After 15 years without a new album in the U.S., Tom Jones will release a disc of almost entirely original material this autumn.
The 68-year-old singer will release "24 Hours" on November 25th via S-Curve Records. It's a retro-tinged album much in the style of Amy Winehouse's "Back to Black" that finds the Welshman's voice as strong as ever.
There are two covers on the album - Bruce Springsteen's "The Hitter" and "I'm Alive" by Tommy James and the Shondells - but the rest Jones either co-wrote or collaborated with the songwriters. Bono and the Edge of U2 appear on the song "Sugar Daddy."
"The fire is still in me," Jones told the Associated Press in an interview, speaking by phone from his home in Los Angeles. "Not to be an oldie, but a goodie. I want to be a contender."
The disc was produced by British production duo Future Cat, who have cut tracks for Lily Allen and Kate Nash. With backing horns the sound is often distinctly old-school.
"We've been thinking about this for a while, doing a retro sound but new," said Jones. "And Amy Winehouse, she cracked it. When that album came out, my son called me right away and said, 'You know what we've been talking about? Listen to this.'"
While his 2000 album "Reload" was a hit in Europe and elsewhere (buoyed by the club hit "Sex Bomb"), it was never released in the U.S.
"The hits that I've had recently have all been European," he said. "I've had a lot of success worldwide, which is a pain because I live here and I do most of my shows in America ... Hopefully this will straighten that out."
