The musician Tom Petty called “one of the greatest people I’ve ever met”
Everyone has a list of influential musicians they’d love to meet, and Tom Petty often tops those lists. A stellar musician and champion of the underdog, he was known for standing up to the powers that be—a message that continues to resonate. Despite his own fame, Petty remained a music lover at heart, with his own set of idols he wished to meet. Thanks to his creative achievements, many of those dreams became surreal realities.
Retrospectively, the writing was on the wall for Petty early on. He knew school wasn’t for him and was afforded a life-changing opportunity at the green age of ten. While only just into double digits, the rock ‘n’ roll rebellion exploded and captured his imagination. Just a year later, he would see arguably the most famous musician of all time in the flesh, and it would confirm his thinking that his parents’ humdrum careers were not for him.
In the summer of 1961, at age 11, due to his uncle’s job, Petty visited the set of Follow That Dream, where he watched the star Elvis Presley do his thing. After witnessing ‘The King of Rock and Roll’ in action, he traded his slingshot in for a collection of his records with a friend, which also included releases by other genre pioneers, Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis. From that moment on, he was consumed by music; it was all he wanted to do.
Petty would go on to enjoy immense success, first coming to prominence as the leader of Mudcrutch before leading The Heartbreakers to global triumph in the late 1970s. Writing tracks such as ‘American Girl’ and ‘Refugee’ confirmed him as an all-American champion. As a result, in 1988, he was enlisted to join the world’s most star-studded supergroup, The Traveling Wilburys, alongside Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Jeff Lynne, and Roy Orbison. Remarkably, this came a year before his most famous song ‘Free Fallin” was released.
Joining the supergroup was a highly life-affirming moment for Petty, as it saw him work with those who inspired him when young, get to know them as people, and cast off the mythologised essences known to the public. This position gave him the rarest of insight.
Speaking to Spin in August 1989, Petty was asked what the late Orbison was like, given that he sadly died in December the previous year. Reflecting on his esteemed friend, he described him as one of “the greatest people I’ve ever met”.
He explained: “Roy was such a gentle man and a gentleman. He’s one of the greatest people I’ve ever met. He was very bright, very well read, not some cracker. You wouldn’t expect it, but Roy knew all of Monty Python by heart. He loved really offbeat comedy, and he had a pretty keen sense of humour himself.”
Orbison was very much into being Wilbury, Petty maintained, and at the time of his death, he was starting to rebuild his confidence after years of not having hit records. His new energy was palpable thanks to working on Mystery Girl with Mike Campbell and T Bone Burnett alongside his efforts with the supergroup. Tragically, though, he wouldn’t get to see the record released or its critical and commercial triumph.
Petty concluded: “I wish he could’ve seen the success of that album because if there ever was a guy who was going to dig it… You know, when someone dies, you always hear nice things about them, but Roy really was that way, a very special person.”
