Southern Man

Tom Petty, like rock ’n’ roll, was born in the South. He has created timeless music that surpasses most of his influences.Philip Martin

Let me remind you that this ain’t the end. I can still kick some ass. — Tom Petty, accepting his Billboard Century Award in December Rock ’n’ roll belongs to anyone who wants it bad enough. It doesn’t much matter what you sound like when you open your mouth to sing or who your daddy was or what star you fell to earth from. If you’ve got aspiration and arrghh and a way of connecting with the boys and girls, you don’t need much talent. It’s a democratic form; all you need is a back story and something to bash on.

But we do have to insist that you acknowledge it started here, below America’s belt. Elvis and Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins and Ike Turner and Sam Phillips and Dewey Phillips and all those wild Burnett boys who started the grass fire that would consume the world were Southerners. Rock ’n’ roll was born Southern. Rock ’n’ roll’s an equal opportunity employer, but facts are facts.

To understand the subject of this essay, a Floridian with Indianstraight corn-silk hair and a crooked grin named Tom Petty, it’s important to know that rock ’n’ roll — as opposed to the corporatized “rock” — is essentially a Southern thing and always has been. Whether it’s Jersey-boy Springsteen affecting the beat-down vowels and mumbled “sirs” of the sharecropper or Britishers Mick and Keef droppin’ their g’s or even Dylan — the boy from the Iron Range — trying to sound like Blind Willie McTell, the inflections and vernacular of rock ’n’ roll have always been Southern.

This is one of those years when people will talk a lot about Petty and how he fits into our cultural landscape. November will see the 30 th anniversary of the release of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, probably the greatest debut album ever by an American band. In December, Petty was honored with Billboard magazine’s highest honor, the Century Award. Last year, Petty’s first “biography” (actually an extended dialogue with writer / musician Paul Zollo titled Conversations With Tom Petty was published. In the foreword, Petty promised an autobiography at “another time” ). Later this year — possibly as early as this month — Petty will release his next solo album, Highway Companion. There is an often-told story about Petty meeting Elvis Presley on the set of a movie improbably titled Follow That Dream. Petty’s uncle Earl Jernigan — “the only Northerner in the family” — worked a lot with film crews shooting in Florida. One day he brought 11-year-old Tommy with him to the set. “I didn’t know a lot about Elvis Presley,” Petty told Zollo. “I couldn’t get into my head who Elvis was exactly. I knew he was a rock ’n’ roll star. And I’d never thought much about rock ’n’ roll until that moment.” Elvis said hello and smiled and nodded. Petty doesn’t remember what he said. You can make it out to be like that moment when Bill Clinton shook JFK’s hand in the Rose Garden if you want to, a signal moment of torch-passing.

UNDERVALUED? People like Petty. They love the expansive jangle and grace of his singles. But they don’t necessarily consider him an important artist. He’s not Bruce Springsteen singing about the socioeconomic consequences inherent in the paradigm shift from industrial to service economies, and he’s not Bob Dylan muttering mad prayers. He works a vein of mainstream pop, singing mostly about girls.

If you’re going to make a case for Petty and his Heartbreakers as the pre-eminent American band of our time, you’d better prepare your case carefully. The same is true if you’re going to suggest that maybe the Heartbreakers are the direct descendants of Creedence Clearwater Revival or the American equivalent of the Rolling Stones — that is, if you don’t like Petty, you don’t like rock ’n’ roll.

Which goes back to the idea of rock ’n’ roll being essentially Southern and the existence of a specific genre known as Southern rock. It’s pretty much over now, although you still hear residual traces of it in bands like Drive-By Truckers and My Morning Jacket and in the truculence of country jingo singers like Toby Keith and cracker rappers like Kid Rock (who despite his Motown roots is pure d redneck trash ). Southern rock flashed across the empty skies of the 1970 s and was gone.

Southern rock could be provincial and reactionary, a stubborn regional sound with thuggish fans who didn’t for a minute buy into any of that hippie-dippy peace and love junk. It was a kind of “know-nothing” music, redneck rock that wrapped itself in the Stars ’n’ Bars as well as Old Glory.

Lordy, it could be some dumb music. Sometimes it celebrated getting drunk or getting stoned or getting into a fight or getting a gun. Sometimes it dealt in stereotypes, sometimes it encouraged mindless rowdyism as the answer to systematic exclusion from full economic participation in America.

Sometimes, though, it was better than that. Sometimes it offered up the concerns and attitudes of ordinary working-class folks as well as any form of pop expression. Sometimes — as when the clean lines of Duane Allman and Dickey Betts’ Gibson guitars snaked around each other, when brother Gregg Allman’s bluesy voice began to ripen and roar — Southern rock could be majestic, lyrical and sweet and beyond interpretation.

And while Southern rock is over — it ended violently, amid the torn rubber and twisted steel of various motorcycle and plane crashes — it isn’t dead. It got assimilated, just like the rest of us. Petty comes straight out of that tradition, although he’s an assimilator himself. Early in his career someone asked him what the major influence on his career had been. “The radio,” he replied.

That’s probably not an answer anyone could give now because the radio blew up and fragged into a thousand disparate demographically designed channels. But back in the day, young people, everybody knew the 40 songs on the radio — we all heard Wilson Pickett and The Turtles’ “Elenore.” It was a crowded house back then, everybody rubbing off on everybody else. Now you look at the charts in the back of the magazines and pick one or two or three streams you can sort of follow if you’re interested. (If not, you can just tune in the TV pap and diva shows and accept the manufactured vacuum-formed models the industry stamps out. ) But as late as 1976, when Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers broke out, it was still possible to see a folk tradition at the heart of American pop, to discern regional accents and country-gone-totown giddiness in the chime of a 12-string Ricky.

ECONOMIC AND URGENT When they first surfaced as a national act after years of woodshedding in Florida bars, the Heartbreakers were often mistaken for a “new wave” act, and their economical singles — songs such as the Byrds-like “American Girl” and the Stonesish “Breakdown” — and emotional urgency could have been read as a rebuke to the indulgences of the bloated, faceless corporate competence of bands like Journey and Styx rather than a continuation — and advancement — of the mainstream pop tradition. No wonder the Heartbreakers were booked with bands like the Ramones and Blondie. No wonder that high-school punk rockers were working out versions of “I Need to Know” and “Refugee.” “ It would have been real easy to say, ‘OK, we are new wave,’ and get the skinny ties, ” Petty told writer Dave Marsh. “But it never looked like much of a challenge to me. It looked like a bigger challenge to work in the mainstream, to play to everybody. I never understood being so cool that nobody heard it.”

Underpinning Petty’s most obvious influences — his ringing Rickenbacker 12-string and his nasal upper register are reminiscent of the Byrds’ Roger McGuinn — is a certain bluesy grit and the clean, muscular lines of the Allmans and Lynyrd Skynyrd. (Mudcrutch, Petty’s first band, occasionally shared the bill with pre-fame Skynyrd in Gainesville bars. )

While he is basically a rock ’n’ roll fundamentalist who turns to the Byrds (and to their antecedents Dylan and Nashville ) for melodic elegance and to the Stones for sheer power, Petty’s Southernness never prevented him from incorporating other styles into his music. He has enjoyed fruitful collaborations with Eurythmics’ techno-guitarist Dave Stewart (“ Don’t Come Around Here No More” ) and Jeff Lynne, the former guiding light of Electric Light Orchestra turned Beatles-esque producer who collaborates with Petty on Highway Companion.
For more than 30 years, Petty and the Heartbreakers have been amazingly consistent in commercial stature and artistic quality. There have been no obvious false steps, and even now none of the early songs sound anachronistic. His name may not be the first that comes to mind when talking about the bona fide first-tier rock ’n’ roll pantheon; perhaps it shouldn’t be too far down the list. Presley, Dylan, Springsteen, Berry... Petty ?

Petty has outdone most of his influences. His legacy is likely to outlast that of the Byrds or the Allman Brothers or Lynyrd Skynyrd. Petty’s openness to new approaches has helped his music retain a certain freshness, although it no doubt helps that he writes economical, punchy pop songs that sound timeless. Songs mainly about girls.

Tom Petty Receives Billboard's Highest Honor

Asked early in his career who his influences were, Tom Petty replied "The Radio". What a great answer. And now he is the influence of so many bands who are becoming popular today.

During last night's acceptance speech, Tom mentioned that people come up to him and say that he has been the soundtrack to their lives. I'm sure that is as true for many of you as it is for me. Tom Petty has been my "Elvis" (Bob Dylan, John Lennon, Insert Generation Icon Here") since I bought Damn the Torpedoes in '79. It was great to see my favorite song writer honored in such a way last night. Congrats Tom! Here are some more blurbs from last night...

Green Day's Billie Joe Armstrong was additionally charged with presenting the Century Award, Billboard magazine's highest honor, to Tom Petty.

"I love music, I love rock and roll, therefore I love Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers," Armstrong said. "If you're going to come up [on stage] and thank God, thank God for Tom Petty."

"We haven't always been boy scouts, but we never lost sight of the music," Petty said in accepting the honor. After thanking many who have been involved in his 30-year career, he added, "Let me remind you that this ain't the end. I can still kick some ass."

Still Kicking Ass!

Acknowledging that awards shows aren't exactly his cup of tea, Billboard Century Award winner Tom Petty said of his storied career: "I've had to think about it more today than I've had in years. It has been a big long blur."

"This is nothing I've ever done before," he continued. "[But] I do feel honored that somebody has gone to this trouble to notice the work we've done all this time. In the world of gimmicks and sound bytes, it's nice to be noticed and honored this way."

The artist will continue to have to put his memory to the test next year, as work progresses on a comprehensive Petty and the Heartbreakers documentary that will be directed by Peter Bogdanovich ("The Last Picture Show," "Mask"). "There's probably some new music we'll do for that," he said.

Billie Joe Armstrong To Award Tom Petty

Tom Petty will be handed the Century Award by Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong in February (Pretty sure it's this TUESDAY 12/6).

Petty will receive the award for his consistency in having Billboard hits over the last 30 years. He has had 16 Top 40 hits and ten Top 10 albums.

The Century Award salutes excellence from an artist’s body of work while their career is still unfolding.

Petty will release a self-titled album early 2006 (Again, actually called Highway Companion. How did Paul Cashmere GET this job?)

Interestingly, Petty presented the first ever Century Award in 1992 to his buddy and Traveling Wilburys co-star George Harrison.

Tom Petty to receive Billboard Century Award

Tom Petty presented the inaugural Billboard Century Award in 1992 to George Harrison. Now it is Petty's turn to receive the honor.

The Century Award, Billboard's highest honor for creative achievement, will be presented to Petty Dec. 6 during the Billboard Music Awards at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. The awards will be telecast live on Fox.

"Tom Petty is one of the true great singer/songwriters," Billboard co-executive editor Tamara Conniff says. "Petty's songs and lyrics go to the root of the American dream. For over 30 years, Petty has been a rock icon who continues to inspire new generations of artists. We are honored to present him with the 2005 Century Award."

At 54, Petty shows no signs of slowing down. With his longtime band, the Heartbreakers, Petty just completed a North American tour, drawing more than 550,000 fans to the 36 shows reported to Billboard Boxscore.

"This award comes at a particularly nice time as the Heartbreakers and I go into the 30th year of our career," Petty says. "I'm very honored that Billboard has acknowledged me with this award."

Petty is wrapping up his third solo album, "Highway Companion," due in the spring. While sources say he has been in discussions with Sanctuary Records, there is no official word on a new label home. He has previously recorded for Shelter, Backstreet/MCA and Warner Bros.

In the meantime, Petty has four songs in Cameron Crowe's new movie, "Elizabethtown," and on the accompanying soundtrack, which came out Sept. 13 via RCA.

Influenced by '50s rock and the British bands of the '60s, Petty and the Heartbreakers crafted their own brand of rock'n'roll, generating such hits as "American Girl," "Breakdown," "Don't Do Me Like That," "Refugee," "The Waiting," "You Got Lucky" and "Don't Come Around Here No More."

All told, the Heartbreakers' albums have sold more than 50 million copies worldwide, including their top-selling "Greatest Hits," which has been certified by the Recording Industry Association of America for U.S. shipments of more than 10 million units. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2002.

Petty, a four-time Grammy Award winner, has interspersed Heartbreakers projects with two well-received solo releases and a pair of albums with supergroup the Traveling Wilburys, which included his musical heroes Harrison, Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison and Jeff Lynne.

The Century Award was created by the late Billboard editor in chief Timothy White and former publisher Howard Lander. In addition to Harrison, it has been presented to Buddy Guy, Billy Joel, Joni Mitchell, Carlos Santana, Chet Atkins, James Taylor, Emmylou Harris, Randy Newman, John Mellencamp, Annie Lennox, Sting and Stevie Wonder.