Just a few years ago, Sharon Jones kept hearing that she was "too old, too short, too fat, and too dark" to get much work in a pop-music world dominated by the young and the skinny. But today, she's speed-dialling Denzel Washington with one hand, giving Lou Reed the brushoff with the other, and packing for a cross-country tour.

What gives? Well, it seems that old-school soul is having a revival, spearheaded by the band that the 51-year-old Jones now fronts. Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings are a sharp-suited flashback to the golden days of Stax: eight great musicians working deep in the pocket and topped off by a one-woman whirlwind bent on channelling Aretha Franklin circa Spirit in the Dark. The act is irresistible as the aforementioned film and art-rock superstars will testify.

Unfortunately, their worlds have not always dovetailed as well as they might. Jones, for instance, had been tapped to accompany Reed for the European performances of his Berlin song cycle when Hollywood came calling in the form of Washington's soon-to-be-released The Great Debaters. The respected actor and director wanted the singer for an on-screen role as well as seven soundtrack songs, so how could she say no?

"I had to turn Lou down," Jones confesses, on the line from her Brooklyn home. "We tried to work everything so maybe I could do the movie and tour with Lou too, but it just couldn't happen.

"Lou was a little angry with me, but I saw him in July," she adds. "He tried to walk away, but I ran and grabbed him and said, 'Lou, please don't be mad at me! Give me a hug!' So I gave him a little squeeze around the waist, and he was okay."

Jones reports that she's also patched things up with another New York innovator. Although she failed a 1990s backup-singer audition with David Byrne he thought she wasn't svelte enough she's just finished singing on a track for the former Talking Heads frontman's next CD.

"I just said, 'That's okay, David, that's okay,'" she relates. "'If I had gone out on the road with you years ago, you probably wouldn't have liked me, and I wouldn't be here doing this stuff with you right now.' He just started laughing. He's a little more easy than Lou. He's a nice man. Lou's a nice man too, but Lou is Lou!"

Next in her sights is Justin Timberlake. Although Jones claims not to listen to contemporary pop, she says she'd make an exception for the "SexyBack" singer. "I could play with Justin Timberlake," she purrs. "He's got a little something going on!" And she laughs, knowing that if her luck holds, it could easily happen.

For now, Jones's main focus remains her work with the Dap-Kings, who also backed Amy Winehouse on her "Rehab" single. She and the band have just released their third full-length, 100 Days, 100 Nights, which is packed with 10 original compositions that sound like lost Muscle Shoals classics. Jones's vivid presence is even more captivating; paradoxically, she looks and sounds younger than she did when she first joined the band just over a decade ago.

"I think it's just the energy I have when I'm up there on the stage," she explains. "You've got to keep yourself looking good to keep up!"

Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings play the Commodore on Sunday (December 9).