The songwriter Phil Collins has always loved: “For a long, long time”
The great thing about music is its ability to make its contemporaries become admirers. Sure, the charts and labels do their best to make the industry as competitive a landscape as possible, but with all that stripped away, it’s a subjective medium that should promote healthy friendships. And maybe when you’re as uncool as Phil Collins, it’s in your best interest.
All jibes aside, Collins might not be coolest cat in town but he was indeed a master technician whose career was built on a deep understanding of musicality. He leant on an appreciation for jazz sensibilities to bring the complexity to Genesis’ rhythm sections and not to mention he could do it all whilst singing.
In turn his take on the melodic complexities of songs should be just as valued as that of drumming, and who he heralds as idols in his own right should be heard. But the avenue of love for one artist wasn’t built on high-brow technicality or esoteric songwriting, instead it was a shared sense of cynicism.
Speaking to the Tracks of My Years radio show, Collins said, “I’ve loved Tom Petty’s stuff for a long, long time. He is very cynical, which I kind of understand, you know.”
He added, “It’s very English in some respects. I always loved his work with the Traveling Wilburys. But he has that 12 string thing. It’s just that reminds me a little bit of The Byrds, I think, from the 60s. I just find him very edgy. Keeps reinventing himself, big fan,” Phil Collins said.
Cynicism isn’t an exclusive trope to Englishness but there is certainly a point in what Collins is saying. Particularly in the heady days of the 1970s and 1980s, before the digital world globalised tastes, there was still an American outlook within music that sought to celebrate what was left of its so called “dream”. Music stars was unattainable and in many ways, aesthetically perfect. Petty wasn’t, he wore his flaws on his sleeve artistically and delved further into the complexity of sonic arrangement to give a more realistic world view.
Let’s not pretend Petty was any sort of David Bowie-like chameleon, but throughout his career he attempted to push past the mould any previous success of his work had created. Take Wildflowers for example. Despite being in the midst of a crippling heroin addiction, Petty confronted whatever distress existed in his life to create a body of work that showcases his discomfort and in turn deliver creative difference.
During that interview, Collins cited ‘Learning To Fly’ as his favourite of the Americans. It was a song that spoke to Petty’s style and position as one of music’s more intriguing songwriters, for while many thought it was a direct reference to drug use, Petty explained that he had seen a pilot speaking on TV during an interview, claiming landing was harder than the flying itself.
Understandably, critics linked it to a more abstract representation of drug use which let’s face it, would have been considered in Petty’s imagery. Nevertheless, it’s a stellar example of Petty’s observational outlook that made him one of music’s most treasured songwriters and rightly an icon in the eyes of Collins.
