“Mary Jane’s Last Dance” ( Greatest Hits, 1993) Most of Petty’s period singles that failed to make the Greatest Hits cut were justifiable exclusions this one was a legit miss.ġ3. Though his career may have been something like the photo-negative version of Petty’s, Replacements leader Paul Westerberg’s best songs struck a lot of the same chords (literally and figuratively) as the King Heartbreaker - exemplified by songs like “Change of Heart,” which split the difference between power pop and bar band like the best late-period Replacements songs, only a half-decade earlier. “Change of Heart” ( Long After Dark, 1982)
#TOM PETTY SONGS FULL#
“I Won’t Back Down” ( Full Moon Fever, 1989)Ī melody so fundamental one of the biggest pop hits of this decade could rip it off without even realizing it, and a similarly straight-laced message that Petty’s fanbase could take to heart: “You can stand me up at the gates of hell/ But I won’t back down.” He sings it with a shrug rather than a sneer Petty never needed to be bossy to be the boss.ġ4. The harmonies and ringing guitars that lead the chorus back into the verse are also pure Fab Four apparently Petty passed the audition because within a year he’d be in a band with one of ’em.ġ8. “Ain’t Love Strange” ( Let Me Up (I’ve Had Enough), 1987)Ī buried gem on Petty’s only pre-’94 LP not to notch at least one song on his Greatest Hits collection, rollicking and twangy and red-blooded enough to have featured on a late-’80s Steve Earle album. “Good love is hard to find/ You got lucky, babe, when I found you,” he taunts on the chorus, with the keys chiming in like backing singers to provide further shoulder-dusting.ġ9. “You Got Lucky” ( Long After Dark, 1982)Ī delectable moment of synth-pop swagger from the rarely malevolent Petty. Crank them up, give them life, breathe them in like oxygen.Ģ0.
Tom Petty's Final Concert: Watch Him Close With "You Wreck Me" and "American Girl" Tellingly, Petty’s best-selling set by a mile remains 1993’s Diamond-certified Greatest Hits few of his singles had the largesse to be world-conquerors, but add ’em all up and just about every household in America needed to own at least one cassette copy. But they were songs that you lived for your entire life, songs whose casual, chiming perfection very unassumingly lodged in your heart forever.
#TOM PETTY SONGS LICENSE#
They weren’t songs that signified a ton about who you were or where you came from - while peers like Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen wore their home states like license plates, many of Petty’s fans probably would have trouble picking out his Gainesville, Florida, roots from a multiple-choice question - and liking them meant nothing about your taste in music other than that you weren’t violently opposed to rock music as a concept.
Still pretty good.) His life may not have always been as frictionless as his catalog - he even kinda warned against assuming that it was in one of his biggest hits - but his music never soured, and neither did his fans Petty’s ultimate legacy may be as proof that adult affability could be as magnetic a rock-star quality as animal charisma.Īnd most importantly, he had the songs. (OK, until 11 days before the day he died. He came up on ‘ 70s FM radio but still thrived in the ‘ 80s and ‘ 90s on MTV he sold out arena shows until the day he died. Petty released 10 albums between 19, and all of them were at least certified gold his most recent, 2014’s Hypnotic Eye, was the first Billboard 200-topper of his career.
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