The album Tom Petty considered an “enormous leap”
When Tom Petty first went solo, his label told him he needed to learn some things first. Before he released his debut with the Heartbreakers, Petty was essentially sent off to get a musical education, to work more on his songwriting and only record the album when he was ready. But even after that, the singer remained a student, trying to take things further and further with each new release.
It’s heard across the albums: his solo offerings and his work with Heartbreakers. Even if critics would attest to the quality improvement, there was a notable change and evolution each time. There was always something new on the table or some new inspiration to be heard somewhere among it all.
It’s because Petty never wanted to rest on his laurels. He always believed that artists should seek out education, look for new inspiration, and find ways to push themselves forward, carrying that ethos throughout his career.
In particular, he heard the result clearly on two albums. The first was Full Moon Fever, his 1989 debut solo album, where he went it fully alone for the first time. Already challenging himself to do something new simply by leaving his band behind, he also saw it as a pinnacle for his songwriting, telling the Gadsden Times in 1994, “I see ‘Full Moon Fever’ as another period, where the songs were lighter in content,” adding, “And I think from just looking at it from the sheer craft of songwriting, better.”
But while other artists would see that, see that they’d improved and then act as if they’d ticked some mythical box off, done their bettering and were now fine to coast through, Petty kept changing.
By 1991, when he reunited with the Heartbreakers for another album as a full band, he saw that evolution continue. “I made an enormous leap lyrically,” he said about Into the Great Wide Open. While in no way their best-performing album in terms of charts and sales, Petty and many critics saw it as another moment where he levelled up.
Part of that was attributed to Jeff Lynne’s involvement, who co-produced and co-wrote the record and who, in Petty’s eyes, could “pretty much do it all”. It could also come down to the impact Petty was still feeling from the Travelling Wilburys when his time performing with Lynne, George Harrison, Bob Dylan, and Roy Orbison seemed to reinvigorate him as a songwriter, spurring his dedication to evolution into new directions thanks to his bandmates’ inspiration.
Either way, he saw Into the Great Wide Open as a moment where he once again levelled up. But when he talks about that fact, it’s a beautiful example of how Petty’s ethos of hard work came above his ego. “I can’t tell if I’m always getting better, but I can tell that I’m getting somewhere else,” he said, making it clear that always evolving, trying new things and working hard would always come above self-criticism or even a desire to perform better and better.
