3. He credits Sandie Shaw with his big break
Struggling to get into the music industry, Sir Tom had been recording a lot of demos for established artists.
But he struck lucky when he was asked to record a demo of It’s Not Unusual for Sandie Shaw.
He told The Telegraph: “I suppose I must have sounded strong on it – I wish I still had the demo, but unfortunately I’ve lost it. Anyway, when Sandie Shaw heard the demo, she said, ‘Whoever is singing this song, it’s his; I could never sing it like that’. God bless her! Because if she’d taken it, things might never have happened.”