The Tom Petty Project artwork

The Tom Petty Project

161 episodes - English - Latest episode: 22 days ago - ★★★★★ - 23 ratings

Join Kevin Brown as he digs into Tom Petty's catalogue, starting with the first track from the debut Heartbreakers album, all the way through to the final song from Hypnotic Eye. Along the way, there will be conversations with musicians, fans and people connected with or inspired by Tom in some way. This podcast is in no way affiliated with the Tom Petty estate.


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Music Commentary Music Music History tom petty heartbreakers mudcrutch travelling wilburys mike campbell benmont tench stan lynch ron blair howie epstein scott thurston
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Episodes

Greatest Hits (with John Paulsen)

April 03, 2024 09:00 - 1 hour - 96.3 MB

A really fun one today folks. John and Kevin dig deep into inclusions and ommissions from 1993's Greatest Hits. We have a conversation about formats (CD vs vinyl), chronological ordering vs sequencing, and whether ballads belong on Greatest Hits compilations. Both John and Kevin have one song that the other feels simply doesn't belong on the Greatest Hits album and have a fulsome conversation about their reasoning! Do check out www.4for4.com if you're into fantasy football and follow John o...

The Petty 8ight with Sean and Todd McGinity

March 27, 2024 09:00 - 1 hour - 146 MB

Today’s episode is the third installment in my Petty 8ight series, where I bring in musicians who aren’t Pettyheads, give them eight deeper cuts that they likely haven’t heard before, and get their thoughts on them. In this episode, my willing newbies are Sean and Todd McGinity. The brothers are based in Winnipeg and have a long history of writing, recording and playing shows both together in bands as well as in other projects. They’re also both seasoned podcasters, with their show The SeanG...

Something in the Air

March 20, 2024 16:28 - 21 minutes - 30.7 MB

A major change in this cover version is the format of the lyrics. Something in the Air is a fairly ominous call to arms. The original was released in May of 1969 when the Vietnam War was still raging at its most furious. Speedy Keen said that told ZigZag magazine in 1975 of the song "It was a reflection of what I was seeing at the time". But rather than using the overtly observational third verse and the line “Hand out the arms and ammo. We're gonna blast our way through here”, Tom repeats t...

Mary Jane's Last Dance

March 13, 2024 09:00 - 27 minutes - 39 MB

When author Paul Zollo asks Tom about the song in his book Conversations With Tom Petty, and mentions that the song had been partially written some years previously, Tom confirms this, saying, “That was one I wrote during the Full Moon Fever sessions. I wrote all but the chorus. I just had the loop going around and around and really had most of the words and everything. And I played the tape for Rick Rubin and he liked it a lot and suggested I write a chorus. There were maybe five years betw...

Peace in L.A.

March 06, 2024 09:00 - 24 minutes - 35.4 MB

In March and April of 1992, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers were wrapping up the European final leg of their Into The Great Wide Open tour. This leg saw them play dates in Germany, the UK, Ireland, Belgium, Switzerland, France, Norway, and on April 3rd, they closed out the tour in Malmo, Sweden, playing an extended set of 28 songs to 6000 Swedish fans, closing out with Learning to Fly, Making Some Noise, and then serene lullaby, Alright For Now. Tom couldn’t have anticipated that on his retu...

10 Questions with Peter Nester

February 28, 2024 09:00 - 46 minutes - 64.1 MB

Today's episode is my ten questions with the brilliant Peter Nester. I usually put these out as bonus episodes in the same week as my chat with that guest, but Pete's answers to these questions were so thorough, considered, and beautifully expounded, that I felt this needed to be a regular release. I guarantee you'll hear which artist he wants to cover which Tom Petty song and go "Oh, damn, yeh I need to hear that!" and our discussion about which is his favourite album was a particular highl...

Jeff Slate Returns

February 23, 2024 09:00 - 1 hour - 109 MB

This is a special non-Petty episode of the podcast. I haven’t recorded one in ages, but when former guest Jeff Slate reached out to me to ask if I’d be interested in talking to him about his new single which is out now and the album it’s from which will drop in May, it wasn’t a hard sell for me as I'm a fan of both his music and his writing. We had a great chat about throwaway lyrics, production differences when you bring in outside voices, and recording an album with people in remote loca...

Peter Nester

February 21, 2024 09:00 - 1 hour - 126 MB

I have two words for you: Yogi Berra. But what does the Yankees catcher have to do with my conversation with Pete Nester? Tune in to find out! Today's episode is a sprawling, hugely enjoyable conversation I had with a fellow music podcaster who I've been listening to for a couple and a half years now. Pete was very supportive of this show right from the getgo and offered me some valuable advice when I was starting up around issues of music usage/rights etc. He's also just a damn fine human ...

Into the Great Wide Open (with John Paulsen)

February 14, 2024 09:00 - 1 hour - 133 MB

Another long one this season folks! But again there's so much to talk about with this album and we felt we needed to talk about each individual track. John and I had a good discussion about the background to the recording of this album and where this sits in the evolution of Tom's songwriting. We also didn't have a "producer for the day" discussion because we agreed that the album is sequenced pretty much flawlessly. Do check out www.4for4.com if you're into fantasy football and follow Joh...

Built To Last

February 07, 2024 20:17 - 24 minutes - 34.2 MB

The lyrics in Built to Last are unambiguously hopeful and quietly resilience. Perhaps it’s Tom’s last attempt to build a creative buttress around his failing marriage. Perhaps its an equal attempt to put up a wall around a band that had gone through a major friction point and were probably still unsure what direction they would be taking. The lyric feels, in some ways, like a more introspective complement to I Won’t Back Down. The sentiment is the same really, but the perspective and the for...

Makin' Some Noise

January 31, 2024 09:00 - 23 minutes - 33.3 MB

I know that, because you’re listening to this podcast that you must love rock n roll music. And when you hear the crackle of a cable being plugged into an amp, or that low buzz from the speaker, there’s just something primal and irresistible that happens to you if you love this type of music. Your whole body responds to it in both a physical and emotional way. It’s not “just” music. It becomes like oxygen for your soul. Makin’ Some Noise just captures that rapturous feeling of delight that w...

You and I Will Meet Again

January 24, 2024 09:00 - 26 minutes - 36.7 MB

Another simple song, another catchy hook, another memorable idea that Tom puts into our heads and leaves there as a treat. I’m 100% sold on Into The Great Wide Open these days, where I didn’t listen to it front to back very often before. This song is another little forgotten deep cut that does so much with so little, very economically. The core idea is a fairly profound one but it’s wrapped up in a breezy, light little piece of music. Just marvellous. There’s a ton to love about this song, b...

10 Questions with Mark Lindsey

January 10, 2024 09:00 - 23 minutes - 32.6 MB

Today's episode is my ten questions with the amazing Mark Lindsey. As a veteran of over 40 Heartbreakers shows and as a guy who has seen Mudcrutch, Bob Dylan, ELO, and Bob Dylan live, my questions about opening acts, shows Mark would like to see, and Mudcrutch or the Wilburys became all the more interesting. His picks for people to cover Tom Petty songs were also on the money! Don't forget that Mark runs the Sight and Sound Care charity that provides free vision care, including examinations...

Out in the Cold

January 03, 2024 16:41 - 20 minutes - 28.9 MB

In Conversations With Tom Petty, Tom says “I struggled with the lyrics quite a bit. It was one of those things where you struggle and you always wonder if you got everything out of it that you could.” He does go on to say that during a rehearsal for the song he found that he enjoyed the lyrics, but I think the way they’re crafted belies any notion of uncertainty on his part. I love that alternating point of view in the two halves of each verse and then the two halves of this relationship, in...

Mark Lindsey

December 29, 2023 09:00 - 52 minutes - 71.9 MB

Today's episode is my wonderful conversation with one of the finest human beings you're going to find anywhere on the planet. As well as being a lifelong superfan of Tom Petty and a veteran of over 40 of his shows, Mark also runs the Sight and Sound Care charity that provides free vision care, including examinations, contact lenses and glasses to musicians and music industry workers all across the US. If you want to find out more about Sight and Sound Care and even make a donation, please ...

Trapper Schoepp

December 27, 2023 09:00 - 50 minutes - 69 MB

Today's episode is a conversation I had with Milwaukee-based musician Trapper Schoepp. We discussed his love of Tom's music, the background behind his cover of Free Fallin' which you can find on all streaming platforms, his co-write with Bob Dylan (yes, you read that right!) and he rapid-fire answered my ten questions, which is why they aren't being broked out into a separate episiode. We were also joined by his wonderful pup, Leroy, who did his best to derail Trapper's tender story! Go fin...

10 Questions with Doc Wiley & Chris Gillette

December 24, 2023 09:00 - 36 minutes - 50.1 MB

Today's episode is Doc Wiley and Chris Gillette's answers to my ten questions. Doc found a good hack to my question "Which Tom Petty concert from history would you like to have seen" and Chris talked wonderfully about Walls and mentioned that The Waiting played it during their PBS special, which will be airing in January next year. For more info, videos, and performance dates, please check out their website here: https://www.thewaitingmontana.com NOTE: This episode contains a small amount ...

Doc Wiley & Chris Gillette

December 22, 2023 09:00 - 1 hour - 89.3 MB

Today's episode is the fourth installment of my #Guestember series of conversations. This one is with the wonderfully funny and insightful Doc Wiley and Chris Gillette, who are the bass player and singer/rhythm guitarist in Montana-based tribute band, The Waiting. Like my previous tribute band guests, The Waiting don't put on wigs and costumes and play the songs note for note, but instead apply their exceptional musicianship to lovingly interpret Tom's catalogue. Their debut PBS special perf...

Too Good To Be True

December 20, 2023 16:44 - 22 minutes - 32.1 MB

Maybe she’s the girl who is gonna be picked up in King’s Highway. Maybe the thing she’s finally managed to break free from is a relationship with a self-obsessed movie star who has been pulled into a world of glamour and glitz. Maybe, just maybe, I’m massively overthinking this, but it sure is fun to connect dots and build out the narrative in your own mind! Today’s episode covers the second song on side two of "Into The Great Wide Open", "Too Good To Be True'". You can listen to the song ...

10 Questions with Will Porteous

December 16, 2023 09:00 - 32 minutes - 44.6 MB

Today's episode covers the Ten Questions part of my conversation with Will Porteous. It's no surprise which album Will chose as his favourite, but our conversation about which song we'd give to someone who didn't know Tom's music saw us talking about a few deep cuts that don't often get a shout out on that question. If you want to check out Will's amazing podcast, The Limehouse Podcast, click here; https://soundcloud.com/user-434215118, If you want to check out his Tom Petty covers, you ca...

Will Porteous

December 15, 2023 09:00 - 1 hour - 101 MB

Today's episode is a conversation I had with powerhouse multi-disciplinarian and resident of Diss, Will Porteous. As a quick warning, there's a bit of profanity in this episode, but when you get two Englishmen in a room (even virtual) the langauge will change on a dime! I've been looking forward to this chat for somewhere around two years now because Will has been a very generous supporter of the podcast and a super nice guy to chat with offline! I really hope you enjoy our conversation whic...

All The Wrong Reasons

December 13, 2023 09:00 - 25 minutes - 36.1 MB

There are, again, some very big ideas packed into this very simple almost-four-minute pop song and as always, Tom isn’t preaching or judging, just observing. As my wonderful guest Matt Jaffe said during our Ten Questions episode, Tom is never didactic. He’s not saying that celebrity is bad, he’s not judging the family’s luck or the girl’s choices, and importantly he’s not prescribing an antidote, he’s just making the observation and letting it stand alone. It’s up to us to decide what we thi...

10 Questions with Russell Mark

December 09, 2023 19:34 - 33 minutes - 46.1 MB

Today's episode covers the Ten Questions part of my conversation with Russell Mark of The Nextdoors. Russell took a completely unique approach to the question about which artist he'd like to hear cover Tom's music and which song they'd perform. It's a really cool take on preserving Tom's musical legacy with a new audience. Please check out The Nextdoor's website here: https://nextdoorsmusic.com. You can find out his brilliant project The Title Trackers here: https://www.thetitletrackers.co...

Russell Mark of The Nextdoors

December 08, 2023 09:00 - 1 hour - 95.7 MB

Today's episode is a conversation I had with the wonderful Russell Mark, of the Pasadena-based husband and wife duo, The Nextdoors. Russell is also a long time performer, composer, sound engineer, producer, music camp director and was a very easy person to sit and talk to for just over an hour and a half! I sat down with Russell on November 13 of this year and we talked about how to craft songs around a cello instead of a bass, how inspiration can often come from unexpected places, the sigh...

All or Nothin'

December 06, 2023 09:00 - 24 minutes - 34.1 MB

“You could almost take Mike [Campbell] for granted, because anything you asked him to do, he did it. And more. I don’t remember ever throwing anything his way that he couldn’t do. He could do it, and do it better than you thought. He will give you back your idea better than you had it in the first place. THAT’S a great musician.” - Tom Petty The implication I’ve always taken from the abrupt ending is that in this conversation about all or nothing, this final act of musical vandalism is the ...

10 Questions with Matt Jaffe

December 02, 2023 09:00 - 33 minutes - 46.6 MB

Today's episode covers the Ten Questions part of my conversation with Matt Jaffe. We had a great conversation about Walls (Circus) vs Walls (No 3), Matt surprised me with who he would have cover a Tom Petty song, but since he's said it, it's been stuck in my brain. He also gave a superb answer to my final question and described Tom Petty in 3 words absolutely brilliantly! Please check out Matt's website here: mattjaffemusic.com and go check out his Youtube channel here: @MattJaffeMusic ...

Matt Jaffe

December 01, 2023 09:00 - 1 hour - 93.4 MB

Today's episode is a conversation I had with the wonderful Matt Jaffe. After cutting his teeth on open mics around the Bay Area, San Francisco songwriter Matt Jaffe was discovered by Jerry Harrison of Talking Heads. Together, they produced his first album at the age of 16, cementing Matt's dedication to music. Soon, he formed a band, dropped out of college, and has not looked back. Since then, Matt has cowritten with Chuck Prophet and Tom Higgenson of Plain White T’s, crisscrossed the coun...

The Dark of the Sun

November 29, 2023 09:00 - 23 minutes - 33.2 MB

In 2004/2005 when Paul Zollo is interviewing Tom for his seminal book, Conversations With Tom Petty. Tom bemoans to Paul that The Dark of the Sun was never played live. He says “It got lost in the shuffle of that album. There were so many songs on it. I thought it was a good little song.” This is another one of those tracks that I sometimes forget about and then when I hear it think, “man, that’s a great song!” and then when I hear Mike’s solo, I think “Man, that’s a REALLY good song!” It’s...

Two Gunslingers

November 22, 2023 09:00 - 32 minutes - 45.3 MB

In Conversations With Tom Petty, when Tom tells author Paul Zollo that the band were allowed to pick some of their favourites for the Anthology, Paul asks “So Two Gunslingers is one of your favourites?” Tom Responds “Oh definitely. I love that song. I was really proud of that when it got done.” When Paul comments “It’s a funny song, but meaningful.” Tom responds, “Yeh, it’s a really good anti-war song”. Today’s episode covers "Two Gunslingers", the fourth track on "Into The Great Wide Open"...

Into The Great Wide Open

November 15, 2023 09:00 - 36 minutes - 49.9 MB

Where Tom’s vocal on a song like Refugee or Rebels is like a sharpened steel, his voice here sits more in that butterscotch place that he could employ when he wanted to dial the energy back. Even in the chorus, he doesn’t lean into any vibrato, doesn’t crack or pinch his voice and just lets the melody wash over you. And it’s a song that doesn’t need vocal pyrotechnics because all the explosions in this song come from that wonderful turnaround, the tonal shift in the chorus, and one of the be...

Kings Highway

November 08, 2023 09:00 - 21 minutes - 29.5 MB

Like Learning To Fly, it’s a song that the band would change the arrangement of and when Paul Zollo mentions the acoustic version on the Playback boxset, Tom responds that “It’ll work just about any way you want to play it.” He also goes on to say “It was a tricky one to record. We went through a few changes trying to get the track to sound the way we wanted.” I think that “the Kings Highway” here isn’t at all a reference to the road that runs through Brooklyn, New York. If I had to guess, ...

Petty Live - Recap!

November 01, 2023 09:00 - 27 minutes - 38.3 MB

Another recap episode for you this week folks as I try to wrangle guest schedules! This week we're looking back at which live shows my guests wish they could have seen. Winterland? The Fillmore? The True Confessions tour with Bob? The Superbowl half time show? The Gainesville homecoming show on the 30th anniversary tour... There are so many to choose from and some of my guests picked the same shows for similar reasons! In order, the people answering the questions are; Dallas Heliker, Gwen J...

Learning To Fly

October 25, 2023 09:00 - 27 minutes - 38.5 MB

When Paul asks Tom to confirm that the origin of the song is him hearing a pilot say that learning to fly is easy, but coming down’s the hard part, Tom replies “True. That was the inspiration and I took it from there. Jeff and I wrote that together.” He also comments that it was written pretty quickly, saying “I think we wrote it in an evening. It came quickly because I had written most of the words and I had gotten a tune in my head. We sat down and spent a whole evening on it. But that’s f...

The Petty 8ight with Randy Woods

October 18, 2023 09:00 - 1 hour - 127 MB

This week's episode is the second installment The Petty 8ight! I love talking to Pettyheads, musicians, and other people who have been influenced by Tom or his music in myriad ways, but I thought it would be neat to see what non-fans, or non-hardcore fans think of Tom's music if I threw deeper cuts at them. My second #Petty8ight guest is my best friend and musical mentor, Randy Woods. Randy is the guy who does all the little musical interludes. He's also a songwriter, singer, guitarist, al...

Full Moon Fever (with John Paulsen)

October 11, 2023 09:00 - 1 hour - 121 MB

It's a long one this season folks! But there's so much to talk about with this album and we felt we needed to talk about each individual track. Which song does John think that Kevin rated too low? Which songs made it onto Kevin and John's resqeuenced discs and which songs do they think could have been left off, if any? Check out the playlists below to find out! Please note, there is one small piece of profanity in this episode when Kevin quotes Ringo Starr. Kevin's sequence: https://open.s...

Cover Versions - Recap!

October 04, 2023 09:00 - 25 minutes - 35.4 MB

Another recap episode for you this week folks as I try to wrangle guest schedules! This week we're looking back at the songs of Tom's that my guests would love to hear covered by other artists. This is a question I always look forward to discussing and it's thrown up some brilliant ideas! In order, the people answering the questions are; Dallas Heliker, Gwen Jones, Nic Apostoleris, Janet Lovell, Jeff Slate, Megan Volpert, Dan Spiess, Corey Morrissette, Katie Moulton, Ivan Anderson, Tommy Ed...

Zombie Zoo

September 27, 2023 09:00 - 20 minutes - 28.2 MB

In Conversations With Tom Petty, when author Paul Zollo asks about the origins of the song, Tom explains “It was when Jeff and George (Jeff Lynne and George Harrison obviously), went out to Anaheim to ask Roy Orbison to be in the band (the Traveling Wilburys, again obviously). We were writing everything we saw. One line I remember that we saw on a billboard was “every day is judgment day”. That later turned up in “End of the Line”, the Wilburys song.” He goes on to explain that “We stopped a...

A Mind With a Heart of Its Own

September 19, 2023 09:00 - 19 minutes - 26.9 MB

I do wonder whether the friend who’s treehouse he’s slept in is the same girl from the opening verse. There’s almost a Forrest and Jenny vibe to it if you link those two verses. “She never looked different but something would change” is later in the timeline, and the later treehouse reference snaps you back to a more innocent time. I know that this isn’t the case because the third verse is ad-libbed, but hey, it’s fun to paint your own pictures on the canvas that Tom provides sometimes so I’...

Dan Spiess (Tom Petty Weekend 2023)

September 16, 2023 09:00 - 1 hour - 83.3 MB

This bonus episode sees Dan Spiess return to the podcast to fill us in on what we can expect at this year's Tom Petty Weekend in Gainesville. There are so many cool things to do, from the Wildflowers exhibit at the Cade Museum, to the Gainesville tour bus, to the Heartwood Soundstage Storytellers sessions! The lineup is insanely good, the beer lineup is equally impressive and I'm looking forward to hearing about all the fun that's going to be had at this year's event! If you're attending th...

Alright For Now

September 13, 2023 09:00 - 14 minutes - 20.1 MB

Everything is alright. For now at least. And that’s where I think this song becomes much more interesting. Despite the light fluffiness of the verse progression and the sincere expression of adoration in the lyrics, that caveat on the title line, we’re alright “for now” belies a slight tension in Tom’s state of mind. Now, it just could that no other words fit as well as “for now”, but given that Tom was very rarely glib about word choice, I would say that this deliberate inclusion of doubt e...

The Apartment Song

September 06, 2023 09:09 - 24 minutes - 34.1 MB

The lyrics in this one are again, really direct and simple. Tom reminisces about his two room apartment and that he’s glad he doesn’t live there any more, but there’s a fondness in the tone. In the second verse, we hear that there’s a similar nostalgia for a former relationship that he sometimes remembers wistfully. The chorus underscores all this by giving his current state. “Oh yeah, I’m alright, I just feel a little lonely tonight. I’m okay most of the time, I just feel a little lonely to...

10 Questions with Petty Theft

September 03, 2023 09:00 - 23 minutes - 32.9 MB

Today we hear what Django and Dan would pick as their favourite album, who they'd love to see open for the Heartbreakers and which song they'd love to have joined the band on stage to perform. Petty Theft is currently in the middle of their 20th Anniversary Tour (so you know they have to be good, because you simply don't last that long if you aren't!) and you can check out tour dates, find out more about the band, and even go support them by buying some merch at their fabulous website, here...

10 Questions with Tommy Edwin

September 02, 2023 09:00 - 34 minutes - 47.2 MB

Another half hour with Tommy today folks. Wait til you hear who he would like to see open for Tom Petty and which artist he wants to hear cover a Tom Petty song! Please check out Tommy's (brilliant) website here: https://www.tommyedwinmusic.com. Also, check out his song Empty Chair, from the album "Fade To Memory": https://youtu.be/MGAfmr4Y54U?si=jBEiJQpB3u39412P Don't forget to follow me on social media, like, subscribe, and please, leave a rating if you like the show: Facebook: https://...

Petty Theft

September 01, 2023 09:00 - 50 minutes - 69.7 MB

Today's special bonus episode is a conversation I had with San Francisco-based tribute band Petty Theft. I chatted for just about an hour and a half with bassist Django Bayless and lead singer/rhythm guitarist Dan Durkin, the two founding members of the band about how the band came together, how they choose songs to cover, and of course, their love of Tom's music. As I said to the boys during the call, their sense of fun and their love of playing Tom's music shines through both in conversati...

Tommy Edwin

August 30, 2023 09:00 - 51 minutes - 71 MB

Today's episode is a conversation I had with the wonderful Tommy Edwin. Tommy and I connect over on Twitter months ago and I've been a fan of his music (and his personality) ever since. I love having conversations about Tom Petty's music with other musicians because, even when we're not talking directly about Tom. the ways in which he influenced people always shines through. Tommy Edwin is not exception. His feel for song structure and clarity always ring true for me. This was a fantastic ho...

Depending On You

August 23, 2023 09:00 - 21 minutes - 29.7 MB

Something that my season seven guest Ivan Anderson said that stuck with me, was that “Listen to Her Heart” is a 'little' song. And by that, he wasn’t being dismissive. He was saying that it wasn’t covering a weighty topic and it was compact and accessible. I’d say exactly the same thing about this one. It’s neat and compact. It has a superb hook in the pre-chorus and the whole thing is imminently hummable. It’s a pretty perfect little pop song. Today’s episode covers the third track from si...

Yer So Bad

August 16, 2023 09:00 - 19 minutes - 26.8 MB

Yer So Bad could almost be the most important song in the entire Tom Petty canon. Almost. Probably not the most important, but it was the first song that Tom showed to Jeff Lynne and from there, the rest of Full Moon Fever and then The Traveling Wilburys dropped effortlessly into place. You have to think there was a little magic in the air that night. Tom tells Paul Zollo, “It was around this time that I showed Jeff one night that I had written the song ‘Yer So Bad’. But there was one little...

Feel a Whole Lot Better

August 09, 2023 09:00 - 18 minutes - 25.2 MB

Every hardcore Tom Petty fan knows that when Tom took the record to the execs at MCA, they didn’t like it at all. When Paul Zollo asks Tom why in Conversations with Tom Petty, Tom replies “They didn’t hear a single!” One of the other issues with the record that it was only nine tracks long. So while Jeff Lynne, who coproduced the record, was out of town, Tom and Mike recorded the lullaby, Alright For Now, but they still needed more tracks, as the late 80s was the era of the CD and you could ...

Runnin' Down a Dream

August 02, 2023 09:00 - 20 minutes - 28.7 MB

In his fantastic memoir, Tom Petty and Me, Jon Scott calls Runnin Down a Dream “One of the greatest driving songs I’ve ever heard” and you get his point completely. It’s a juggernaut of a rock n roll song but isn’t overpowering sonically. Again Jeff Lynne leaves enough space for the song to breath but adds in enough flare to keep you interested all the way through. It’s an urgent and riveting song; almost as if it’s an hour and a half action movie packed into for glorious minutes of pop rock...

A Face in the Crowd

July 26, 2023 09:00 - 22 minutes - 31 MB

“I do like that song. I think it’s a really sweet song. A nice sentiment. Very simple. Extremely simple. It’s not complex in any way” One thing I always find interesting in reading Paul Zollo's book is the way that Tom often seems to be looking at his own songs from the outside. The book came out in 2005 and in preceding decade, Tom had only played the song six times, so you can see why some of these songs he would have to go back to to think about. But I also get the sense sometimes that l...

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