Last night the Sproules and the Bonks....
hit the third leg of their personal "Geezer Rock Tour" (Ringo Starr last October; Brian Wilson last month) when we went to see 1960's superstar/heart throb Tom Jones at the Benedum Center.
Tom Jones is 76 years old. You never quite know what to expect when you go to hear a guy in his seventies sing, but from the moment Jones sang the opening lines of his opening song, you realized that the Jones Pipes have lost nothing - nothing! - since the time you heard him for the first time, back when Lyndon Johnson was President.
First of all, Tom Jones has aged well:
Still a great looking guy who can belt out a song. Oh, he doesn't move and swivel like he did back in the day, but, as I said above, he can still belt out a song.
Jones was backed by a nine piece band that included a terrific brass section. The show was a mixture of new stuff, old stuff, rock and roll, gospel, blues. A polished and very professional Vegas-type show. The man is a Pro, no doubt about it.
Jones also gave the fans what they wanted, a handful of Jones classics - Delilah, What's New, Pussycat, Green Green Grass of Home, Thunderball, and, of course, It's Not Unusual. He sung What's New, Pussycat accompanied only by an accordion and a tuba! How often have you seen that at a rock concert? (Minor quibble: He did not sing Help Yourself, and that bummed me out a little bit.)
All in all, a great night out and a great show and performance from a guy who shows no signs at all of slowing down.
Let's close this post out with a view of a younger Tom Jones (from 1989) singing perhaps his most famous song:
(All photos, except the one of the Benedum marquee, courtesy of Dan Bonk.)
