“If it doesn’t always work, no harm done: the knicker-throwers will still turn out, as long as he deigns to sing Delilah when they do.”

The Evening Standard gave the album four stars, with David Smyth writing: “It’s heady stuff, even more surprising if you’ve only heard him on ITV lately. What a wonderful surprise.”

The Independent’s Helen Brown also gave the album four stars, saying: “As a fan who’s never been able to join in with lock-in singalongs of Jones’ 1968 hit ‘Delilah’ (the whole woman-killing vibe just never grabbed me), I’m not quite sure why Jones and Johns have decided to retell the biblical tale of Samson and Delilah here, with the chap yet again emerging victorious.

“But I love the closing track, a stone cool account of Terry Callier’s ‘Lazarus Man.’