Tom Jones

Born June 7, 1940, Pontypridd, Wales. "Jones The Voice" first recorded for Decca in 1964, and scored the first of many trans-atlantic hits with "It's Not Unusual". By the end of the 1960s, Jones was a regular performer at Las Vegas, and had his own networked US TV show, "This Is Tom Jones". Though his record sales tailed off during the 1970s, he remained a huge draw as a live performer right through the 70s and 80s (and up to the present day, indeed.) In 1987, he returned to the UK and quickly re-established himself as a recording artist when the typically bombastic "A Boy From Nowhere" (from the unstaged musical "Matador") reached number 2, and the following year made his first real foray into dance music as we know it by collaborating with The Art Of Noise on "Kiss". From there, he has continued to include dance-styled material in his repertoire, alongside a diverse range of other musical styles. Although he remains a thoroughly old-fashioned entertainer whose present popularity is perhaps predicated as much on kitsch value as anything else, he also - in his sixties - fully retains the vocal ability that made him a star in the first place.