What's new, pussycat?

'I've got male intuition I've got sexual ambition I'm the last great tradition Let me state my position.'

It's not unusual for pop stars to strut their stuff. But you'd have to be more cocksure than most to sing those lines. Bono understood that about Tom Jones when the U2 frontman wrote Sugar Daddy to show off his Welsh friend's big voice, and bigger reputation.

'I'm bragging a bit there,' admits Jones, chuckling as he repeats the opening words to the song and recalling Bono urging him not to take it 'too literally'. 'But then it goes, 'The older I get the better I was; It's all just a show; It's all just because; The show must go on.''

Three months shy of his 70th birthday, Jones is old enough not to take himself too seriously. Which is why he can boast about his attributes while acknowledging the scourge of time and admitting his is simply an act, and one that includes tongue-in-cheek performances tailored to encourage female fans to bump up lingerie sales whenever he grinds into town.

One of 13 tracks on his latest album, 24 Hours, Sugar Daddy is part of a full-blooded music menu Jones promises to deliver to Hong Kong on Wednesday, his first concert in the city since 1973. Judging by the rapt 'he-still-has-what-it-takes' concert reviews of his world tour, which has swept through the US, Chile, Australia, Malaysia and elsewhere since last October, he should have no trouble encouraging enthusiastic audience participation while taking his fans through sing-along singles (Delilah and The Green, Green Grass of Home, among them) as well as new songs and unusual covers.

One such golden oldie planned for Hong Kong is Hard to Handle, a posthumous hit for Otis Redding, who died in a plane crash in 1967. 'He thought I was the best soul singer in the world,' Jones remembers. 'I said, 'Coming from you that is a compliment.''