Ten Things You Never Knew About Shirley Bassey

The 'Goldfinger' singer has played pretty much every major venue in the world and has collaborated with some of the biggest stars of all time, but here are ten facts that you may not know about old Shirl.

1. Shirley Bassey was born on January 8, 1937 in Tiger Bay, Cardiff to Henry and Eliza Jane. She was their seventh child!

2. Bassey's first job involved her packaging enamelware in a factory. However, this didn't stop her testing out her vocal chords. She says: "The supervisor would say, 'Bassey, what do you think you're doing? All of you, get back to work!' The whole factory would stop. I didn't realise what I was doing."

3. Shirley may be quite clean-cut these days, but in 1956 one of her early singles was actually banned by the BBC. Her track 'Burn My Candle (At Both Ends)' was deemed too suggestive by radio bosses.

4. Bassey has said that she is glad that she got discovered in the 1950s, arguing that modern-day musicians are not given enough care. "These days, if kids do get discovered, it's sad, it's not lasting, because they're not taken care of," she thinks. "I was taken care of. They're instant stars, they can't handle it, and the inevitable happens, they turn to drugs and drink."

5. Bassey hasn't lead a life completely free of controversy. In 1978, she pleaded guilty to being drunk and disorderly and shouting abuse in the street. It was the result of too much pink champagne, apparently!

6. Bassey has become synonymous with James Bond thanks to her work on the classic theme songs. But can you name them all? She has actually worked on three: 'Goldfinger', 'Diamonds Are Forever' and 'Moonraker'.

7. Most of Bassey's biggest hits came in the '60s and '70s, but she had a renaissance in the '90s courtesy of some unlikely collaborators - British big beat group Propellerheads! 'History Repeating', their 1997 collab with Bassey, landed them a UK dance chart number one. In the sleevenotes for their album, the dance duo offered "maximum respect" to Bassey for sparing her time to work with them.

8. In recent years, the Welsh diva has branched out in other ways to show that she still knows how to get down and dirty with hard work. She famously stole the show at the 2007 Glastonbury Festival, playing in the mud dressed in an extravagant pink Julien MacDonald dress. She also recorded the Rugby Union World Cup track 'World In Union' in 1999, taking to the turf at the Millennium Stadium to perform for thousands of rugga-mad fans.

9. Bassey must quite literally have wardrobes filled with awards she has won down the years. She has been given gongs by Music Week, the Brits, TV Times, the Variety Club and the Grammy Hall of Fame. She also has a CBE, DBE, a Madame Tussauds waxwork and a Guinness World Record (for 'Most Successful British Female Singer') to her name.

10. You can say what you like about Shirley, but never, ever, call her a "belter". She says: "Don't say belting. I hate that word. It's an awful word. I don't like belting. Belting is disrespectful, you know. Only my kind of singer is accused of belting. You don't say that opera singers belt. I don't belt. That's just my voice."