heartbreaker

Look. There's nothing that I can write about the guitar-slinging rebel from Gainesville that someone much more eloquent and informed hasn't already tweeted in one hundred and forty characters. But, doggonit, Petty's songbook slowly became so woven into the fabric of my life that it was almost unnoticeable. Unnoticeable that is until I look through the stacks of mix tapes and compact discs that I've curated for Miranda over the duration of our almost two decades together. Petty's everywhere. Especially in those early mix tapes, his name is showing up over and over again on those J cards.

From the beginning of our relationship, Petty and the Heartbreakers were major players in soundtracking our courtship. During our first year of dating, Petty released Echo. You know, his divorce record. We would listen to it over and over and over again while driving around Muncie, IN, eating bean burritos, and dropping in to see friends working third shift on the edge of town. That summer two of sat under the stars and reveled in Petty's masterful live performance. During our first year of being husband and wife, we were driving from Indy to visit friends in Terre Haute. We were listening to Petty albums on the car stereo and getting so lost in singing along to our favorite songs that before we knew it, we were almost in Louisville, KY. We had been driving for over an hour in the wrong direction without a care in the world. They're just a handful of moments, but such great memories.

Ugh. There's been a lot of devastating news to endure lately. Petty's passing to the other side of life seems unexpected. Again, there's nothing new that I can necessarily add to the conversation. But, the songs he gave us... Wow. They will forever echo down the longest of highways and under the darkest of summer skies. Several years ago, Miranda and I watched the 4-hour doc on Petty and the Heartbreakers, Runnin' Down A Dream. It. Is. Stunning. You can watch it right now on Netflix and you should if you haven't. I know... 4 hours... Worth it. In the film there's a clip of Petty and the boys performing a song that was ridiculously kept off of the album Long After Dark at producer Jimmy Iovine's request. In hindsight, the band believed that the track "Keeping Me Alive" should have been on the record. 

"Sometimes we ride around. She plays the radio up loud. If I was sad, well I'm happy now." 

In a world of uncertainty, Petty reminds us of what matters: Love and music.

Thank you, Mister Petty.

Keepin' me alive

Throughout the past fifteen or so years of my life, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers have consistently enthralled and inspired me and my own creative endeavors. Even before knowing much of the band's own history, Petty always came across to me as the genuine article. For all the band's success and MTV exposure, he never seemed to me a guy who would compromise his artistic vision or take any shit from anyone. When Miranda and I became friends and started dating several years ago, the music of Petty and the Heartbreakers often played on the car stereo and always showed up multiple times on mix tapes. The summer after we started dating, we celebrated my birthday under the stars at Deer Creek Music Center enjoying Petty and company along with the incomparable Lucinda Williams.

This Christmas, santa brought us a copy of the new Peter Bogdanovich film, Runnin' Down a Dream, which I've been dying to see since its release back in October. Over two nights, Miranda and I sat down and watched this detailed four hour film tracing the inception and the history of Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers. Since finishing the film, I've been revisiting all of the Petty albums which we have collected in our home with an invigorated and deepened admiration for the man and his music. The song Miranda and I have listened to over and over and over again can be found as a lost track in the 1995 box set Playback. The song is featured during a studio take in one of my favorite parts of the Bogdanovich film. The title of the song is "Keeping Me Alive" and was actually cut from the Long After Dark sessions. In the film, Petty admits that fighting producer Jimmy Iovine for the addition of this track and a few other acoustic based songs would have made the album stronger, to which Iovine replies "Yeah, after the third album you should probably shoot your producer." Maybe this song was just too incredible to be included on an album. It stands on its own as proof of Tom Petty as one of the truly great american songwriters.