The First Hot Press Interview with Tom Petty

HEARTBREAKER HOTEL

Tired, bloody knackerd, the boat-train trip may be cheap but it's no way to relax. To top it all the sky has just released one of its downpours. I´m soaked. But I know I'm in the right hotel, 'cus the lobby's fall of Petty logo- emblazoned jackets.

One of these shows me up to his bedroom. This is Petty's first interview today, it's my first in three years. Trying to organise my tape recorder and notebook and sit down, I realise Petty has asked me a question. Where did I get my boots? My denison black leather beatle boots he's referring to, so I tell him. He says he'd like a pair, not 'that' pair I hope.

Anyway down to the serious business at hand. The new album hasn't received as favour-able reviews as the first one, has it? "There were two good ones and two bad ones that I saw. Roy's Karr -- NME) surprised me a bit, that was the only one that bothered me. lt always been one of my highest ambitions to enrage one of these Melody Maker writers. If they're really enraged, then I think I've made a point. Roy's... just because he's a friend, I thought, well he's not downing me, he really didn't like it. The Melody Maker and NME both gave us bad reviews the last time around. I think the NME changed their mind and came out and wrote another review later, so it's really just following the same pattern.”

The first album came out around the end of 476 over here, so I wondered about the delay in releasing the new album. "During the long gap between albums there was a whole lot that went down. There was a lot of legal confusion with the record companies, which tied us up for quite a long time. So we went out on the road in America. This time we stayed up there in the studio for about 3 months, almost 4. lt wasn't like we were workin’ on the tracks for weeks, we were really, like, writing in the studio, we just did so much stuff."

So presumably you have some tracks over. "Oh yeah, a whole lot more. I was actually going to try to do a double album with some live stuff, cover things, just some strange stuff. But I couldn't convince the record company to sell it for the price of one album. So I think in the end this one is a couple of minutes short of what it should have been — but I didn't have much choice."

The year's absente may have helped the Petty band in that if they had come over in the height of new wave hysteria, they might have lost out some, but now after Power Pop had reared its ugly head, things looked like they might be moving in a more melodic way anyhow.
"I think the audience have actually Bone more to our side of things really, the kids seem to want songs now. They can tell somebody playing around with them. I’ve never really worried about proving myself to anyone. I just make records; if you like them, play them; if you don't fine".

ls there a lot of difference between the audiences either side of the Atlantic?
“For us there’s not. I think that in America right now, we are a much bigger band. It used to be exactly the opposite. I haven’t played England this time, so I don’t really know, but I think we're one of the few bands that can play both countries. These days it's getting very black an' white - you're either here or there."

 
The Knebworth bill features the hot young things Devo, currently makin' waves. What does Petty think of these emerging weirdos. I haven't seen Devo play. I heard nothing but great things about Devo from people whose opinions I respect, so I am looking forward to seeing them."
Me too mate me too. "I’ve heard the music, which is really interesting. Not my kind of thing, we're more kind of R ‘n' B...“ OK but what about other US bands who have sixties roots the likes of Earthquake or the Flamin' Groovies. 'We just played with Earthquake and I missed them. I never really heard of them before. I think the Groovies are... we’ve probably gut this '60's influence that they have... but I think they're more into really pure representing the '60's, which we never have. We're not interested in doing that. I think what we're doing is a new music." I imagine he means with a 'c', not a ‘k’.

“I really wouldn't want to dwell an recreating anything, we constantly want to do different things. This slagging we got was because we did something different, which I thought really wasn't fair. I think everybody expected an album of 'American Girl' twice. We wouldn't do that. The next album will be something different too."

After Petty's first band broke up, he spent a couple of years hanging around and recording with various session superstars, the results of which have never been released. Does he want to work solo or does he prefer being part of a band?
“My name wouldn't even be in the billing if I didn't already have a contract when I met the band. There was no way I could get out of the record deal, so the easiest way was to put my name there and add them on. It’s very much a band, it’s not a solo trip at all- it’s not a back up band. It’s the only healthy way to work. I’d be bored with it all if I was dictating things to the musicians because there’d be no commitment there, it’s just a gig. But with a group everyone cares.”

One of the most things about the last 6 months is that people may be ready to accept bands on different level. A rock band may be part of the ‘ten- peen- up’ syndrome, as well as being acclaimed as good playing rock.

Tom Robinson can be in “Oh Boy” one week and receive a long analysis in Sounds the next. Much has been made of the Heartbreaks heartbreaking looks.

“I think were the only band in America where there’s little girls...I guess our audience is about fourteen to thirty...it’s sort of like a lot of screaming girls, knicken and all that. I think we are the only band who plays music for those kids. It’s a crime that people assume, especially industry people, that if you are under 16 or 18 that you are dumb. They are not dumb; they know a good record from a bed record. I respect their opinion as much as someone of thirty’s, probably more, to tell you the truth. But we’re not aiming the band at any age group. We’d be really fadish trying to be bopper starts. “

By know I had settled down a bitt; Petty is an easy person to interview and I thought it was time to ask the question that practically everybody had said to ask him. Yeah you guessed it, the truth about the Petty Rats tour, as told by the man himself.

“I actually quite liked them but they’re really full of shit, all tee things they said. I make it a rule not to talk about other groups. I’ll make an exception `cus this has to be put right. They constantly did it...I admire their spirit you know. It is like they never come near to blowing us off the stage, they never even got an encore, as a matter of fact. Which is nothing wrong with that, they were a band new band.

They were constantly ... they had that little guy...B.P Fallon who is a habitual liar. I remember reading all this quotes from me. I don’t think I ever spoke to them. Which wasn’t that I had something against them. Once read that he (Geldof I presume) refused to take photos with us. They didn’t finish the sentences; they didn’t go into the fact that he had a fever of 102, which is why he didn’t want to go out. No I don’t hold anything against them. Good luck to them.

I thought it was very strange. They were too hungry for publicity in those days. The easiest way to get publicity was to pick on me. ‘caus we done the same with Nils Lofgren. We’d kind of taken the thing and so they wanted to take us. It actually didn’t happen. I remember reading about me tearing banners down when I wasn’t even there.

“One night we come in at the sound check and they were spraying their banners which they did every night and the promoter was there and he went out and said no. But I actually went to the promoter, I don’t think the Rats ever knew, I went to the promoter and he was furious. He said ‘I am really sorry ‘. I said it’s all right. It doesn’t make any difference to me. So he told the kids we weren’t going to play `till the banners came down. Wooosh. “(Here Peter makes a longs tearing down sounds). “And they were paying their roadies to jump on stage and pretend to be going crazy. A real showbiz trip. But I was slightly annoyed to read I was tearing down banners. I don’t understand - in England that goes on a lot more than in America.

“I don’t hold things against other musicians. I went out of my way to see they got sound checks. I’d just been through a really rough thing doing support. It was a bit disturbing ‘cos we actually like the band. The original demo they send us for the tour was good – very early Stones-ish. I saw them call us wimps of the year or something.” To make his next point, Patty looked me in the face: “They would never call me a wimp to my face. You know what I mean… because I’d kill ‘em, that’s my mentality. I am from the South, I would actually cut them. They know that.”

Funny thing was, I believed him. Be a great match that, Modest Bob meets Honest Tom: “But I guess they are playing the showbiz game. It’s not healthy for musicians to knocks each other. I’ve got a long list if I’m going to knock people to start on before I knock musician at all. There’s a lot of creeps way out in front of musicians.”

Throughout the interview, I’d got the feeling that Petty had, at various times, a little unhappy about the way the band had been promoted and also the way his record company was looking after the band.

“We haven’t ever got control of it- I’m getting frustrated about how we are advertised and promoted. We’ve never really got our own creative control till the last few months.” There was probably a lot of dissatisfaction under the surface, only a little of which came out, so I asked how he would like to see the band treated. I would just like to see it a little more true to what we are, rather then what they think we are. Everyone has a different image of us.

Some people in America think we're an English band. Or they think we're like the Marshall Tucker and 'cus we're from the South. Others think we're a Californian Eagles band. All that we really are is a working rock. 'n' roll band. So when you make it quick and big like that, uou come to expect right away the daggers to go in. Especially like the Boomtown Rats, who are trying to … they had just got a record out and they seen us come in and take off. So the only thing is to go to the press and say that they blew us off the stage. Or pay off Harry Doherty (M.M.), who is Irish too, to say they blew us off stage. IM still play with them an time and blow them off the stage - yeah I'd like to see that," Don't know about that Tom, I can't help but feel that although Petty is very much in touch with what's happening, that perhaps he hasn't quite got the feel of the effect of the last year. A lot, of course, depends on the audience either band would be playing to.

So to change the subject a little we talked about new bands and the ones he rates. "Nick Lowe, I saw him play the other night, I was amazed. It was at Dingwalls. I thought it was a great set. Cheap Trick I also think are actually pretty good. There´s only a handful of people that are good, unfortunately. But at least there's more opportunity as a result of last year . . . he punks, new wave or what-ever."

What does the future hold for the band? "I always like a wide variety of music and this band can play any kind of music it really wants to. I think we'd just be foolish to play "American Girl" again and again". He also I doesn't feel that the Byrds were as big an influence on the band as people imagined.

The band's inclusion in the recent 'F.M.' movie was brought up. Petty had thought it would be about the current sad state of F.M. in America – instead it turned out quite different. Petty himself appears briefly, maintaining that he had done it mainly to get a chance to see how movies are made.

After talking to him, I was impressed with the guy. He probably thought I was an idiot. Still I liked him: his heart is in Rock 'n' Roll though his vision of it may not correspond exactly with mine. But I was looking forward to seeing the gig the next day: Was he? "We don’t really like festivals, I don't think it's the hip way to see rock 'n' roll. But we're doing this one cause it's the only way to play to the country very fast — otherwise we wouldn't have been able to come."

Well they won at Knebworth: following an after Devo, they got an encore from the vast crowd, which looked like most festival crowds do, as if nothing has happened in the last 10 years or so. Personally because I was expecting a lot (like Roy Carr in his review, though I like the second album), I was disappointed; I'd have liked die band to rock harder.

But considering the crowd, who probably thought this was outrageous rock 'n' roll, his set was right. But I felt, as the weather wasn't the warmest, the crowd— or more especially I myself — could have done with some more fast numbers. As it was, the whole thing sagged in the middle. But there's no doubting both the excellence of the band and their material. "Breakdown" from the first album, is one of the best things I've heard in a long time. They encored with "Route 66". lt was worth their while making the visit.