seen it before do you see that did you go see marin live yeah dude he's got full like a professional viking grill up there

and a point zero fridge is that what they're called? And he bakes a bread, and he plays guitar, and he's kind of narrating it and doing stand-up at the same time. I've never seen anything like it. Well, he bakes a bread. Yeah, at the end of the show, there's bread.

Huh. Is it good? I don't know, man. It needs a bigger closer. I mean, the bread's good, and the bit is... Yeah, I mean, it's good, you know, but the closer is kind of the bread, you know, so there's a lot hanging on the bread.

Tom Jones, the new album, Surrounded by Time, comes out this Friday, April 23rd on S-Curve Records. You get it wherever you get music. He's 80 years old, 80, And he's fucking firing on all cylinders. Just listen to me and Tom Jones. You can get anything you need with Uber Eats. Well, almost, almost anything. So no, you can't get snowballs on Uber Eats.

But meatballs and mozzarella balls, yes, we can deliver that. Uber Eats. Get almost, almost anything. Order now. Product availability may vary by region. See app for details. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations,

how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. Hello, Sir Tom Jones. How are you? I'm all right. I'm very good, thanks.

I've had my both shots, so I'm bulletproof. Well, that's great. I listened to the one you did with Hugh Grant. Yeah, he's funny Grant oh yeah he's funny oh he's funny as fuck he is excuse my French oh you can fuck all you want oh because we always blame the French

excuse my French and so we should it's so funny man because it's nice to meet you because when I was a kid one of the first cassettes I had was I think a greatest hits record because I was looking over, one of the first cassettes I had was, I think, a greatest hits record because I was looking over the stuff about you, and it reminded me my parents had given me this cassette player

they didn't use anymore, and it had a box of fucking cassettes, and one of them was the Green Green Grass of Home. Yeah. And Delilah, I'm sitting there reading this thing, and I'm like, I can sing that song. I was like 10 years old. I don't remember the last time I heard it, but I can sing Delilah. Well, if you could sing Delilah

in the same key as I recorded it in, it must have been before your balls dropped. Because that's high. You could belt it out, man. Has your voice changed? Like now, how does it sound? Well, it's lower now because like everybody else,

even if you're not a singer, as you get older, your voice drops. Your speaking voice. it's lower now because like everybody else, you know, even if you're not a singer, you're, as you get older, your voice drops, your speaking voice. If you listen to young people speak, you know, they're all,

most of them are up there. And then as you get older, of course you get more character in your voice. Right. That's a nice way to say it. I mean, that's, that's how the agent talks to you as they,

as the, as the work dries up. That's right. Now that you're of a certain age, we have to look at life in a different light. Yeah, sure. But you don't seem to be worn down in any way. Not at all. Not at all.

It's a strange thing because I'm 80 years old now, but my voice is still about 30. Yeah. Well, that's great. And that's a big thing because with older singers, you see, your vibrato, you lose control more than anything else. It's not so much volume, it's the flexibility of the voice because the older you get, the less control you have over your vocal cords. It's just a natural thing. And you listen to old singers

and they start, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh. You know, they can't speed it up. Well, it's only going to do really is push it harder, you see. The harder you push, the faster the vibrato gets. I mean, it's a fact. But maybe some of those old people, they can't seem to get it. And I feel very sorry for them.

They don't have the Tom Jones push. Well, this is it. So you've got to be able to push the shit out of it. And I can still do that, thank God. How's everything else working with the pushing? All right? Yeah, yeah, so far so good. You know, there's always Viagra.

You know, I mean, that's a little help here and there is all right. No shame in that at 80. You got to do what you got to do. Exactly. I know a great joke about that, by the way. Go ahead. Well, this old fellow goes to the doctors and he said, doctor, you know, I'm 90 years old, he says. And he said, I got a problem here.

The doctor said, what's the matter? He said, well, look, when I was 20, he said, I get a hard-on. He said, I used to grab ahold of it with both hands, and I couldn't budge it. He said, and then 30, the same thing. He said, 40, a little bit. And then he said, 50, I'm bending it over a little bit more. He said, now that I'm 90, I can bend it all the way over. Am I getting stronger?

Right? Yes. And the doctor said yes you are yes you are whatever you say you're doing you're you're still alive you made it yes but Jesus Christ man I mean when you think back on the life you know because I just read about your life but I mean what what like how far back do you go? What are the great memories? Do you do that much? Oh, yeah, all the time. I've got a lot of pictures in my hallway of the flat that I've got now in London. Yeah.

Because when I had a TV show, you know, in the late 60s, early 70s, I had a lot of great people on there. So I've got a lot of pictures to prove it. I had a lot of great people on there, so I've got a lot of pictures to prove it. And I've got a great picture of Sinatra and myself when I was walking at Caesar's Palace and coming through the casino, I was going to see Sammy Davis. And Sinatra was sitting at the bar and he says, Thomas? Well, I think he was the only guy that used to call me Thomas. So anyway, I thought, oh, that's Frank. So he says, come and sit down. So I said, well, I'm going to see Sammy Davis. And he said, he can

wait. And I said, well, he said, I'll send somebody to tell him, you know, put the show back 30 minutes or something. And I said, okay. So I sat there and we drank and, um, there was a girl who wanted a picture. So she came up with a little, you know, a little camera and she said, wow, you know, Frank Sinatra, Tom Jones together. Could I have a picture? And he said, if you want to do it properly, let's get the camera girl over. So we called the camera girl over and we had this great shot together. So I got to thank that girl, whoever she was, you know, that wanted that picture,

because I've got a 10 by 8. It's a classic. You know, I'm sitting at the bar and he's got his hand on my shoulder, sort of, you know, looking over my shoulder. It's fantastic. So I've got a lot of those pictures with Elvis and Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard, you know, all my heroes. Were they mostly in Vegas or were they at the TV show? Were they mostly in Vegas or were they at the TV show? At the TV show. I did some duets with Jerry Lee. I did all his, you know, the hits that he had. He's still at it.

Oh, sure. I talked to him last week. I call him up regularly. Yeah. But his accent, you know, he's got a solid accent. And I said, hey, Jerry, how are you feeling? Yeah, Tommy. You know what? I said oh great oh great as long

as you're feeling good. He seems to be talking you didn't you didn't make out what he said but he seems to be talking. Exactly because he had he had a stroke as he was in so maybe that's had some effect on him but I saw I saw just before while we were on that subject, in 2019, I was doing a tour over there, and we were down south. So my two heroes, you know, was always Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard. And they both, well, Little Richard then passed away, but they were both in Tennessee.

So I said, well, I don't know when I'm going to get this close another time. So we still, we held the plane over, you know, we was using this plane. So, I flew to Memphis, saw Jerry Lee and as soon as I saw him,

he was in hospital at the time and then I flew to Nashville and saw little Richard and I'm so glad that I saw little Richard because

not long after that he passed, you know, so I've got, I think the last picture because, first of all, he said he didn't want a picture. Yeah.

You know, no pictures. I said, I just want to come and shake your hand. You know, I've known him for years. So then he says to his son, take a picture. Yeah. So I've got the pictures. He was so great, man. Like, I mean, when he died, you know,

I've got this box set, and I kind of started to go through it, and it was just, there was just really nothing like that guy. No. He was unbelievable. And again, he did a gospel. I don't know whether you know this,

but there's a gospel album he did with Quincy Jones in 1962. It's fantastic. And you would never think it was Little Richard. I play it. You know, I play that one, and then nobody gets it, and then I play his greatest hits, you know, and I said, it's the same guy. Wow.

It's unbelievable. He must have found the, I guess he always had the faith, but maybe he was really feeling it, changed him. Yeah. Well, he sang with a pure voice, you know, because when he did the rock and roll things, like as I'm saying with the vibrato, he used to push the shit out of it, you know,

and sing in his throat, but his normal voice was just a beautiful gospel voice. So when you were coming up, I mean, like, you grew up where? In Wales, in South Wales. Coal mining. Oh, coal mining. I don't even know. I have no sense of that.

I have a sense of London and the countryside. I've noticed that with Americans, they don't know much outside America. Well, no, I've been to London. I've been to England. I've been to Scotland. I've been to Ireland. I love Ireland. I just haven't made it to Wales yet because I haven't felt the urge to go see the birthplace of Tom Jones yet. Oh, okay. What about Dylan Thomas? What about, you know, there's some great people who've come out of there. All right. I'm going as soon as we get through the plague. Right. Exactly.

Wales gets bypassed a lot. I mean, I understand that. One American said to me once, so where is Wales then? In Scotland? I said, no. It's the other end of the country. Yeah, yeah. Like that.

They seem to use too many letters. Am I wrong? Well, it's a different language. They don't know the origin of the language. Of Welsh? Of Welsh. It's a strange, it's a Celtic language, but it doesn't, it's not like Irish and it's not like Scottish.

It's a different language. It's the ancient British language. When the Romans came, we all spoke what is now Welsh. And that's the ancient British language that they spoke then. Did your parents speak Welsh? My grandfather did because he was, my father's mother and father came from England. They were immigrants. They came into South Wales looking for work in the 1800s, you see, with the Industrial Revolution. Yeah. But before that, you know, my grandfather on my mother's side, Albert Rhys Jones, died in the First World War.

But he was all the way Welsh. You know, he spoke Welsh. But I never met him because he died in the First World War. And you say it was a coal mining family? Coal mining. My father was a coal miner. His two brothers were coal miners. So everybody was covered in coal dust all the time? Not all the time. We'd say in a bath. But the thing was, we used to have a tin

bath. This is no word of a lie. A tin bath hanging on a nail outside the kitchen. Yeah. And before we had indoor plumbing, honestly. So my mother, she used to take this bloody tin bath off the nail, stick it in by the fireplace, because that was the only warm room in the house, because my father didn't believe in central heating, so he had a big fireplace. And then he would have a bath by the fireplace when he would come home. So he would come home black, you know.

And, yeah, Elvis Presley once asked me, he said, are there any black people in Wales? I said, yes. When they come out of the coal mine, yes. But then they have a wash and then they're not. Then, of course, they had showers near the coal mine, you know, at the top of the pit. The top of the pit, we used to call it. And then they used to shower there. But when I was a child, after the war, he used to bath in the house.

Did he get sick from the mine? No. Well, he died of a chest problem, but the doctor in Los Angeles, because I moved my parents to LA, and the doctor there, Dr. Kivowitz, he said, your father's lungs, he's got what we call, oh, is that me? Sorry. It's okay. Maybe it's Jerry Lee Lewis.

It could be. Wait a minute. Yeah, that's him. I still got a flip phone, by the way. Yeah, well, you don't want to rush into the future. Exactly. There's certain things that I refuse to do. Okay. So, okay. So the doc said the lungs were what?

Wet. Because I said, he's been a coal miner all his life. He said, yeah, but he doesn't have black lung and he doesn't have silicosis, which one comes from coal dust and the other one from stone dust. Yeah. But he said he has neither of those. He smoked cigarettes all his life, right? I said, yeah. He said, well, that's what's killing him. It's the cigarettes. Honestly, can you imagine that? I mean, being a coal miner and no effect, cigarettes. But so as soon as you've made enough money, you got him out of there.

Oh, yeah. I retired him. I went home. I bought this red Jaguar. And in the 60s, you know, after I got my first hit record, which was It's Not Unusual. So I bought this red Jaguar, which I always wanted. Drove back to, because I was living in London then, drove back to Wales.

And my mother was cutting sandwiches, making sandwiches for my father's box, you know, this lunchbox. I said, where are you going? He said, I'm going to work i said you can't go down the coal mine now and he said well that's what i am i'm a coal miner i said dad please i said you know i'm making a lot of money now yeah but how long is that gonna last he said you know when you're gonna get a real job? So I said, look, Dad, if I put the money in the bank tomorrow,

how much money do you think you're going to make now until you're 65? Because he was in his 50s. Yeah. And so he said a roundabout this, that, and the other. I said, well, I can put that in the bank. So that's the only way I can stop him from going to the coal mine. Is give him a guarantee that he'll be covered exactly exactly well that's sweet so that like so that that song it's not it's

not unusual like i've always you know i don't think i've ever asked anybody this you know who i talked to like because i talked to to like i talked to steve miller yesterday you know guys who yeah yeah i know Steve Miller. He's a great guy, actually. Yeah, yeah, he is. We were in Vegas together. He was in Vegas sometimes when I was there, yeah. But, you know, it's like, when you sing these songs, and we can talk about this with Elvis,

too, do you still feel the songs every time you perform? Is it still a unique experience? Definitely. Every time you perform, is it still a unique experience? Definitely. Because now, especially for me, being older, I've got a point to prove. You know, when you're young, of course, you know, you're full of piss and vinegar, you know, and you want to get on with it. But when you get older, the difference I feel is that I can still sing, you know, and I can prove it. Right.

And here it is, you know and i can prove it right here it is you know so yeah and that's why you're still doing it to say exactly fuck you i can still do this exactly yeah why is he still doing it to tell you to go fuck yourselves and stop calling him an old man well yeah but you can't piss off the audience. No, no, no, no, no, no. You can't do that. They still love you. I imagine that the size and style of panties coming up to the stage

are a bit different now. Well, thank God they don't throw them anymore because that became a joke, to be quite honest with you. I know. It was sexy at the beginning. In the Copacabana, a woman actually took them off and handed me them, and I wiped my brow, and I said, watch you don't catch cold.

Uh-huh. When I handed them back. See, so it was shtick. You know, you learn shtick. You're a stand-up comedian, right? Sure, yeah. So you've got to use whatever tools you have, you have to use them.

So that's how it started. But then it caught on, and then I was bloody drowning in a sea of panties after a while. See what you did? You and your big ideas? There you go. It backfired on me. And room keys. It was like room keys.

I was in Vegas, and somebody threw a room key up there and I said, who's this? And she said, well, use it and you'll find out. And did you? No, me, no. Yeah, right. Well, you know, at least you're discerning. That's good. You won't just follow up on any key.

No. Well, when you start singing, like what you sang when you were a kid, how does it start? Were you in a band originally or what? No, I was singing as a child. I was singing in school. I sang in chapel. I used to go to a Presbyterian chapel.

We sang gospel songs in chapel. And I remember once I sang the Lord's Prayer in school as a child, and the teacher said to me, why are you singing this like a Negro spiritual? But I didn't know what she was talking about. I really didn't know what she was talking about. But I must have heard Mahalia Jackson sing it or something on the radio, and it rubbed off on me. So were those your influences? I mean, I know you like little Richard and Jerry Lee and the rockers, but like there seemed to be a bunch of British soul singers, but you're like the first really, it seems. You were before a lot of the ones I remember talking to. Yes. Well, I always, musically, I always felt more American than I did British.

Because, you know, I loved 50s rock and roll music. And before that, you see, the gospel influence, the blues. Yeah. You know, Big Bill Brunzi. I used to listen to Big Bill Brunzi. And, you know, people like that. And Muddy Waters a bit later. But when I was a kid, after the war, see, I was born in 1940.

Right. So, after the war, see, I was born in 1940. Right. So after the war, it was the big band scene. You know, it was Sinatra coming up to your ears, you know, or out of wherever else. You know what I mean? It was the crooners and the big band sound. What about that skiffle music or whatever? Well, that was later, you see. That was Ronnie Donegan.

Yeah. Ronnie Donegan. But that's, again, it's American roots music. He was really doing lead belly songs, you know Ronnie Donegan. Yeah. Ronnie Donegan. But that's, again, is American roots music. He was really doing lead belly songs, you know, and stuff like that. Isn't that interesting? Yeah. So it was Rock Island Lion. You know, he had a big hit with that.

And that's an old thing that they used to sing in jail. Yeah. Right. Well, it's so interesting how much of American black music primarily, you know, didn't really become hugely popular until it went through England and come back around. Quite right. Well, a lot of blues singers that came to England, like Big Bill Brunzi, prime example, he couldn't believe it when Otterley Patterson, who was a white blues singer in England, she took him to lunch. Yeah. So he had never had lunch with a white woman in a restaurant.

Things like that. So they would come over to England, a lot of the black performers, and up to this day, Will.i.am says, you know, Jennifer Hudson was doing the voice with Will.i.am for two seasons. And both of them said, we feel more appreciated here than we do over there. You know, we seem, I said, well, that's a nice thing. I mean, I like that, you know, that you, because sometimes people say, oh, you're more prejudiced over here than you are over there. I mean, hopefully oh, you're more prejudiced over here than you are over there. I mean, hopefully not.

You know, I mean, I would hate to think that British people are like that, you know, in general. But in America, of course, you know, the country is so much bigger and you've got the South. Yeah, things get lost and it's, you know, I try to figure that out sometimes, but it just seems that when, like, it seems to me in the UK that, you know, a country that size with sort of a, you know, it's possible for everyone to sort of know you and appreciate you. Yes. Somehow. Yes, it's simpler. I think it's more, I felt that when I went from England to America for the first time. Didn't you work with Will.i.am?

Did he produce something for you or did you do? No, no, he's on The Voice with me. See, I'm doing The Voice UK and he is one of the coaches like I am. So I've known him now for like 10 years. So how do you make your break? How did I make my break? I was singing in pubs and working men's clubs. Now, do you make your break? How did I make my break? Yeah. I was singing I was singing in pubs and working men's clubs.

Now were you doing another job? Did you have other jobs? Were you working? Oh shit yeah. Yeah. I worked in a factory because I got married young and I was getting paid so I had to hold the job down until I was 21. Then I told them all to go fuck themselves. You got married before you were 21? Yeah I was 16.

Oh my god god yeah my wife and myself but i had to hold this job down because the manager of the paper mill said if you can run that machine you got the job right so i did and i was getting paid and my cousin who was head of the union tried to stop me getting a fucking wage so i excuse me, you know, because I wasn't old enough. But anyway, once I was 21, I started- He tried to stop you? He ratted you out? Yeah.

He said, you shouldn't be getting this money. So they got the manager there, and the manager said, look, as long as I'm paying above the union rate, you can't say anything. If I was paying below, then okay. But he's getting paid above the union rate, so go fuck yourself. So it was my cousin. You know, he was my cousin, this schmuck. So anyway, I love that word schmuck, by the way.

It's a good word. Yeah. The Jews have come up with some good things. Of course. Well, I worked the Catskills. I was up in the Catskills, you know. I know. I got to hear about that.

But let's get to it. So wait, how long before you talked to your cousin again? Never. I said, fuck you and the horse you rode in on. So anyway. So I came out of the paper mill. I went on to the building sites, you know, construction. Because it was only in the daytime so I could sing at night.

So that's when I really started to, I got a band in the Pont-de-Prix where I come from. They were playing YMCAs and stuff like that. And I took them into these working men's clubs that had never, ever seen rock and roll before. You know, they'd never seen electric guitars and electric amplifiers and drums. So as soon as we walk into this first club,

the first thing they said was, pay them off, which means pay them not to perform. And I said, just a minute, fellas, you know, give us a chance here. And they said, oh, not you, Tommy. You know, you're a lovely boy, Tommy. You know, you can sing. But the rest of these pricks, you know, we don't know about them. So I said to the band, I said, look, keep the volume down to start with.

We'll do My Mother's Eyes, you know, My Yiddish Mama, things like that, you know. And then when they're not looking, Great Balls of Fire, you know, like that, see? So I brought these kids into workman's clubs. And then I was discovered by Gordon Mills, who was already in show business. And he was one of a singing group called the Viscounts. I'd seen him on TV. He came to see me in one of these clubs, took me to London, wrote It's Not Unusual. And that's when we started. What did you have to do with that dude Meeks? Joe Meek. He was the first one, when we put some tapes,

we made some tapes in Wales and sending them to different producers and record companies, you know, anybody that we could. So he listened. He liked what we did. So we went up and did an audition for him. Yeah. But nothing came of it, you see.

Because he sort of became this weird father of kind of techno, you know, like... Exactly. Yeah, like experimental music, electronic music. Yes. There was a song out called Telstar, which was an instrumental, big hit, number one in America and Britain in the 60s.

So, because of the Telstar, you know, the satellite. Yeah. And that was him? Yeah, that was Joe Meek. So I auditioned for him. We did some songs with him, and he said he was coming out on EMI. We went there. He didn't know I was.

Went to Decca, didn't know I was. So I went and said, hey, let me have that contract back, or I'll kill you, you bastard. So you got it back, and then the guy who wrote It's Not Unusual, he was your guy. Yes. And then, of course, they put the bloody records out after the fight. The Meek did. Yeah, it came out on Tower Records in the States.

Yeah. I had a hit with a song called Little Lonely One, which came out the same time as It's Not Unusual. And then the music publishers came around to the hotel that I was staying at in New York. I said, are you going to do Little Lonely One? I said, no, I'm doing It's Not Unusual. Yeah.

And so they bought me a case of scotch, which I don't drink. I said, at least if you're going to give me something to drink, give me anything but scotch. What do you drink? Well, normally anything but scotch. What do you drink? Well, normally, anything but scotch. So you hook up with Gordon Mills. Yes. But did you ever write anything, any songs?

Yes. Well, some B-sides, as we say. Sure. Yeah, yeah. I wrote some things. I did a song called Looking Out My Window, which I wrote myself. And that was, well, I am picked up on that lately.

You know, you said a lot of hip-hop people, you know, they'd sample. Oh, that's nice. That's good. Yeah. So, and I said, well, I wrote it. You know, I wrote it on a crumpled road in the 60s. I was driving down and it was pissing down with rain

and I thought, oh, fuck. And the windscreen wipers were, you know, and I was looking out the window, you know, looking out the thing. That was it. Looking out my window. That was it. Wrote the song. So I wrote some things, but not any of the big ones that I've had hits with.

It's sort of interesting the time you came up because like, so It's Not Unusual, you know, becomes a hit. What is that? Like 65, 66? Yes, 65, exactly. So you're right on the cusp of the whole thing changing, right? Yeah. So you have a few hits, and then all of a sudden, 1968, 67,

the whole idea of what pop music changes. Well, it changed when the Beatles came out. I mean, they opened the door because that was in 64, maybe? Four, 64. Yeah. When they went on the Ed Sullivan Show, that was like big deal. It knocked Elvis Presley out for a while. But for you, Elvis being on the Ed Sullivan Show, that was a big deal. Oh, definitely. And when I met Elvis Presley, he said while. But for you, Elvis being on the Southern show, that was a big deal.

Oh, definitely. And when I met Elvis Presley, he said, thank God for you. Oh, really? I said, why is that? He said, well, because that's all we're getting from Britain normally are the Beatles and the Stones and all these other wankers. You know, he didn't say wankers because all these other jerk-offs. You know what I mean? He didn't say wankers because all these other jerk-offs.

You know what I mean? He said, here you are being influenced by Elvis Presley. You know, doing. When I first came to London, they said, look, that Elvis Presley macho shit went out the window. Who said that? The record companies. And they said, it's the Beatles. You've got to look like a boy now.

You can't look like a man. Curly hair doesn't work. That busted nose, you've got to get it fixed. You know what I mean? I said, where do you go? Fuck you, sir. I said, look, what I was singing in South Wales, right? I said, Cardiff is 160 miles from London.

You can't tell me that English people are that different to Welsh people. They're not. And, oh, well, it doesn't work, doesn't work. Well, once I got the hit record, of course. It works. Told you so. Well, it's funny because what happened is you held on to the generation of people, of men and women who saw masculinity a certain way.

Yes, definitely. Yeah, because my dad used to think he looked like you for years. And also the Elvis thing is interesting because the idea of one dude, you know, getting up there in front of a band that works for him and delivering the goods in a way that Elvis did. So Elvis takes that from the older crooners who were a lot less dynamic in a way. Well, he got it from black gospel music. One of the first things he said to me was,

how come you sound, you know, like influenced by the same people? I said, yeah, black gospel music. He said, yeah, but are there any black people in Wales? That's what he came from. Right, the joke, yeah. Exactly. So I said, no, the radio, you know, I listen to the radio, and that's what I've gotten it from.

Because he said i was born there you know and he said i went to these black gospel churches and uh you know loved what i was hearing and rhythm and blues you see he was playing more black rhythm and blues records than he was white records right but but like you know stylistically i can see that but it was still like you know it wasn't the band you know it wasn't like you know, stylistically, I can see that. But it was still like, you know, it wasn't the band. You know, it wasn't like, you know, no one was, there was no, you know, teeny boppers, you know, putting pictures up of, what's his name, the guitar player for Elvis.

You know what I mean? Yeah, Scotty Moore. Scotty Moore. You know, there's no teeny boppers who are like, I'm a Scotty Moore person. I don't love Elvis, but Scotty. Exactly. You know, you're up there in the person. I don't love Elvis, but Scotty. Exactly. You know, you're up there in the front, you know, and then you're driving it, and that's it.

And I remember when the Beatles split up, right, Elvis says to me, he says, is that right, the Beatles have split up? I said, yeah, this was like 1970, right? Yeah. And we were in Vegas, and he said, wow, what a shame. I said, yeah, well, they've done some great music. He said, oh no, I'm not talking about that. He said, I thought it would be great

if we had them as our backing band. All my life. He said, wouldn't it be great to do a show, you know, and have the Beatles play for us? You know, you could do some of your songs, I do some of my songs. Wow. All my life. And I said, well, I don't know whether that would happen, even if they were still together.

Okay, so after, you know, It's Not Unusual and then What's New Pussycat is huge. I mean, it's just like, but then like, you know, what struck me in reading about this stuff was there was a period there where, you know, obviously the cultural tastes were changing and and and i yeah like i didn't really think about the i the the idea of of country hits like that that the idea of country music that you could come in and it's the same like ray charles in a way

that yes exactly that there was a tolerance and and also an embracing that if you sang the songs in a certain way, the country songs, the country fans will accept you. Yes. And you see, to black ears, they don't like listening to white country singers. And I can understand why. It's an alien sound. It's, you know, they sing through their noses. Well, they used to anyway. So when Ray Charles did that first country album, it was fantastic.

But he heard in the songs more than just the way they were being delivered. He heard the essence of the songs. And that's exactly what I do. So when I did the Green, Green Grass of Home, it was more like if Ray Charles had done it, as opposed to one of the country singers that did it. It was a country hit before I got a hold of it, you see. But did the country people like your version? Loved it.

I heard Jerry Lee Lewis. See, he did an album called Country Songs for City Folk, and I bought it in the colony record shop 1965 in new york city in times square i remember that place yeah yeah the colony record shop so i said you got anything by jerry lee they said well he's gone country he's got this country album i said i'll buy it took it back to the hotel green green grass of home was on there and uh so that was it i got back to england said, I got to record this song. And like you just said, you know, my recording manager,

Peter Sullivan, at the time said, well, you want to go country? Yeah. I said, no, I want to sing country songs. I don't necessarily want to go country. So I tried. Once the Green, Green Grass of Home, you see, once that hit, then he said, oh, we've opened the door here now. Yeah.

And that was the second wave of Tom Jones, those hits. Exactly. Exactly. Because like the other ones were kind of like, you know, dynamic, big orchestral pop tunes. You know, What's New Pussycat? And then these ones were, they actually brought it down a notch, but your intensity stayed the same. Exactly. And it's always stayed the same.

And it's still the same today. Thank God. It got a little lower though, I hear. A little lower. It's lower now, yes. I used to be a tenor. I used to be a tenor. Now I'm a baritone.

But everyone's saying you still got the push. You can still push it out there. Definitely. And flexibility. See, flexibility is the most important thing. You know, the way you read songs, as an older person, you see, I listen to songs differently now to when I was young. That's why I'm using the spoken word on two of the tracks.

On the new one? Yeah, it's called Surrounded by Time. The album is called Surrounded by Time. And there's two songs on there that I spoke got out. Yeah, it's called Surrounded by Time. The album is called Surrounded by Time. And there's two songs on there that I spoke as opposed to sing, because sometimes the spoken word is more effective than the singing, because the melody doesn't get in the way, you see?

So the theme of this album seems not necessarily political, but definitely wise and a little less. Is it cynical or no? No, it's basically the story of my life in song. I picked songs that relate to different chapters of my life. Like there's one called Pop Star, which Cat Stevens wrote. And so that's like the beginning for me.

You know, look at me, man. I'm on TV. and when he wrote it he was taking the piss out of out of the record company because i was with him at the time in the 60s and he said the record company want me to be more a pop star he said so i think i'll write a song called pop star see what they think of that you knew you knew him back then oh yeah yeah and um and he had tuberculosis as a child, like I did. So we had a little connection. Oh, you had tuberculosis, huh?

Oh, yeah, yeah. From the time I was 12 till I was, yeah, it was 12 to 14. Did you have to be like an iron lung or anything? No, I was in the house. I couldn't leave my house for two years. Holy shit. Yeah. That's sort of like what kids are going through today,

but they got a lot more toys. Exactly. But I, honestly, I feel sorry for kids of that age, especially going through puberty, you see, from 12 to 14.

Yeah. You know, things start happening, you know, you don't really know what it is. So, but in those days, everybody else was out in the street playing, and I couldn't go out there.

Now, of course, nobody's out in the streets. Yeah, but they're on Zoom playing. They're doing what we're doing. Yeah, exactly. All right, so Cat Stevens. Okay, so the pop star is like your early years, and you moved through your whole life, huh? Yes, exactly.

With the song choices. Did you do all the selections yourself or you got a guy that helps you look at things? No, no, basically myself. Yeah. My son, Mark, he co-produced this because he was always on the sessions with me because Ethan Johns,

I don't know whether you know who Ethan Johns is. I do know. What is he? Yeah, Glyn Johns is his father. He was a big producer in the 60s. Yeah. And yeah, Ethan Johns, I don't know whether you know who Ethan Johns is. I do know. What is he? Yeah, Glyn Johns is his father. He was a big producer in the 60s. Yeah. And, yeah, Ethan Johns. So he's done a lot of people.

So, like the Kings of Leon, you know, people like that. He's done a lot of different people. So I started doing albums with him, and I thought, well, I want to use Ethan because he knows me well. And so he said, well, what songs do you want to do? So there's a song that I did called I'm Growing Old, which is by Bobby Cole. He gave it to me in Vegas when I was in my 30s, and this was in the 70s. And he said, I got this great song. You know, do you want to have a go at it? I said, well, I'm not old enough to sing it yet. But I said, if I get there, you know, if I get that old, then I'll do it.

So I wanted to do that. So there's some really important songs on this album from different parts of my life. And when you were performing before the plague, I mean, like, you still do Vegas? No. No, I haven't like, you still do Vegas? No. No, I haven't played Vegas for over 10 years now. So I gave that up.

You know, been there, done that. You know, it was like that. So I concentrated more on Europe. But still, I do shows in the States as well. And what's your audience like? Are they longtime Tom Jones fans? Some are. But, you see, because I'm on The voice yeah you know which is the voice uk a lot of kids watch it it's a saturday night

in britain it's on saturday prime time so a lot of kids see me on there and they know who i am now and little kids come up to me you know and it's amazing this little girl i was walking in battersea park i live close to this park in london and um this little girl come up to me and know and it's amazing this little girl I was walking in Battersea Park I live close to this park in London and um this little girl come up to me and she said oh I watch you on The Voice and I think you're wonderful and oh I said thanks very much I said you like the show she said no I like you on the show she was 10 right so I said oh and I thought oh maybe it's just a show and she said my favorite song is the green green grass of home and I thought shit you, maybe it's just a show. And she said, my favorite song is the green, green grass of home. And I thought, shit, you know, a 10-year-old kid that's being affected by this song.

So you never know. That's sweet. You never know who you're affecting. Well, yeah, well, music's got this magic to it. You know, long after anybody, you know, once it's out there, it has a life of its own. Definitely. I mean, it's true. What would life be like without music?

Could you imagine seeing a movie without music in it? No, I can't. It would be terrible. I listen to music all the time. I'm constantly listening to stuff, new stuff. There's never a shortage of new things. You can never know all of it. And I got back into the records.

And it's just every day i i listen i learn new things yeah well i do that on the on the voice i'm listening to young singers and i think shit you know that's that phrasing is really something you know how did he or she come up with that so you all the time you're learning you know you're listening and learning about things that's the way i feel anyway no No, I think that's true. So once you become big in Britain, so how did you end up? Because I've talked to people, because of your tenure in Vegas, like I talked to George Wallace a few weeks ago.

Yeah, yeah. Well, George used to open my show. Exactly. A lot of comics open. Before comedy clubs, you would open for show. Exactly. A lot of comics open for, like before comedy clubs, you would open for guys like you. Well, see, I was in, I went to Vegas in 68 and I stopped there 10 years ago.

But I was in, I played Vegas more than Sonata did in terms of years. So, I mean, I thought, well, you know, I've done that. So in 68, that's sort of like, like you were one of the new guys in 68, right? So there's a whole generation that had owned the place for a decade already, right?

Yes. Well, Elvis Presley came to see me in 68. Yeah. And he said, I've wanted to play Vegas since the 50s. They didn't get him in the 50s, right, in Vegas. So he always wanted to get back into Vegas. So he came to see me in 68 and said, I feel that we are similar in what we do.

And then he came back in 69. But it was because he came, all my life, he came to see me and realized that, you know, vibrant, rock and roll, sexy, whatever you want to call it, music is alive and well, you know, vibrant, rock and roll, sexy, whatever you want to call it, music, is alive and well, you know, as long as you get on with it. Put on the show, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, make it a big show. Tell a few jokes. Well, if, yeah, if something happens and you need a little humor, throw that in as well. But I never did a Vegas show. It was the same show as I would do in new york or london you know wherever i got a band and i do the songs you know so i never had dancing but you were like a personable guy i mean you were you know when you did the television show it's a variety show you got to do bits you know you got to act a little

bit you've done a little you're an entertainer on some level i mean you're a singer but as time went on you got other chops yes yes and sense of humor you see i've always believed in that if you have a natural sense of humor like hugh grant you know when you were talking to him the other day it's like that's it it's it's uh it's it's it's a lot easier to go on, you know, with a smile on your face, you know, and sort of look at it like that rather than say, this is serious music. Sure.

I don't want anybody, you know, like this. No, shit. Well, that Vegas was always about fun, it seems, with the entertaining. Exactly. Well, anyway, when I'm on stage, I love to do what I do, and hopefully people are going to get it. Yeah.

You know? Of course. Well, no one's going there going like, who is this guy Tom Jones? Well, one time at the beginning they did. No, I know. But not now. No one's wandering in going, who's this new fella? No. But like with Elvis, though, you guys stayed friends

for this whole long time, huh? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Right from 65 when I first met him. My first year in show business, 1965, I met him in Los Angeles because I did an Ed Sullivan show from LA because it went to color. 1965, it went from black and white to color and they couldn't transmit from New York.

So we had to do it from LA. So that gave me an opportunity then to go to LA. And I met Elvis on that trip in September, 65. And it was tremendous like you know it sounds like you had a kind of a fun relationship and and you respected him and he got a kick out of you and you were like minded so like I don't know if I've ever talked about this with anybody really but I in terms of these friendships but I mean you know as you see a guy like Elvis kind of get insulated and go into some sort of mental or emotional decline or substance abuse or whatever. I mean, what do you do? Okay.

Well, when we first started talking together in Vegas, he said, what do you take to stay sane? What is your drug of choice? I said, a pint of Welsh beer or maybe a bottle of champagne. You know what I mean? I'm a drinker. I wasn't interested in anything else, thank God. I mean, booze is a drug as well if you abuse it.

So that was it. So I said, no, I don't. So then one night I came in to see him, and he thought that he was getting away with stuff, you see, by taking pills and drinking a lot of water and he wasn't getting hangovers the following day yeah so one time I went to see him and he said uh Tom Jones said tonight you know right and uh keep drinking that champagne Tom you'll be all right you know like ha ha and I said yes I will and I will be all right

yeah here I am you know well he you know he got the food and everything else i guess like you know it's hard to imagine like all you guys who can do the you know men and women who can do the performing on on the level with the band and music and everything else it's a real gift and it's a unique thing but i guess there's no way to really know the toll that it took on that guy, you know, being, you have to carry that, the burden of being Elvis Presley into a middle age, you know, I don't think he could hack it. No, I don't think that Elvis would have enjoyed growing old. Right.

I don't think he would have liked it. No, he's like Marilyn Monroe. You know, any of those icons that die when they're young, you know, they'll always be icons. It's just a shame that they filmed him when he got heavy towards the end. You know, that's a shame. Priscilla says that because I'm friendly with Priscilla Presley,

and she said, I don't like it when I see those old footage of him when he got fat, you know. But he always sang. You see, his voice was always there. And, yeah, it was a shame to what happened to him. And I tried to talk to him, but he wouldn't listen to anybody towards the end, you know. Oh, really? He fired all the guys. Oh, the Memphis Mafia.

They came to me. Sonny West, one of his bodyguards, you know, he said, could you talk to Elvis because he's falling apart and we can't save him. So I said, I'll try. I used to call him, you know, at one time, any time I called him, he would get back to me, you know. But like the last two years, I would say, of his life, he never returned any of my calls, you know. like the last two years i would say of his life uh he never returned any

of my calls you know and uh and then he was gone that's sad huh yeah it is sad because i you know when it happens it's always after the fact of course but you think shit if i'd really pushed i wondered if if i could have gotten through to him you know and i could have straightened him up yeah maybe yeah i don't know i well usually not yeah yeah well that's what they said the guys that will be how do you save somebody from yourself yeah if they don't want to do it yeah what are you going to do i know well you're fortunate in that like whatever your compulsions were they weren't uh they weren't going to kill you no exactly not yet but it's interesting you know these people that you know like in your business

and you've met a lot of these people where you know they're all in in terms of like somehow or another it becomes they're risking their life to do with this music you know that the lifestyle they believe fuels it or they just can't get out of it but and they get known for like yeah you know you've you met janice joplin i mean when yeah sure and and you and you you had respect for her but did you feel when you talked to some of these people that they were going to not last that long um not really because there was a lot of people that did last right you know

that that were heavy in the shit you know know, in the 60s. Sure. Eddie Clapton said, if you remember the 60s, you weren't there. Well, I don't believe that. Right. But there's a lot of people got messed up, but they're still here. Eddie Clapton is still here.

Yeah, I think you Brits seem to be built for something that some of us aren't. I mean, Christ, Keith Richards, you know, I mean, you look at Keith Richards, he looked like he should have died 10 years ago, but he's still there. So a lot of us came through it. Now, Jimi Hendrix, I knew. Wow.

And he went. And Janis Joplin did my TV show. The Jimi, I just listened to this box set, Jimi at Winterland. It's like three nights of shows. He was from another planet, dude. Yeah. Well, I knew the two guys that made up the experience. Oh, the British guys, Noel and Mitch?

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, exactly. Well, they were ligging around, you know, in Ladbroke Grove in 1964 when I first came to London. We were all there, you know, trying to get ahead. Now, what about, like, the sort sort of was there a period where there was sort of, you know, a tension between like you and like the Stones or, you know, the Beatles or anything like that? Like, I mean, did did they see you in a certain way and you see them in a certain way? Did you have a relationship with any of them?

Yeah, we had a relationship. Who used to we used to be in the clubs you see in london in the 60s you knew that you were in the middle of it yeah you know before that it was always american we always listened to american acts american singers but then when the beatles kicked the door down yeah we thought we're in it you know right there with hit records all all these different clubs we would hang out in. Yeah. All together. You know, we were all in it together.

Eric Clapton, I remember talking to him outside of a club, and he said, look, you know, I put this band together, and we're going to put a record out, Cream. Yeah. You know, he said the first one didn't make it. If the second one don't, I'll play guitar for you, okay? I said, sure. All my life, and that's a fact.

So we were all there at the time. We just sort of went separate ways because of the music that we were recording. You know, I was doing available material at the time, you know, and it took me on a different path. But we were all there in London, in these clubs, in the 60s, and it was fantastic. So when was the Catskill period? Was that like before Vegas? No, no, that was later. That was when I became a Vegas act, as they say. Oh, so then they're like, come play for the Jews. Yeah. Well, I did that in the talk of the town in London in 67 because I sang my Yiddish mama.

Yeah. That my father used to sing when I was a kid. I didn't know it meant Jewish mother. I just thought it was mother. Where'd he get it, your father? He learned it as a kid. See, we used to be a Shabbish guy. You know what a Shabbish guy is?

A guy who knows Jews? Well, a Shabbos, as you know, and the Goy, of course, is non-Jews. Well, we would hang about outside, there was a synagogue in Ponte Prieto, and on the Saturday, which is the Jewish Sabbath, of course, we would be hanging around

because one of us would be picked to go and put the lights on and stoke the boiler. Right, right. To do the work that you can't do. Shabbos goy. Got it. That's what we were called.

Was there money in it? Of course. My father did it before me. You know, he used to do it when he was a kid. Same thing. So we lived in the same area. So yeah, that was it. You'd be out in the street playing marbles or whatever,

you know, like this, hoping that one of these Jewish fellas, the rabbi, you know, would come and say, excuse me, sonny, could you come and do that? Yeah, do the work, shut the lights off. That's funny. For a few bucks or what? I used to box when I was a kid. No, like for a few dollars, they'd give you a coupon.

Oh, sorry. I thought he said, did you box? Yes. Well, it was shillings. Yeah, shillings, sure. Yeah, shillings. And you boxed too thought he said did you box yes well it was shillings yeah yeah shillings and you boxed too is that how you broke your nose yes were you good not good enough but by all accounts did you know bob hoskins well no not not well yeah i i you know say hi on the street because he lived in london or interested yeah But I didn't know him well, no, no. Seems like you two would get along for some reason.

Yeah, exactly. Well, I tell you who I did meet was an American, Robert Mitchum. Oh, yeah, yeah. Right. Now, when I was doing the TV shows in the late 60s, there's an actor called Ronnie Fraser, who was a character actor, British character actor. And he said, if you ever get a chance to meet Robert Mitchum,

he said, you two will get on like a bucket house on fire. Well, I was doing a TV movie up in Santa Barbara. Yeah. And I walked, and I was down on the beach, walked back into the hotel, and Robert Mitchum, Robert Mitchum was sitting in the bar. Right. And as I'm passing, he said,

Hey, Tom, like Sinatra said, you know, come here. Yeah, yeah. So it's the same thing. So I sat down. I said, can I take off my speedos at least? You know what I mean? I mean, on the beach. No.

I said, let me go up and change. I'll be right back. Just sit down. You know, okay, great. There it is, Robert Mitchum. And he was, you know, Roddy Frazier said we'd hit it off. And he was right.

I drank with him all day in this bar. And we were drinking Bloody Marys, right? So we said, what are you drinking? I said, what are you drinking? He said, Bloody Mary. Okay, Bloody Mary. So I'm drinking. So after about six or seven or eight or nine or whatever we were,

I said, there's something wrong with this one. He said, what's wrong with it? I said, I don't know. It's not tasting right. He said, let me try it. He went, oh, sorry, it's mine. I used tequila instead of vodka. I said, well, what happened to mine that had vodka in it?

Gone. You know what I mean? He drank it. But he was great. I had a whole day with him And it was like You know a lifetime With anybody else Oh well that's

That's a sweet memory huh Yeah Yeah oh yeah So when you're up In the Borscht Belt What do you Like so you're playing Vegas You're like

Come play the hotels Yeah yeah Well I was at Caesar's Palace You know for a long time Yeah And so they said Nightclubs

You know where's the Where's the biggest nightclub? Now up in the Catskills, what was the name of that hotel? The Concord? The Concord. Yeah. It had the biggest showroom in the world at one time. Oh, wow. Really?

It was huge. I didn't know that. Huge. And the only thing that I came up against was they used to use knockers on the table. Yeah. You know, like, bang. They said, now, do you want, because they normally, instead of clapping, they use these knockers.

But it's not like they don't like you. It's that they like you. Yeah. But some people don't like the knockers on the table. I said, well, I'm not used to that. You know, I mean, I'd rather, if they could, clap. Right. But if they don't like me, then don't clap.

You know what I mean? You don't have to clap. But, you know, I don't clap. You know what I mean? Don't, you don't have to clap, but you know, I, I don't know anything about those knockers hitting the wooden, you know, on the table. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. So they said, okay, it doesn't have to be like that, but you know, I played there many times, so they must've liked me.

And, uh, did you work with any comics up there? Yeah. Yeah. Uh, Steve Allen. Oh yeah.

He, he, he was up there. Yeah. Um, but it was a lot of, uh, well, a lot of the comics that I used were Jewish, you see. It was Jackie Gale.

Oh, Jackie, sure. Jackie Gale. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, he toured with me. He was on, I mean, he was hilarious. We'd be in a bloody limousine, right? And I used to wear the cross and chain. Well, I still do. Yeah.

And he said, you know what? He said, I love the fact that you wear that cross and chain well I still do yeah and he said you know what he said I love the fact that you wear that cross and chain I said why is that then he said it keeps the bats away from the limousine so he said because I'm he said I've realized I'm working with Dracula he said you don't get up in the daytime he said I can't get any towels you know we don't need hotels and I called down for towels and he said, well, Mr. Jones doesn't want to be disturbed until the afternoon. He said, fuck Mr. Jones. What about me? So what was the process of being knighted? Is that a big day for you? That was the biggest day of my life. Really? Because, oh, when you're a kid, right? You think,

oh, I'd love to be a professional singer, first of all. Sure. And I'd love to be able to get a hit record. I'd love to be on TV, you know? Yeah. That's a big deal. Yeah. But if somebody had told me that I was first of all going to get the OBE, which is the Order of the British Empire, that was the first medal that I got. And then the Queen will knight you one day. Well, I mean, I would have said you're full of shit when I was a kid, you know, because knights in those days, you see, they weren't entertainers, you know, years ago.

You'd have to kill somebody or, you know, be brave like that. Yeah. So, yeah. And I used to look at, my mother had a medal picture of my grandfather who died in the First World War. And I thought,

I'll never be able to have a medal like that because he had a lot of them. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I thought, because I never went to the army. Yeah. So I thought, how can I compete with that?

Well, I've got the OBE medal and I've got the Knight's uh knight's bachelor medal and i thought shit if my grandfather could only see me now you know he wouldn't believe he would have said what did you do for that exactly how many german how many germans did you have to kill for that so uh was it was it exciting to meet the queen and everything? Oh, I started doing the Royal Show, you see, in the 60s. Yeah. Early, you know, they got me on there in like 66 or 67 maybe. And so, you know, I used to go and do a lot of these Royal Shows.

And one time we lined up, you know, and the Queen comes along. She says, are you still living in America? And straight away, without thinking, I said, yes, but only for convenience sake, your majesty. It was like shot out, you know. Oh, fuck. I'm going to be in the tower if I don't. Yeah, she's lovely, though, the queen. The queen is unbelievable, honestly.

Yeah. She's an unbelievable person. I mean, her husband just died, right? Yes. Yes. Right. I got a story about him, if you want to hear it. Sure.

How much time we got? You got as much time as you want. Okay. So I was doing a thing for the Wildlife Association, which he was head of. Uh-huh. We went to this club called the Talk of the Town in London where they were holding this thing. So I agreed to go and do it. So we were in the palace first of all

before we went over there to do the show. Right. So he came up to me. Now, in the newspaper prior to this, he said Tom Jones sounds like he goggles with pebbles. Huh. Right? Yeah.

So when I read it, I thought, what the fuck? So he came up to me, which he never had to do, and he said, I'd like to explain something. And I said, yes, okay. And he said, you know, your royal highness, yes, sir. And he said, look, he said, I was at a small businessman's meeting and he said they were all pissing and moaning about what he didn't say pissing, but he said they were moaning about, you know, they don't have enough, um, from the government. They're

not getting enough help. Yeah. And I, he said, I used you as an example. He said, I said, look, if a coal miner's son from a little town in South Wales can become a fucking multimillionaire, what are you bricks on about? You know what I mean? Words to that effect. You know? And he said, and then I was quoted as saying, you must gargle with pebbles. He said, I mean that your voice is so powerful, you know, and so strong that you must gargle with pebbles because he used to like to say things like that you know yeah and i said well thank you very much sir and

he didn't have to explain anything like that to me yeah yeah you know he could have told me to go fuck myself i you know i mean i would say i just said yes sir thank you thank you sir yeah thank you very much sir yes but he did he took the time and i'll never forget that you know yeah yeah yeah you know but you know it even even even with that spin tom you know i'm i'm wondering if he was just covering his ass well i don't know he was very diplomatic because i mean it's hard to make that into a compliment that's just from an outside listener here i i understand i understand i felt the same way at the time but i didn't Because I mean It's hard to make that Into a compliment That's just from an outside Listener here I understand

I understand I felt the same way At the time But I didn't want to say anything Hey man It was great talking to you Thank you Because my son

By the way Listens to you all the time So he knows exactly You know What you had Obama on And you know like that Yeah yeah yeah But he said

It's going to be good So I'm glad I did it Thank you Did you have a good time? Wonderful time. It was great talking to you. I'm glad you're doing so well and I'm excited

about the new record. Thanks, Mark. All right, take it easy. All the best. That was Tom Jones, the new record Surrounded by Time out this Friday,

April 23rd on S-Curve Records. Get it where you get music. It's weird, man. The closer is basically the bread. So if that doesn't, yeah. And he doesn't have enough to share. So I don't know.

I don't know. Maybe it's good. It seems like a lot, driving around the country with a Viking range. Here's some guitar. Enjoy your day. Your week. I'll talk to you Thursday Thank you. BOOMER LIVES Boomer lives. Monkey.

Lafonda. All of them. Cat angels everywhere. you can get anything you need with uber eats well anything. So no, you can't get an ice rink on Uber Eats. But iced tea and ice cream? Yes, we can deliver that. Uber Eats. Get almost, almost anything. Order now.

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