Tom Jones - Love Machine (1976)

That's the perfect song for Tom to do in 1976

Looking back over so much time, my first impression is how much he took from black soul & R&B. It's kind of gross.

Love it, love it, love it.

Love ALL of it.

My second impression is, those platform shoes!

This is a song by The Miracles ca. 1972. But I like the cover. My mom loved Tom Jones but I never saw him on video really, except the odd talk show appearance. He looks great moving on stage. Better than Elvis? I mean..those hips!

In 1976 I wanted an afro and platform shoes. I was 11.

I feel like platform shoes were earlier.

R3 Me too!

I love Tom Jones, this is one of my favorite performances...damn that guy could dance.

The only thing "gross" is your warped ideology, R2.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

Sexy fucker.

How dare he, r2! Doesn't he realize that culture is meant to be hoarded and owned by particular races, and not shared by everyone?!?

R9 Yes what a mover!! That hankie sweat is not COVID friendly tho LOL. And he never kissed 2 sisters?? Puhlease!!!

What can you say? The man is a Sex Bomb!

To me he always seemed like an absurdity. His management used to hire women to throw (hopefully new) panties on the stage.

R2 You are kinda gross for saying that, for real.

I've been watching clips of Tom Jones from the UK version of The Voice. He's got to be close to 80 years old at this point, but he still sounds amazing. And he does exude a certain sexiness, even at his advanced age.

There are a lot of clips of him on YouTube from the 60's (I think he made have had his own TV show back then?) in which he's singing with the likes of Aretha Franklin, Janis Joplin, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young...and he more than holds his own with all of them.

He was never taken particularly seriously because he put out of lot of middle-of-the-road, schlocky material in his heyday, but he really had (and still has) an impressive set of pipes.

Didn't he have a rather public affair with Mary Wilson?

[quote] My second impression is, those platform shoes!

High-heeled shoes, it looks like. I can’t see the entire shoe, so can’t see the differential between the front platform and the heel. But I’d bet the heel was higher.

The shoes are chunky heels not platform, so yes. This was early! Before platforms. I am fascinated by the pants though. I don't know what kind of camera work this is, but it elongates the performers on stage. There is no way Tom Jones is 6'5". He does look great in those pants tho...

R18 The Voice is what got me down the Tom Jones rabbit hole! He does look great for his age. He's pretty hard ass in terms of who he turns around for. Like, he almost never does it! He and Will.I.Am have the same vibe that way on the show.

The shoes are ridiculous but those were the days. He worked it for my mom though and was the one celebrity she ever expressed an interest it.

He's before my time, but I've studied him. Sexy as fuck in such an overt way. I think it's wild. Men don't do that now. Al Green was a sexy seducer too - and better singer.

Tom Jones sang many times with Dusty Springfield and the great R&B artists of his time - it's classic. Aretha sat there and sang The Party's Over. What? How fucking great. The Tom Jones and Dusty Springfield shows are unbelievable in the amount of GREAT singing and entertainment they presented. Looking FAB and sounding great.

He danced and burned up the place with Tina Turner, Wilson Pickett, Cher, Dolly Parton, Little Richard and Stevie Wonder!! Dude deserves respect. Welsh soul. I want to go back in time and F U C K him. Tom Jones was a sexy bitch.

And he left us this. Amazing moment.

Tom was a great blue eyed soul singer when he took it seriously

^^^ You beat me to it. I watched the Tom Jones show when I was a teenager and this duet blew my mind.

R26: check this out. And listen to what Aretha does with It's Not Unusual. Jesus......

WOWowow! Janis Joplin and Tom Jones. That's ALL!

Look out boy. The key is wrong for Dusty. But they sang many times together. Tom's show.

There was no wrong key for 1970 Aretha. Gorgeous singing.

There's no way John Travolta did not study him to prepare for SNF. No way.

R29 Great clip!

R30 Fantastic!! Tom Jones was laser-eyed on Aretha the whole time and she never looked at him. "You in danger girl!" LOL!! Can you imagine the magnetism of these two on that stage? The Ghost Hunter EFM would be off the fking chart...hahaha

I loved "The Midnight Special" on NBC and watched it frequently. It was on Friday nights. My sister favored "In Concert," which was on at the same time, on ABC. The "Midnight Special" performances hold up well even today.

My mom loved him; some of my earliest memories are of the Tom Jones show being on at night.

I've been down the TJ rabbit hole a few times. As cheesy as those old variety shows were (against which we Gen Zers rebelled), the performances hold up.

Sexy bitch with that gorgeous Elvis tone and Roy Orbison cry in his voice. Except Tom Jones had that full rich baritone voice with just enough rasp. He loved American soul singers and he could really fucking sing. Tom And he looked like THIS!!

Tom was the male Cher.

In R35, meant Gen Xers, of course.

Doesn’t he also have a huge schlong?

Tom Jones has a similiar tonality in his voice to Cher.

Always wished they had recorded together .

He had so much soul for a white man from Wales. He was a terrific singer, an amazing dancer, and sexy AF

I'm surprised Network TV in the 60s and 70s allowed him to have that bulge on national television.

I remember when I was a kid, listening to the radio and I heard Janis Joplin sing Bobby McGee for the first time. I was absolutely amazed at her voice and the song. It just pierced my little gay soul. I was probably about 12.

Tom Jones was HAF- there is absolutely no way to deny that.

For comparison, Travolta in Saturday Night Fever.

The Welsh are oppressed.

R39, I think Elvira tells a story about being broken by his big dick.

Holy shit! I think those are the same pants 👖 r44

"Sex Bomb" is a great song. Total earworm.

In her autobiography, Barbara Eden wrote of appearing as a guest on his television show and Tom trying to fuck her all during the week's rehearsals. One night, he tried to gain access to her hotel room at 3:00 AM, but she rebuffed him.

great thread

you bitches deliver on contemporary music

R35 Me, too! "This is Tom Jones" was weekly appointment TV for my mom. I still remember how the show would begin with the camera focused on a microphone. The announcer would say, "Ladies and gentlemen, this is Tom Jones." Then he'd grab the microphone off the stand and start singing and gyrating.

As a 5-year old kid, I didn't really understand his appeal. But watching him now, I get it. He was pure sex, and like another poster above noted, it was rare to see a man be so overtly sexual back then.

Now I know why my mom never missed an episode of his show!

He was bisexual you know.

Can you imagine any male singer today wearing a white speedo on TV while performing his latest hit?

A woman who worked at Leona Helmsley's hotel on CPS claimed she was ordered up to Tom Jones suite at the hotel back in the late 60s to ask him to quiet down as other guests were complaining. She said when he came to the door in a towel, the room was filled with naked men having what she claimed to be an orgy. I was "out" at the time (yes, eldergay) and she was bearding for a closeted (and rich) cousin of mine. I remember thinking she brought this tidbit up to show me it was "normal" to beard for someone in the closet. And I remember saying, "But he's married." She just looked at me and smiled.

[Quote] Looking back over so much time, my first impression is how much he took from black soul & R&B. It's kind of gross.

How? Motown, Stax, Atlantic - the hits of these labels have endured much more than most of Tom's MOR crap. When was the last time you heard a cover of "The New Young Mexican Puppeteer"?

Vocal coaches are in awe of his voice. He's untrained. It's almost all 'head voice'- he just blasts it.

[quote]Didn't he have a rather public affair with Mary Wilson?

Why would anyone admit to that?

....

I wonder if his wife was happy with her lot.

He was dating Priscilla Presley a few years ago, not sure if they're still on.

The son is a...?

...a fat, R61, the son is a fat.

He looks a little paunchy, but in his younger days, he was 6'1" of pure magnetism!

He's a satyr. Like Broadway Joe.

It's not an insult.

I preformed the hits for my dear Aunt Barbara. What’s Up Pussycat followed by a costume change. When I returned, with her dead husband’s Brylcreem in my youthful locks, I would do an Elvis medley. I was ten years old.

The son turned out alright. They're probably more like brothers- only 17 years apart:

"A ladies' man early on, Jones was 16 when he got his high school girlfriend pregnant. They married, and have remained together ever since -- though Jones has admitted that at the height of his fame, he slept with up to 250 groupies a year"

he was corny AF

Nah, R67 I don't think he was corny. I was born in 1983 and I get off on vintage Tom Jones performances. His heart was in it and his presentation was his own. A lot like Al sexy ass Green. You like them or you don't. But they weren't corny. They were just blatantly sexy men & very good singers.

Rockin'

Yes, R19, and she was a WHORE.

Tom Jones had a weird relationship with his wife. He was married to her for 57 years until her death, throughout his hundreds of affairs and the birth of his child with another woman.

Plus, she was very plain and not at all they type of woman you'd expect a sex bomb like Jones to be with. In her later years, she became agoraphobic and never left her home.

They obviously had some kind of understanding. She probably was okay looking the other way as long as he took care of her financially.

He impregnated her at 16.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

R73 That's his wife, pre-agoraphobia.

Apparently, his wife got emphysema when she got older and she didn't leave their house as she became more ill. Tom Jones has never said she was agoraphobic, but people who knew her said when she got sick, she never left the house again.

I well remember when we first started hearing his music here in the states most everyone assumed he was a black guy.

Re children - just the one, dear?

He was sexy as fuck.

R76, the first time I heard “Thunderball” I thought it was Sarah Vaughan.

Definitely has the magic combo of talent charisma and looks. Wowow. I wonder how he escaped the drugs and alcohol part of the fame spiral? Just thinking of Burton and Hopkins. Artistic temperament + Fame = raging alc..? Of course not limited to handsome Welsh men...

R78 TJ = full package!! Would love a closer look🧐

Any relation?

I had a pair of black platform shoes in 1974-75. I loved them. Brings back a lot of memories.

ALL my aunts and the neighborhood ladies loved themselves some Tom . I remember he was on some interview and the guy asked him if it was true he'd slept with 100s of women and was there anyone famous ? Tom said "a gentleman never divulges the name of a lady whose company he enjoyed" . I didnt get him as a youngun but I totally got into him as a teen !

Tom has been said to extol the virtues of the three Cs after dinner: Cognac, Cigar, and... you can probably guess the third.

Illegitimate son?

Sir Tom Jones to you boyos. Another talented Welshman. This thread cheered me up in the pandemic. He is a National Living Treasure.

[quote]I well remember when we first started hearing his music here in the states most everyone assumed he was a black guy.

He sang his first two big hits with such a Welsh accent no one confused him with a black singer.

But he is black. Just like Dame Shirley.

I watched the tv show on ABC in 1969. I was just nine years old, but I knew exactly what I liked.

Even Elvis had a crush on Tom

Nice mutton chops!

“So, I was in the shower this night, right, and as I’m washing my hair with my eyes closed I hear ‘ahhuuuhhhhhh’…I thought it was the plumbing, but no. So, then I thought ‘Wait a minute…who is this…?'”

“I opened my eyes. The shower head was there and the door was there. And right there was Elvis Presley leaning over the shower door and he was singing to me in the shower!”

[quote]. I remember he was on some interview and the guy asked him if it was true he'd slept with 100s of women and was there anyone famous ?

Famous? No--just Mary Wilson.

I wonder why he got such a drastic nose job and adopted that Afro.

At any rate, the man did do a lot of schlock, but in so many other cases, he really knew how to pick a song. There was one album in the '90s on which he did "Situation" (the Yaz/Yazoo song), and it was amazing.

His pipes sound like they're made of leather and Welsh coal dust.

I’m not into watching him.

Doesn’t he look kind of like Greg Brady, though, in the face?

If u zoom in on r73 u seem dick head...low

R86 - that's awful.

But does he have the range?

I just threw my panties at the computer

Did they completely cover it R100 ?

Why did he wear that giant cross? Was he afraid of vampires?

R102, to offset his low center of balance.

Fk I love you guys DL... 😂 This thread is a slow burn w so much amazingness! 💕

Make a wish and blow!

Is he white?

Thinking Tom Jones would stand upright 3 days after he died if he had a chance at Pussay...LOL. From The Voice UK finale. He looks damn good and singing live - I am ALL IN!

Class Act! 100%

He did that DNA thang to see if he was black. Seems he is not.

Hey, my dad is gonna be 86 (b. 1934). Tom Jones will be 80 in like 2 wks (b. Jun 7, 1940). It's so awesome to see older people active and with it, doing what they love! My dad is like a 35 yr. old. Walks 5 km every day, and then 6 flights of stair up to their condo. Only trouble for dad is his eyes. He has good genes and always took care of himself. Tom seems the same! I love this so much!!

Cock Ring alert!

As a kid, I always felt sorry for Tom's choking balls on his TV shows.

He said in a recent interview, that at the beginning of his career he was so upset by all the homosexuals in the entertainment industry he almost gave it up and ran back to Wales.

What a MAN!

He manages to make almost all of the songs he sings sound exactly the same.

& in his 60s/70s TV shows, the lame jokes and his fake smiles between the songs are puke inducing.

Was Gordon Mills gay?

1976 Tom was fit and hot. Elvis was fat and dead a year later.

I saw him once in a theater in the round in Cleveland, Ohio. I think the stage revolved. Women were throwing bras and panties on the stage. They seemed to bring them along rather than taking their underwear off, however. He put on a great show back in the day.

This never happens. Reality show judge asks contestant if they are related to a songwriter from his distant past? Guess what? Songwriter's son! And then, Mr. Tom Jones, from his judge's chair without any beforehand knowledge or prep, stands up and does impromtu duet with contestant!! CLASS ACT!!

Jones sounds amazing! How old in this clip, please?

I remember being amazed to find out he was born and raised in the U.K. because he sounds American.

Most British singers of Tom's generation sound American.

*when they sing.

R36 That vid is amazing. The tones are so clear! Thanks for sharing!

R121 I’m talking about speaking voice.

[quote]He manages to make almost all of the songs he sings sound exactly the same. & in his 60s/70s TV shows, the lame jokes and his fake smiles between the songs are puke inducing.

True he's like Shirley Bassey in that regard. But still great.

R111 LOL

Yeah, Jones is too cabaret for me, even when singing more bluesy material.

DL fave Lulu appeared on the same Blues show as the clip above. She makes a better job of it than Tom.

R127 Nice, but Alison Moyet does a great version of Cry Me a River.

Has Tom ever done anal?

Perfect talent.

The man is 80 years old this year. Even if he was 75 in the clip above, he sounds amazing at that age.