Tom Jones - the Life

by Sean Smith

  Ethan told him that they would go into the studio, play around with a couple of songs and take it from there. Tom observed, ‘I liked what he said. “You sing ’em the way you feel ’em and we’ll back you up.”’ Tom, in fact, thought they were still just rehearsing when Ethan switched on the tape machine and was amazed when the producer suggested they listen to what they had so far. He had managed to create an environment for the singer that took him back to the smoky back rooms of the Pontypridd and Treforest pubs where he had started more than fifty years before.

  Tom wanted to sing the material not as soaring ballads that made your eyes water, but as songs that would move you: ‘If my versions of these songs don’t touch people, then I’ve missed the mark.’ The very first track hit the target. It was a stripped-bare version of a Bob Dylan song, ‘What Good Am I?’, that Ethan had advised him to sing ‘breathy’. Q magazine loved the track, saying, ‘It’s immediately clear his voice was made for such soul-bearing, sermon-giving, fire and brimstone-calling fare.’ It was a perfect introduction to an introspective album from a man turning seventy.

  Ethan astutely recorded the album live at the Real World Studios, Peter Gabriel’s renowned recording complex near Bath. He used a minimal number of musicians, concentrating on an insistent bass guitar and a taut lead guitar, which he played himself.

  The critics queued up to deliver praise and little-to-no blame. MOJO called it ‘remarkable’. The Mail on Sunday found it ‘surprising, brave and adventurous’. Andrew Perry in the Daily Telegraph said, ‘Praise and Blame is drenched in blues and Southern soul, and yet it sounds way more current than Jones’s hi-tech latter-day flops.’

  None of the tracks appeared weaker than the next, although the John Lee Hooker song ‘Burning Hell’ was memorable and would find its way into his live repertoire. The closing track, ‘Run On’, was one he used to sing in Vegas, not in the showroom at the Flamingo or Caesars Palace, but in Elvis’s suite when they would duet late into the night. The public liked what they heard and Praise and Blame debuted at number two in the UK album charts.

  Tom sang the album from start to finish at a special concert in the Union Chapel, a beautiful working church in Islington. He no longer needed someone to write his lines for him, telling the packed ‘congregation’ that the lozenge he popped in his mouth was Vocalzone and not Viagra. He also disarmingly explained the album title: ‘If you take the praise, you’ve got to take the blame. People say, “Tom, he’s got a lovely voice … but he’s a bit of a naughty boy.” You see?’ As one reviewer pointed out, ‘This is not hymn singing. If it were, then the churches across the land would be packed to the rafters.’

  At last Tom had found the musical credibility he sought. The Los Angeles Times called it ‘gravitas’. His music had finally found a perfect fit with his rich and experienced voice. He really did sound black. The establishment loved him. The knighthood, the Brits, Glastonbury and Desert Island Discs were just some of the acknowledgements that here was an elder statesman to be celebrated. He was given a Music Industry Trusts Award ‘in recognition of his achievement in being the most played Welsh artist of all time’. It is the ultimate accolade in British music – previous winners included Elton John, Andrew Lloyd Webber and George Martin, The Beatles’ producer. Tom sang his old standards, as well as some new ones from the album, to invited guests at the Grosvenor House Hotel in London. Kelly Jones joined him to sing ‘Mama Told Me Not to Come’ and Cerys Matthews sang ‘She’s a Lady’.

  It had been a year of huge celebrations for Tom, but on his seventieth birthday he was at home in LA, enjoying dinner with his wife … The road always leads back to Linda.

  23

  The Voice

  Inevitably, the singer nicknamed ‘The Voice’ was approached to become a coach on a Saturday night television series called The Voice. You can imagine him being the first person the BBC thought of when they commissioned the show. For Tom, it was perfect timing. He had decided to give up his annual ten-week stint in Las Vegas, so he was looking for something not too strenuous.

  Undeniably, even at seventy-one, it was a good career move for Tom, because these television talent shows are much watched and discussed. He would be the subject of many water-cooler conversations as a result. It would remind younger generations that here was one of the great British artists. The pay was also attractive. Picking up an estimated £500,000 for choosing a few promising singers and guiding them through to a final over a three-month period was easy money. The BBC, which paid £22 million for the show, offered a sweetener that clinched the deal for Tom. The Corporation agreed a special clause that he could swap his suite in Vegas for one at the Savoy, one of the great hotels of the world.

  The television critic Kevin O’Sullivan observes, ‘He has got a very superstar deal that gives him three months living in the lap of luxury in London. It must cost a lot of money. After the show, he can go out to posh restaurants with his mates, like Jools Holland. He enjoys himself. The Voice is a nice little earner, which has let him enjoy London again.’

  Tom was full of optimism when he was confirmed as a coach at the end of 2011. It wasn’t obvious at the time that the Universal Music Group, which was providing a recording contract for the winner, was also the umbrella company behind Tom’s record label. Jessie J was on the same label. Will.i.am was on Interscope, also a division of Universal.

  Tom said the right things: ‘It’s exciting, competitive and compelling television. I look forward to being part of the team that discovers a great, new genuine talent.’ He had to backtrack over a newspaper report that said he had criticised other talent shows. He apparently claimed, ‘Some of the judges don’t have the experience to be on talent shows – if you’ve only been in the industry two minutes, how can you offer advice?’ He continued, ‘Every time I see one of these shows I think half the decisions are wrong and it really frustrates me.’

  The following day his Twitter account, which he doesn’t write, stated: ‘A comment of mine has been misunderstood by the press.’ In truth, his remarks were only reflecting what most of the 10 million or so people who watch such shows are shouting at the television screen every week. It’s part of the fun and makes the shows compelling.

  The Voice began in triumphant fashion when a TV audience of 9.4 million watched the premiere in March 2012. The contest was at the chair-swivelling stage, also known as the blind auditions. Tom and his fellow judges, Jessie, Will and Danny O’Donoghue, the lead singer of The Script, listened to a contestant without being able to watch that person. They then dithered about whether to press their buzzer to turn their chair around so they could see the act. The beauty of this format was that it gave the opportunity for the coaches to be surprised to discover that the singer was old, young, short, tall, thin or fat. If Tom had sung on the show, everyone would have thought he was black until they saw him. In 2013, the surprise was that the angelic-voiced Andrea Begley, who won the competition, was partially sighted.

  When more than one coach turned round, it was up to the contestant to choose whom they wanted to be their mentor. At first, Tom seemed to be the preferred choice, perhaps because he had the biggest reservoir of affection among the voting public, who ultimately picked the winner. That proved to be the case when one of his acts, Leanne Mitchell from Lowestoft, who initially hadn’t been one of the favourites, won the series.

  For her audition, she sang Beyoncé’s ‘If I Were a Boy’ and all four judges turned round. Tom was the last to pitch for her to choose him as her mentor.

  Leanne asked nervously, ‘What would you like to do with me, Tom?’, which reduced everyone to fits of giggles.

  Tom laughed, ‘I’m a married man, so I can’t answer that question.’ He said, more seriously, he liked the timbre of her voice and thought she could handle different sorts of material.

  She chose Tom. As they hugged, she blurted out, ‘You’re a legend’, and immediately wanted the ground to open up and swallow her.

  Tom’s team of chosen sin
gers met him properly for the first time at the Hospital Club in Covent Garden. Just as he seemed to be enjoying himself, Mark, who is firmly in charge these days, told him, ‘OK, Tom, we’ve got to go now’, and ushered his father out. Leanne observed that you could see his face drop; she thought he would have been happy to stay out partying all night. Before the Battle Round, where two contestants have to duet against each other, Tom enlisted the help of a guest coach, or battle adviser, as they were called. He was joined by Cerys Matthews and the contestants could see they were good mates and happy to have a laugh together. Cerys told Leanne she had ‘a fair set of lungs’ on her.

  During the live shows, Tom was surprisingly involved with helping his acts and advised Leanne about what songs might suit her. Behind the scenes, Mark, who had such an influence on Tom’s own choice of material, interrupted rehearsals at the semi-final stage, when she was singing ‘I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You’. He told her it wasn’t working and he thought they could do better.

  Someone had the music to ‘Run to You’, the Whitney Houston song from The Bodyguard, so they tried that. It was the sort of big power ballad that had defined Tom’s career, and it would win Leanne the competition. When she sang it for the first time, she noted in her book, Finding My Voice, ‘Tom started to get a bit choked up, which really took me by surprise.’ In the final, Leanne sang ‘Mama Told Me Not to Come’ with Tom. She gives an interesting insight into singing with him. Basically, he does what he likes – there was no point in giving him instructions on what to sing or where to sing it, because he would just ignore them.

  Mark had decided that she should perform ‘Run to You’ again as her closing song, rightly gauging that she would win if she sang it. He wanted Tom to be the first winning coach. Both Tom and Jessie had tears in their eyes when she reached the soaring high notes. Tom had taught her to bare her soul in a ballad. He said, ‘She knocks me out.’

  Sadly for Leanne, her triumph didn’t lead to a glittering prize. Her debut album, entitled Leanne Mitchell, wasn’t released by Universal’s Republic label until nearly a year after the show had finished. It sold less than a thousand copies in its first week. The fickle British public had forgotten about her. She did see Tom once more, when he performed at Newmarket Races in August 2012. He asked her how the recording was going and was encouraging.

  Leanne made the perceptive comment that there is no handbook on how to be a celebrity. They don’t give you one when you win a talent contest. She observed, ‘For someone like Tom, there is a magic about him that makes it look so easy.’

  Leanne was quietly dropped by her record label at the beginning of 2014 and was back appearing at the Potters Leisure Resort, a sort of modern Butlins, a few miles from her home, where she had been working since she was fifteen. She and Tom are not in touch.

  Tom improved throughout the first series. Live television was not a comfort zone, but he eventually settled into his role as the elder statesman. When will.i.am mentions working with Michael Jackson, Tom counters with Elvis, or Aretha, or Janis, and his name-dropping became one of the best features each week. Kevin O’Sullivan observes, ‘It has become a kind of ongoing joke, but it’s not contemptuous. He is very entertaining. It’s amusing, but it is bloody interesting at the same time. You name a superstar and he was mates with them and you know he is not bullshitting. It makes him very compelling and that is an important part of the show.

  ‘He’s got the talent, he’s got the back-story and he’s got the anecdotes. I’ve always thought he is the most important judge they have got. He could do with being a bit more articulate, but then live telly doesn’t suit everyone. But there is a sense of gravitas whenever he is talking.’

  Tom enjoyed it after he had settled in. He continued to find it difficult to send contestants home, however. The producers told him to drag out the moment for dramatic effect, but he hated being the one to end a person’s dream. He explained, ‘When I watched other talent shows and saw people getting emotional, I thought it was just show business. But when you’re there, with the person in front of you, God, it is very intense and emotional. And you do cry.’ He made a point of telling the contestants that only one person could win and that they should not let the outcome ‘shatter their lives’.

  The Voice confirmed Tom’s newly acquired venerability. He could easily put his feet up for the rest of the year and go into semi-retirement, especially as he no longer had his ‘pension’, as he described his 140 shows a year in Las Vegas. He explained his decision to quit the desert: ‘I was flogging a dead horse. When you’ve been somewhere a long time, you’re taken for granted.’

  Post-Vegas, Tom continued to choose projects that would stretch him. Finally, after talking about it for nearly fifty years, he had a proper, serious acting role. He played the title role in a bittersweet comedy called King of the Teds. It was a half-hour episode in the Sky Arts series Playhouse Presents. The writer, Jim Cartwright, was best known for the award-winning film The Rise and Fall of Little Voice.

  The executive producer of the series, the comedienne Sandy Toksvig, arranged to meet Tom for lunch at the Savoy. She recalled, ‘It turned out 1 p.m. was a little early for Mr Jones, so I sat with his son and daughter-in-law for a while before going up and knocking on the door of his suite. Tom materialised, wearing the shortest shower robe I have ever seen, and said, “Hello, Sandi” in that deep gravelly voice of his.’

  Tom hadn’t even seen a script by that stage, but his principal concern was to be treated with consideration in light of his inexperience. He didn’t want to let anyone down because he had never acted in a drama before. He played Ron, a failed pop star in the late sixties, who dated two teenage girls when he was younger. He married Tina (Alison Steadman) when she became pregnant, while the other, Nina (Brenda Blethyn), leaves to become a career woman. Ron worked in a bottle factory, but now is a redundant has-been whom even his wife finds a bore.

  King of the Teds obviously mirrored some aspects of Tom’s own early life and his marriage to his pregnant girlfriend. Linda asked him how filming was going when they spoke on the phone. He told her, ‘If I hadn’t cracked it, Ron could be my life. There but for the grace of God.’

  Tom’s problem was a tendency to overact. He told the Radio Times, ‘It’s a Welsh thing. The camera records every expression, so you have to try to underplay. I haven’t had acting lessons, but someone is helping me get the words right, because there are rhythms in the language and I have to be word perfect.’ In some ways, he had the same difficulty when he started singing – he was always at full throttle.

  Jim Cartwright knew that Tom would be a success in the role: ‘Someone who had performed such dramatic songs as “Delilah” in such a real and moving way would be able to do it.’ He was impressed that there was no ego or ‘I’m the star’ about Tom. He ditched his elegant and expensive clothes and sought out the tattiest cardigan to wear as Ron. He also mucked in with the rest of the cast during a week’s filming in Surrey. He sat on the catering bus with everyone, eating cottage pie and swapping stories, as he liked to do. ‘He’s a complete charm bucket,’ said Sandi.

  While Tom will always wish he had tried acting as a young man, he knows that it would never have replaced singing in his life. His follow-up to Praise and Blame was called Spirit in the Room and was his fortieth studio album. He is reported genuinely to have sold 100 million records worldwide.

  Spirit in the Room, produced by Ethan Johns, was superficially more of the same. Tom was again in introspective mood, exploiting the richness of his older voice, but on this album he chose more contemporary songs from writers including Paul McCartney, Leonard Cohen, Paul Simon, Tom Waits and Bob Dylan. The Daily Telegraph described it as ‘a beautiful album of great songs performed with taste and sung with tender resonance’. Amusingly, Tom, the man who has sung with all the greats, and known and drunk with many of them, has never met Bob Dylan.

  If a contestant on The Voice had come on stage and sung one of the album’s songs, To
m would have told him or her to lighten up. The opening track, Cohen’s ‘Tower of Strength’, is perversely autobiographical for Tom, including the lines ‘My friends are gone and my hair is grey’ and ‘I was born with the gift of a golden voice’. Even Tom acknowledged that it felt as if he were singing about himself.

  Tom could so easily have compromised and cashed in on his prime-time fame with The Voice and produced an album of familiar classics. Instead, again he challenged his audience. He would not be singing anything from Spirit in the Room on Saturday night shows like Strictly Come Dancing, however. They weren’t party tunes. Even the Paul McCartney track is a lesser-known one, ‘(I Want to) Come Home’, from 2010, a song the former Beatle hasn’t included in one of his own albums yet. Andy Gill in the Independent noted that its theme of wearied resolution suited Tom’s age and stature.

  In Praise and Blame and Spirit in the Room, Tom is playing to his strengths. Some critics thought it a shame that he hadn’t made such outstanding records earlier in his career. The simple answer to that is he wasn’t ready then. These albums are autumnal.

  The remarkable longevity of Tom’s voice was abundantly clear when he was one of the stars on show at the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee concert outside Buckingham Palace in June 2012. While others of his vintage, including Paul McCartney, Cliff Richard and Elton John, seemed to struggle to find their vocal power of old, Tom was the same as ever. His friend Rob Brydon introduced him as the ‘King of Music’ and the ‘Rajah of Rhythm’. He sang ‘Mama Told Me Not to Come’ and ‘Delilah’ as if he were twenty years old. He performed them with such freshness and vigour, it was as if he were singing them for the first time. That is one of the great secrets of Tom’s enduring popularity: he has sung his hits so many times, but he never looks or sounds for a moment as if he is bored doing so. The Queen arrived just as Tom finished, which was bad timing on her part.