Tom Jones 1995 Interview: Elvis, McCartney and the Song That Got Away

In this January 1995 broadcast of The Dini Petty Show, Tom Jones walks on to thirty years of screaming fans, just weeks after the release of The Lead and How to Swing It. Before he even sits down, a fan in the audience produces a newspaper clipping from 1965, the year “It’s Not Unusual” made him a star, and the conversation runs from there back to the beginning.

The heart of the hour is the music that made him and the one that got away. Jones explains how he picks a song, credits manager Gordon Mills with writing “It’s Not Unusual” for him, and remembers the Las Vegas nights with Elvis Presley that didn’t end until the sun came up, the two of them singing together till morning. Then he tells the story he has never stopped thinking about: Paul McCartney wrote him a song, it was in his hands, and the timing went wrong.

There is plenty more. He recalls the pub gig that paid one pound, the drummer from his first band who went on to join AC/DC, and the girl from school he married long before the fame. He talks about keeping up 150 nights a year on stage, working with his son Mark, why he walked away from a Jackie Collins movie, The Stud, and the Van Morrison and Simpsons connections, and he offers some fame advice for Luke Perry and Jason Priestley. The studio audience saves the most famous Tom Jones question for last.

Unseen since its original January 1995 CTV broadcast, this master tape has been meticulously optimized and preserved via the official archive of The Dini Petty Show.