Nothing Like A Dame

I was very excited to find an email from an old friend in my Inbox.

Yep, that's right, Dame Shirley Bassey emailed me herself (including the honorific!) to let me know that her new LP, The Performance, is available for sale in the UK.
I dutifully visited her website, where I was pleased to see I could download a free track, and learned more about the record. Seems like she took a play from her old chum Nancy Sinatra, who released an album a few years back with songs written for her by Morrissey, Bono, Thurston Moore, Jarvis Cocker, etc. Anyway, Dame Shirl has some new tunes by Gary Barlow, Rufus Wainwright, the Pet Shop Boys, and more.

I first discovered Dame Shirl as a wee tot with a record my parents had called Shirley Bassey Belts The Best!, which was a collection of Broadway songs.

I still associate "Everythings's Coming Up Roses" and "If Ever I Would Love You" with Shirl. It wasn't until many years later when I read an article called "Sassy Miss Bassey" that I deduced the correct pronunciation of her last name.

Now, I never forgot ol' Shirl, but I sure was glad to be in a Gentlemen's Bar a few years ago and see a video of her covering Pink. I think my jaw may have dropped, but we'll let the history books decide if that's true or not.

Some fink turned off embedding for that video proper, but here she is cutting it up live:




She sure is a fun one. I'm so excited to wait patiently for the new album to be released legally in the US in a few months!

In the meantime, here's the lady visiting our mutual friends, The Muppets, for a little Goldfinger action.

I'll be giving thanks for Dame Shirley this Thanksgiving, for sure.