You get your friends and you're a self-contained unit. "The minute I saw the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show-and it's true of thousands of guys-there was the way out. In a 2006 interview, Petty said he knew he wanted to be in a band the moment he saw the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show. Of that meeting with Presley, Petty said, "Elvis glowed." He instantly became a Presley fan, and when he returned that Saturday, he was greeted by his friend Keith Harben, and soon traded his Wham-O slingshot for a collection of Elvis 45s. In the summer of 1961, his uncle was working on the set of Presley's film Follow That Dream, in nearby Ocala, and invited Petty to watch the shoot. His interest in rock and roll music began at age ten when he met Elvis Presley. His brother Bruce was seven years younger. Petty was born October 20, 1950, in Gainesville, Florida, the first of two sons of Kitty Petty ( nee Avery), a local tax office worker, and Earl Petty, who was a traveling salesman. 2.2 1988–1991: Traveling Wilburys and solo career.2.1 1976–1987: Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.In 2017, Petty died of an accidental drug overdose, at the age of 66, one week after the end of the Heartbreakers' 40th Anniversary Tour and two weeks shy of his 67th birthday. Petty was honored as MusiCares Person of the Year in February 2017 for his contributions to music and for his philanthropy. Petty and the Heartbreakers were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2002. Solo or with the Heartbreakers, he had hit albums from the 1970s through the 2010s and sold more than 80 million records worldwide, making him one of the best-selling music artists of all time.
Petty's solo hits include " I Won't Back Down" (1989), " Free Fallin'" (1989), and " You Don't Know How It Feels" (1994). Hit singles with the Heartbreakers include " Don't Do Me Like That" (1979), " Refugee" (1980), " The Waiting" (1981), " Don't Come Around Here No More" (1985) and " Learning to Fly" (1991). He previously led the band Mudcrutch, was a member of the late 1980s supergroup the Traveling Wilburys, and had success as a solo artist. Stream the documentary here.Thomas Earl Petty (October 20, 1950 – October 2, 2017) was an American musician and actor who was the lead vocalist and guitarist of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, formed in 1976. Petty passed away in October of 2017 at the age of 66 in a Santa Monica, CA hospital after being found unconscious and in cardiac arrest at his Malibu home.
The project - which won the 2021 SXSW Audience Award, and Best Documentary Film at the Boulder Film Festival, ahead of its debut in cinemas last month in sync with Petty's birthday - comes on the heels of the release of a 2020 series of expanded editions of the 1994 record, which Petty wrote and recorded as a double album before his record label convinced him to trim it back to a single record almost two decades later, "Wildflowers & All The Rest" delivered the second half of the album as originally intended.
The film presents archival footage of Petty and his band in the recording studio, behind-the-scenes on tour, and at home with his family, and includes never-before-seen video from a newly discovered archive of 16mm film, as well as new interviews with Wildflowers co-producer and Heartbreakers guitarist Mike Campbell along with Heartbreakers keyboardist Benmont Tench, and many more. (hennemusic) Tom Petty's team are streaming a documentary about the making of his 1994 album, "Wildflowers." Directed by Mary Wharton and now available in 4K resolution as part of the YouTube Originals series, "Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free: The Making of Wildflowers" offers an intimate look into the making of the rocker's second solo effort through the period of 1993-1995 as he worked with producer Rick Rubin for the first time.