Sir Tom In the News, What's New, Pussycat?
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Tom Interviewed On Australian TV: One Of The Worst Interviews Ever
Monday, March 1st, 2010
How could I forget?
Happy St. David’s Day To All! And a special congratulations to Sir Tom whose song It’s Not Unusual hit #1 45 years ago today!
Dydd Gwyl Dewi hapus! Happy St David’s Day!
Tom was one of the guests on the Australian TV news magazine 60 Minutes Sunday. TJI should have the video soon and, despite how I feel about this interview, I will post it. At least it’s something nice to look at and one can always turn down the sound. Meanwhile, the transcript of the interview is below. But as you read it, note that the reporter’s voiceover comments are mixed in with the conversation, so it’s a bit confusing.
Of course, even though we can bet sure money that the reporter was given ground rules — told NOT to discuss knickers, Tom’s marriage, infidelity, he just plowed right ahead, even asking about dead contemporaries (perhaps to underscore the point that he thinks Tom is old?) and whether the Queen, upon knighting Sir Tom, threw ” a pair of royal knickers.” And, no surprise, he gets Tom’s name wrong.
After all is said and done, it is a pointless, stupid interview with no discussion of Tom’s music, the 24 Hours tour and CD. I’ve seen Tom’s press material and there’s a enough stuff in there — and in other sources that any halfway decent reporter can obtain — on which to base reasonable questions. I’m not a prude and there were no new revelations here but — I’ve never said this before — whomever accompanied Tom to the interview should have put a stop to it. I’m among those many fans who’d love to see Tom have another shot here at 60 Minutes, 20//20 or Dateline but, if it were to be like this, I’d just as soon skip it. This is pure crap that does nothing to promote his tour or enhance his image.
Sex Bomb
Reporter: Liam Bartlett/Producer: Howard Sacre
He’s the coal miner’s son who hit pay-dirt with his great voice. The original, hip-swivelling smoothie from the swinging sixties.
Now he’s pushing seventy, but Tom Jones is still a sex bomb and hard at it, singing, that is.
He says his days as a serial philanderer are over. But on stage, Sir Tom, yes he’s even scored a knighthood, can still bump ‘n’ grind with the best.
And as Liam Bartlett discovered when he caught up with him on the eve of his Australian tour, there’s still no shortage of knicker-hurling fans.
LIAM BARTLETT: We’re at one of Tom Jones’ favourite hang-outs, a pub in London. Most of his contemporaries have long left the stage, but Tom’s as happy as ever in the spotlight. Still touring, still recording albums. I read where you’ve sold 100 million records?
TOM JONES: Oh, yeah. Yeah, it could be even more because like places in South America we couldn’t get the the proper results of what we did sell, you know, so that’s a conservative estimate.
Click here to
LIAM BARTLETT: If you got 1 pound for every record that you’ve sold – that’s a lot of pints.
TOM JONES: Yes.
LIAM BARTLETT: Gees, not bad for a coalminer’s son.
TOM JONES: Well, there you go.
LIAM BARTLETT: The coalminer’s son Thomas Jones Woodward, started out singing in pubs and clubs in Wales. The tight pants, billowy shirts and the hairy chest became an early trademark. By day he’d work on building sites, and even tried his hand as a door-to-door salesman.
TOM JONES: Once in a while I’d have to try and make a little extra cash so selling vacuum cleaners was sort of falling in with what I was doing because I’d be in these areas, you know, singing in these clubs. And then we’d go and pick up some vacuum cleaners in Cardiff and and go to these same areas.
LIAM BARTLETT: And knock on the door.
TOM JONES: And knock on a door. So it was, you know, she’d go, “I saw you in the the club the other night” and, yeah, can I come in and sell you a vacuum cleaner?
LIAM BARTLETT: From the south of Wales to NSW [Australia] and every place in between, Tom Jones has gone on to amass a personal fortune of $250 million. For 50 years he’s been a one-man variety show and there’s nothing he enjoys more than belting out a song in front of screaming fans.
TOM JONES: The music is my life. I mean it’s, it really is true. I mean I love performing. I love touring, I like getting out there, I like going to different countries, you know, and singing to different people. It’s all a ball to me.
LIAM BARTLETT: A lot of your contemporaries though have passed away now.
TOM JONES: Yeah.
LIAM BARTLETT: Does that make you sort of sit back and think, ‘gee’?
TOM JONES: Mm, well, I’ve been lucky, you know, that I never got into the drug situation and all that. I was never, it never appealed to me, you know, taking drugs. I’ve always been a drinker.
LIAM BARTLETT: As an ambitious 20-year-old, he moved from Wales to London looking for the big break. It was the early 60s and there was a lot of competition.
TOM JONES: The Beatles had just cracked it and and then the Rolling Stones, so, you know, I was told, “Well, you don’t look boyish enough. “You know, you look like a man.” and I said, “Well, what the hell’s wrong?”
LIAM BARTLETT: They want, they wanted bands and you were a solo singer.
TOM JONES: Yeah, but a macho solo singer as well, which they said that macho bullshit don’t go down any more. I said, “Well it did in Wales “and I don’t think England is that different.
LIAM BARTLETT: But he was always confident he’d make it because of his voice. And sure enough, success came in 1965 with his signature hit – ‘It’s Not Unusual’ The teasing moves and raunchy repertoire attracted frenzied crowds of knicker-hurling women. All along there was a secret admirer, a fan he never expected. She awarded him a Knighthood in 2006. What did the Queen say to you?
TOM JONES: She said, “You’ve given a lot of people a lot of pleasure for many years”. And I said, “Well I’ve had, “I’ve got a lot of pleasure out of it as well, Your Majesty” and she laughed, and then she did the sword.
LIAM BARTLETT: That was it.
TOM JONES: Yeah, so…
LIAM BARTLETT: Arise, Sir Thomas.
TOM JONES: Yeah.
LIAM BARTLETT: She didn’t throw a pair of royal knickers at you, did she?
TOM JONES: Ah no, she didn’t.
LIAM BARTLETT: Thank goodness for that.
TOM JONES: I mean I wouldn’t, eh, I don’t think, I wouldn’t even think about the Queen, you know, in that, in that way. It didn’t enter my mind.
LIAM BARTLETT: Over the years, he’s shared the stage with a who’s who of legends. But behind the scenes, no-one’s stuck by his side more than his wife, Linda.
TOM JONES: We fell in love. We were both, we went to school together, you know, we grew up together and then we realised what sex was, you know, tried that, but nobody had explained it properly.
LIAM BARTLETT: It wasn’t long before Linda fell pregnant and they decided to marry. After more than 50 years, they’re still together – despite some very rough patches along the way. It can’t have been easy for her over the years with all the publicly documented affairs.
TOM JONES: Yeah. Well, it’s…she’s, um, she has avoided things, you know, because she doesn’t want to know certain things.
LIAM BARTLETT: Vicky Carr, Nancy Wilson, Diana Dawes, Mary Wilson, Cindy Montgomery, Marjorie Wallis, the list – it’s a long list.
TOM JONES: Yeah, Yeah.
LIAM BARTLETT: You’ve been a naughty boy, haven’t you, over the years?
TOM JONES: Well, yeah, I’ve been a naughty boy, yeah. A couple of things that I did, you know, affairs came out in the newspaper and she beat me up one night.
LIAM BARTLETT: And fair enough too.
TOM JONES: Exactly.
LIAM BARTLETT: You deserved it.
TOM JONES: She started punching and kicking and I was just in the corner, blocking whatever I could, but, you know, she had a point. And that’s it, so I took my punishment, you know, which was, she called me all kinds of names and I took a beating.
LIAM BARTLETT: In the same contrite vein, he went on to assure me that his philandering days are over. In fact, he seemed very much at home in the sedate surroundings of his private club in London where he prepared for his latest tour of Australia starting this weekend. You you never look down at the audience and see a beautiful girl and think, “I could be her grandfather?”
TOM JONES: Ah, no. No, no. I mean it’s sometimes when, um…
LIAM BARTLETT: You resist the temptation?
TOM JONES: Well, yeah. There’s one thing about getting older, you know, you’re not as, eh, you’re not as, um…
LIAM BARTLETT: Come on!
TOM JONES: Well, you don’t sort of think about, you don’t think about it as much, you know, so I can concentrate more on the singing now than be distracted by other things.
LIAM BARTLETT: But don’t think his act will be any less exuberant than its always been. The husky baritone voice is still a mighty force and there’ll be a lot of swivelling hips and squealing women as he does what he loves most – performing. Tom Jones wouldn’t have it any other way. Seriously, can you still be singing ‘Sex Bomb’ at 70?
TOM JONES: Ah yeah, I think so. I don’t th… I mean think sex stays with you for as long as you live.
LIAM BARTLETT: But seriously, I don’t want to wish bad things on you by all means, but if you’re almost 70, realistically, when you think about singers and how far they can go, what, 78, 79 can you do it when you’re 80?
TOM JONES: Ah, hopefully. Hopefully I’ll do something that’s never been done before. Maybe I’ll sing longer, you know, than anybody else has done, that would be great. If I could do that, I’d be more than happy.
LIAM BARTLETT: Guinness Book of Records.
TOM JONES: Yeah, would be nice.
LIAM BARTLETT: Guinness Book of Records, Sir Tom Jones, longer than anyone else. How does that sound?
TOM JONES: Oh, it sounds, well, that’s, yeah. Yeah, right. Yeah.
LIAM BARTLETT: Oh dear.
If you have an opinion about this interview you’d like to share with the people at 60 Minutes Sunday you can email them. If you do, be sure to send along a copy.
March 1st, 2010 at 12:41 am
Well…Stuff for gossip lovers!!! Tom has been so kind to answer to these b……t!!! Provocation, it is all that Mr Barlett can do! I think if I was in Tom’s shoes I’d punch his face like linda did with Tom that night, surely!
March 1st, 2010 at 2:04 am
I can almost hear Tom ansewering these questions.He’s use to everything now and not a lot gets him ruffled!
March 1st, 2010 at 4:04 am
I agree, Ellen – someone should have stopped this interview. Can’t believe the interviewer even recited a list of Tom’s “indiscretions.” This sounds like an interview done by “National Enquirer” or some other similar gossip rag. Other than a few compliments on Tom’s voice (and even those came off as a bit backhanded), there is no mention of Tom’s music, the current CD, the tour, or anything remotely relevant. I can only imagine Tom’s frame of mind as he left that interview!
March 1st, 2010 at 9:11 am
Missed chance by the interviewer, he should be fired.
Over 40 years in showbiss, a great new album out, a great show, a lot of people attending the shows, great reviews, and what does he ask?. What an ..hole..
March 1st, 2010 at 11:11 am
OMG I cringed and gagged reading that transcript. How RUDE and DISRESPECTFUL let alone poor journalism. Unfortunately, Tom is always open to answering questions. Even without the video, I can see Tom stuggling to avoid the topics. Someone should have stopped it.
March 1st, 2010 at 11:39 am
Well, you can always use the email address above to let your feelings be known. I hesitated before I wrote what I did about the interview at the top of the post because, as you probably know, I am a journalist and you can imagine that I’d love to interview Tom.
As a journalist who is a fan, I wouldn’t — as we say here in the news biz — throw softballs at him (like Larry King did) but I’d look at his years and talk about music, musicians he’s known, experiences he’s had. As I once explained (guess to whom), I don’t want to write about Tom’s personal life. If I’m not in it, I don’t care. If I am in it, it’s nobody’s business. Really, I don’t care about that (or, even, Tiger Woods’, for example) and, when I met someone with real knowledge and got to converse, I didn’t ask then, either. This guy interviewed Tom as if he was employed by the worst of Rupert Murdoch’s “news” outlets. Oh! Maybe he is. But, whatever, there’s simply not excuse to ask those old, faded questions. Someone of Tom’s stature deserves better, doesn’t he?
March 1st, 2010 at 1:35 pm
the interviewer was pathetic and low how he get that job? im going to email that link with a complaint and see if they reply to me!!! people can joke and be serious at the same time but too much blows below the belt!!!
March 1st, 2010 at 3:00 pm
You can’t blame the interviewer. He was doing what he thinks is his job, lame as he is. Again, who is handling Tom Jones. Many performers/ celebrities have strict guidelines that they can insist be followed or the interview is over.If Tom is left on his own, he may be stuck being polite and just rolling with the interview, like it or not. This is what publisists are for. Tom really should not have to worry about stuff that should be taken care of in advance by people he is paying to handle it. But Tom has been at this awhile, so if he wanted too he could of stopped it.As big as he is, I can’t beleive he does not have a publisist, manager or some level of handler to be with him at these things. Sounds like his management is phoning or emailing the requirements and thats it.
March 1st, 2010 at 4:43 pm
How pathetic! Where did this journalist get his credentials? He obviously has NO CLASS. I pity the people who are associated with him professionally and personally. But, I also have to agree with Nick — where in the heck are Tom’s people????????
March 1st, 2010 at 5:11 pm
Don’t be so hard on whomever accompanied Tom to the interview. You know, people have to use the rest room, or answer a phone call. It wasn’t as if the reporter had a lot of time alone with the guy. Tom has said many times that he doesn’t read press about himself so he may be — probably is — totally unaware of the end result of the interview. But, yes, Nick, I can and doblame the “reporter.” He probably thought he was getting away with something, being courageous by flaunting the rules — like any three year-old. He’s the type who gives the entire profession a bad name and who causes people in the public eye to dislike all journalists as a group. For some that is, in fact, an automatic response. This guy should be thrown out of any professional organization to which he belongs. Jerk.
March 1st, 2010 at 5:46 pm
I respectfully disagree on a couple of things.In a way Tom started this himself by dedicating a song to his wife who no one ever saw. He had to have seen the questions coming and prepared for it. C’mon we are all curious. Anything Tom does/did is news. So he wasn’t a Saint, who is?
But, the reporter should have asked him about his music for sure. I love Tom for his music and voice. It’s a gift that he’s still giving us.I hope that he continues to sing into his 90′s.
March 1st, 2010 at 8:39 pm
It’s hard to judge the interview by reading it. Sometimes what you say, has less effect than how you say it. Clearly, the interviewer is trying to raise controversy. I guess that’s what sells, look at Howard Stern. Anyway, the bottom line is Tom’s a famous person, and is still actively seeking attention. So, he’s getting attention, you can’t expect only praise.
March 2nd, 2010 at 2:49 am
The opposite of praise is not slander. One is entitled to criticism, but in this case stick to the music. Of course journalists are bound to ask such questions, but there’s a line that no should should cross even with public people. It’s called decency?
I don’t know how journalists work in gossip papers, since I never read them. But the same interview turned in a more decent direction would have the same effect. Tell us about facts as they are without the prejudice behind this interview above.
I’m sure Tom is not naive, but I often think he’s way too open and trusting*, not only about his love life, but in general. It’s his choice but you’re bound to have all the vultures picking at your bones all the time. Then again Tom doesn’t really need “good” or “bad” press, he’s good enough to prove himself as such.
*well, that’s something I like about him
March 2nd, 2010 at 3:45 am
In addition to all this…(can a journalist really be that poor at his research and questioning?). It appears that the 60 Minutes (Channel 9, Australia) segment incorrectly showed a picture on screen of Tom with his sister Shiela purporting it to be Linda. (ie. the photo taken a few years ago of Tom with a black baseball cap outside a gate with his sister Shiela in a fur coat). Link to incorrect photo used: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-510459/It-IS-unusual–weird-world-Mrs-Tom-Jones-typical-Hollywood-wife.html
Immediately following the release of this photo, Tom’s management issued a message on Tomjones.com stating this this was not Linda but Tom’s sister Shiela. Get it right 60 Minutes Australia!
March 2nd, 2010 at 12:05 pm
Nothing really surprises me today about some of the media. Many of them just want all the dirt they can dig up. I am not excusing Tiger Woods but I do think the media has no right to chase down his family – especially the children. Very sad.
March 2nd, 2010 at 12:09 pm
What a terrible interview, totally tactless. I wonder what Tom thought of these questions? The guy asked if the queen threw some knickers at him when she knighted him. How disrespectful and stupid. And Tom Jones’ personal life is none of our business. The interview should have been stopped, I agree. This kind of press is exactly why in some ways Tom has not been taken serious as an entertainer with a great voice.
March 2nd, 2010 at 12:10 pm
“A-hole” indeed, Dre.
March 2nd, 2010 at 1:56 pm
I’ve listened to many interviews over the years, and Sir Tom is always a gentleman, never telling anyone to get lost or saying that’s enough (when he probably should have), always responding to questions the way he wants to, whether it be a serious response, or a joking one. This interviewer was truly not the right person for the job, as he seemed very unprofessional, and kept going in one direction, and no about the man and his music. Who was responsible for making sure guidelines were followed (someone didn’t do their job)? Sir Tom deserves more respect, in so many ways. I would love to be able to sit down, have a quiet conversation, one on one, to find out about the man himself, from deep down inside, and then come up with a question based on that conversation.
March 2nd, 2010 at 2:12 pm
The interviewer was trying to be a hard hitting reporter. Exposing the seedy side of Tom. There is no seedy side of Tom, just a man, in many ways like every man.This person, just does not get it. If it did’nt phase Tom it should’nt phase us fans.I would like to know things about Tom like what exercise program is he currently on? Is he into alternative medicine for his health and longevity? Does he take bo identical hormone and HGH? I think you Ellen or Suzanne Somers should interview him. I would like to see that side of him.
March 2nd, 2010 at 6:57 pm
What a piece of complete garbage. Tom must have built up alot of restraint in his life having to deal with idiots like that dufus pretending to be a reporter. And how good natured he remained ;too bad he couldn’t have given the guy what he deserved.
March 3rd, 2010 at 4:42 pm
That has happened before with the photo of T om and his sister .A couple of years ago a sunday magazine showed a photo of Tom and his Mam saying it was Linda no one noticed the likeness !!!!!
March 5th, 2010 at 8:27 am
Congratulation to 45 years of “It’s Not Unusual” Mr. Jones