By Paul Freeman [1990 feature story]

When we did this interview with Tom Jones in 1990, we marveled at his endurance. He had already been delivering powerful hits with his scintillatingly soulful vocals for 25 years. Still touring and tantalizing in 2018, we can only shake our heads in wonder.

He won a Grammy for Best New Artist in 1966. And 52 years later, Jones is still going strong. He reached number one in the U.K. and the Top 10 in the U.S. with "It's Not Unusual" in 1965. In 2000, at age 60, he returned to the top of the charts with "Sex Bomb."

Having earned the nickname "The Voice," the Welshman with the booming baritone continues to wow audiences with his hot-blooded singing and electrifying, energetic stage presence.

Tom Jones need never worry about what to do, when he retires from show biz. He can open a lingerie shop. He has had a larger quantity of underwear flung at him than Frederick's of Hollywood's sales staff sees in a lifetime.

His wildly passionate voice is a key factor in his enduring appeal, but his vocal virility is virtually ignored by some critics who are distracted by his hypnotic hip movements, bumps and grinds that would make Tempest Storm blush.

"About 1969," Jones recalls, "when I had my TV show and I was playing huge venues, I started getting reviews saying, 'The band struck up and the ladies screamed and Tom Jones came out dressed in such and such and off came the jacket, off came the tie and he sweated a lot and women threw panties and room keys on stage and everybody had a good time.'

"Often, there was no mention whatsoever of my voice. They overlooked my singing, because of the gyrations. That's frustrating to me. My voice has always been the most important thing. The showmanship is second. There's more to me than the wiggle.

"I never want to be a caricature of myself," Jones says. "But I would never try to tone down the sexiness of my songs or my delivery. That would be biting off my nose to spite my face.

"I have to move. I feel the rhythm and it takes over. That's just natural to me. Some performers sing rhythmically, but have no physical rhythm. They just stand there. I love Robert Palmer's records. But the man is very stiff on stage. He hasn't got it in him to move to the music. I haven't got it in me not to."

Singing sex symbols often spark resentment in husbands and boyfriends who are dragged to concerts by salivating significant others. "I have a lot of male fans," Jones declares. "Men like the way I sing. It's a masculine-sounding voice. Men get pissed off, when they see their wives or girlfriends making a fuss over some guy who's wimpy."

Jones likens his performing style to a boxing attack. "I pick songs that are hard-hitting. There are no mild numbers in my show. My set has to be exciting from start to finish, so that, when people leave, they say, 'God, that was a bloody hell of a show, that,' not 'Oh, that was nice."

The stage dynamism Jones espouses was also a staple of Elvis Presley's performances. The two became friends during their frequent work stints in Las Vegas. "Elvis could not understand how people might get excited over someone who couldn't put it across the way we did," Jones relates. "He'd say, 'What do they see in so and so? He has no sex appeal!'

"He liked what I was doing. He saw similarity between him and me. He always said, 'we,' like 'Why is so and so doing that on stage? We wouldn't do that.' That was flattering to me. For a British performer who grew up on 50s rock 'n' roll, it was amazing to be friends with Elvis Presley. When The Beatles met him, they couldn't even speak, they were so in awe of this man."

Jones' last visit with Presley was more than a year before the King's death. "In the end, he didn't want anyone around who really knew him. So I didn't see him at his heaviest or at his worst on stage. He got to the point where he couldn't remember lyrics.

"I remember him joking about his weight. His stomach was getting very big. We were in his suite in Vegas and he said, 'You're working out, right?' I said, 'Yes.' He said, 'I work out, too. Look at this.' And he sat on the saddle of his Exercycle with a pizza in his hand, laughing. He knew what was happening. He didn't want anybody to remind him that he was losing it or that he was getting fat."

Jones has avoided the excesses that doomed Presley. He didn't even experiment, as so many artists did in the 60s and 70s.

"I've never bothered with drugs at all, though the opportunities were always there. It never looked attractive to me. I enjoyed a social drink, but never wanted to fall all over the floor, which seemed to be the aim of those people taking drugs. Maybe they didn't love performing enough or maybe they were scared of it. Maybe they needed to get high, because of a fear of reality. I've never had that fear."

Presley told Jones about another fear and suggested a simple solution. "He worried about not hitting the high notes. That's why he had so many singers on stage with him. He said that way, at the end of a ballad, there were so many singers singing, no one would ever know if he was singing or not. He said I should do that, too, just so I'd be covered, in case I wasn't feeling too swift one night and I went for the top note and it wasn't there. I said, 'I don't want to be covered. I want people to hear me hit that top note.'"

Frank Sinatra also tried to give Jones friendly advice. "He said I was singing too hard and giving too much. I tried to explain to him that he sings the way he feels and I sing the way I feel. He's always been a crooner. I said, 'If I don't push, it doesn't come out right. I have to give each song all the power I can muster.' He said, 'Come to Palm Springs and I'll show you a few tricks.' I said, 'I don't want any tricks.'"

Performing came naturally to Jones. The son of a coal miner, he was born Thomas Jones Woodward, in 1940, in South Wales. "In Wales, people sing a lot. There weren't a lot of instruments around. The most popular instrument was the voice."

Listening to the BBC, he picked up a wide range of influences, including Al Jolson, Solomon Burke, Tennessee Ernie Ford, Jackie Wilson, Brook Benton, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis and, of course, Elvis.

"I've never been narrow-minded about music," Jones says. "I've always listened to everything. I like some classical, some country and a lot of 50s rock 'n' roll and 60s rhythm & blues. I like some ballad singers like Tony Bennett and Sinatra. I like any music that is genuine . If it's put across honestly and well, I like it."

Jones sang in school and church. By his teens, he was performing professionally, as well as working various day jobs. At 17, he had a wife and son. "I was doing anything to make money -- vacuum cleaner salesman, glove clutter, paper mill laborer -- because I couldn't make enough as a singer. I think being married made me more determined to make it. If I had been single, I wouldn't have cared as much. Having a family gave me a driving force. It made me realize what life was all about. It wasn't a joke. It was real.

"Playing in clubs and pubs and dance halls, I had to develop the versatility that I think has been the important factor in my longevity in this business. I'd play to youngsters and old people, as well. I had to please them all. Some performers would come in and do nothing but standards and the kids would say, 'Oh, so and so is coming tonight, who the hell wants to listen to him?' If a rock group showed up, the old people would be pissin' and moanin', 'Oh, who wants to listen to that crap?' I made sure I would appeal to a broad spectrum of musical tastes. I could see by the reaction of audiences that I had a hell of a voice and that, sooner or later, someone would discover me."

It happened in 1963, when Gordon Mills agreed to become his manager, dubbing him Tom Jones, after the popular Albert Finney film. Jones moved to London, where he became a regular performer at a club called Beat City. He opened for The Rolling Stones there.

"I was basically doing the same thing Mick Jagger was, which was basically Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis type of rock 'n' roll, rhythm & blues stuff. The Stones had attracted a lot of teenagers. Usually we drew people in their twenties and thirties. The kids were looking at me like they were a little unsure of me. I held my own. But Mick Jagger came out and did basically the same thing and they really liked it. The difference was that he wasn't threatening. He was cute, he was lean. I was more physically imposing and my vocal sound was more adult."

Jones joined Jagger at the top of the charts throughout the 60s and 70s, recording such hits as "It's Not Unusual," "What's New Pussycat," "Delilah," "Love Me Tonight," "Green, Green Grass of Home" and "She's A Lady."

After a lull in recent years, Jones shot back to the forefront of the video and radio programming with the release of "Kiss," a scorching cover of Prince's tune. His 1989 album, "Move Closer," his first pop/rock LP in almost a decade, generated only moderate interest from the public and the media, however.

"I tried to do too many different things with that album," Jones says. "I should have stayed with a hard-hitting sound. In the old days, you could do all kinds of songs on an album. Now it seems that you have to have a concept, that the album has to stick with one mood."

Jones is planning his next album, as well as trying to fulfill a longtime ambition of bringing to the screen a film about a womanizing Southern gospel singer. Even if he manages to become a movie star, Jones promises not to allow his ego to balloon.

"A lot of people who come from working-class backgrounds really get carried away with fame, because they hated where they came from. I never had that problem. I enjoyed where I grew up and the people I grew up with. I want them to think of me as one of the lads, not as a big-headed bastard."

He has a recurring nightmare about being dragged from the stage and thrust back into the paper mills, where he used to work 12-hour shifts. "That paper mill looms over me, along with all the people who told me, 'You have to have a day job. This is the real world!' 'I don't want to go back to doing a job I dislike. I don't want anything to keep me from being on stage. It's like my life is too good to be true and I'm afraid something will happen to stop it, that I will get into a fight one night and accidentally kill somebody and they will lock me away and I wouldn't be able to sing. Thank God, it's only a nightmare!

"I remember once when I was doing the TV show, I'd been out late the night before and I had to go the studio early one morning to do a production number. I hadn't had enough sleep. I was napping in the back of the Phantom Rolls Royce that I owned. The driver woke me up and said, 'We're here!' I said, 'Oh, Jesus Christ, I've got to go do the number now!' When I stepped out of the car, I saw this little kid running up and down with a ladder, with bricks on his back, which I used to do. He says, 'Hey, Tommy, give us a hand, will ya for Chrissake?' I thought, here I was sitting in this bloody Rolls, complaining about going to sing for a TV show. I should be thanking my lucky stars."

Now an American resident, Jones recently purchased an estate in Wales, so his understanding wife of 33 years would have a comfortable place to stay while he was away touring.

After 25 years of success on stage, Jones shows no signs of slowing down. He's performing about 10 months out of the year. "It's not like being an athlete, where you can only compete for so long... or like doing physical labor. I was a hod carrier, when I was in my early twenties. I know I couldn't do that today. I couldn't run up and down a ladder for eight hours with a bloody pile of bricks on my shoulder.

"But what I did on stage at 25, I can do just as well now, when I'm nearly 50. As long as I feel fit and am having fun, I'll keep doing it."

For the latest news on this artist, visit www.tomjones.com.