Bassey aims to be oldest artist to top the pop charts

It is her 70th birthday year and Dame Shirley Bassey is intent on marking it like a star-studded trouper.

The singer famed for classics such as "Goldfinger" and "Diamonds are Forever", in a career spanning 50 years, is to release her first new solo single in a decade, "The Living Tree", working with a rock band, Never the Bride, who previously supported The Who. She is also set to record a full album of remixed tracks in the mould of the Ibizan café bar sound of Café del Mar.

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And she has even been approached to appear at Glastonbury Festival where long-established stars from Tom Jones to Rod Stewart have re-established their credibility with a younger audience in recent years.

The return to recording follows a chance near- encounter with Catherine Feeney and Nikki Lamborn of Never the Bride when they were performing in Dame Shirley's adopted home of Monaco in 2005.

Discovering the legendary Welsh chanteuse used the gym at their hotel, the pair persuaded a concierge to pop a copy of their CD with a note into her pigeonhole.

To their astonishment, back in London a few weeks later, they received a call from Dame Shirley's management seeking a meeting about the "Living Tree" track, which they had always considered "pure [James] Bond".

"We didn't write it with Shirley Bassey in mind, but the way it came out, we always said, 'Wouldn't it be amazing if this could end up being a Bond song?' You know how you have these little dreams?" Lamborn, 36, said yesterday.

After confirming the deal with Dame Shirley over tea at the Landmark Hotel in London, they went into a recording studio last year.

"We just kept pinching ourselves," Lamborn said. "I just thought, I'm going to drink tequila for the rest of my life, because it was that hallucinatory.

"It was stunning. My heart was in my mouth because I'm such a fan. She really goes for it, sweat was lashing off her [in the recording studio]. I think her voice is even better now than she's been in the past."

Release was delayed because Dame Shirley already had a tour planned and was then involved in the Marks & Spencer Christmas television advertising campaign. But now the band, which has been together for 15 years but always just missed the big time, is hoping to help her secure a world record.

If the single tops the charts when it is released in May, they believe she would be the oldest artist to achieve a number one hit.

They are not certain whether Dame Shirley will appear at Glastonbury.

"It is such a huge event and such a cool event, but explaining how brilliant that opportunity is to a lady in the dame's position is a little bitdifficult," Lamborn said. "She suggested she wants to do a television special."

Nathan Graves, the label manager for Lock Stock and Barrel Records which is releasing the new single and album, said he had no doubts about working with Bassey when it was suggested. "I'm a fan and working with people you want to work with is always exciting," he said. "Finding a new audience to re-ignite a legend is a good thing."

He was responsible for club/dance re-mixes of jazz classics by the likes of Ella Fitzgerald, issued as Verve Remixed, when he worked for Universal and is planning something similar for Bassey.

The Belgian DJs The Glimmers have already re-mixed her singing the Grace Jones track "Slave to the Rhythm", while Mark de Clive-Lowe is remixing the Bond theme "You Only Live Twice" in a Brazilian funk vibe. The album should be released this summer.