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Sat 8 November 2025 19:30, UK <\/p>\n
Not everything that Tom Petty<\/a> ever laid down in the studio was supposed to be terribly difficult to play. <\/p>\n He was always looking to make straightforward rock and roll, and he was not going to get caught in the same trap as everyone else from his generation by trying to stretch his songs out wherever he could. The point was to keep things fairly simple, but you\u2019d be surprised how much hard work goes into making a song sound that simple.<\/p>\n Even on some of The Heartbreakers\u2019 first albums, it\u2019s not like everything is a walk in the park half the time. The pre-Damn the Torpedoes era of the group was a great way for everyone to cut their teeth, but in between the garage-rock-esque production on a few of the tunes, getting the right groove on a song like \u2018Rockin\u2019 Around With You\u2019 or capturing a guitar solo as chaotic as \u2018Too Much Ain\u2019t Enough\u2019 takes a lot more than a bunch of kids trying to figure out what working in a studio is like.<\/p>\n And by the time the band reached the late 1980s, it was more about creating textures with sound than playing everything live in the room. Wildflowers<\/a> could be played on acoustic guitar and still sound powerful, but if you\u2019re listening a little closer, there\u2019s a practical symphony going on behind Petty\u2019s vocals, whether that\u2019s the beautiful piano that comes in and those slight additions of percussion that accent every word he\u2019s saying.<\/p>\n But if you look at any great rock and roll record, you need to start by getting the drums right first. That\u2019s the pulse of what the song is going to be, and if there\u2019s not a strong foundation from the word \u2018go\u2019, there\u2019s going to be problems when it comes time for everyone to start adding their own parts to the record. Then again, it was always going to be in safe hands when you get someone like Ringo Starr to sit in on the session.<\/p>\n Starr has always been the definition of a perfect drummer in many people\u2019s eyes, but when he was first brought in for the session, he remembered getting thrown for a loop more than a few times, saying<\/a>, \u201cWhen I played on Wildflowers, I said, \u2018I\u2019ll play on four tracks Tom, that\u2019s it\u2019. And then after three I said, \u2018I\u2019m going\u2019, and he goes, \u2018Trickier than you thought, aren\u2019t they.\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n But when looking at the way that the Heartbreakers work, a lot of it comes down to the percussion. The rhythm guitars are roaring throughout every one of their classic tracks, and while there are more than a few times where they keep things straightforward, there\u2019s always the odd song that could throw a drummer for a loop if they aren\u2019t paying attention carefully.<\/p>\n Take a song like \u2018To Find A Friend\u2019. The pulse is as consistent as a metronome half the time, but you need that certain push and pull to make everything work, and the verses are already a bit of a handful to deal with. Everything stays in 4\/4 time, but hearing Petty change chords so quickly at the top of the verse can be downright disorienting if someone is looking to get the kind of pulse they\u2019re looking for.<\/p>\n But if you look at the final results of what Starr played on, he was a part of something more than your average rock and roll record. A song like \u2018Hung Up and Overdue\u2019 is beautiful on its own, but by adding Starr on drums and bringing in Carl Wilson to sing a few backing vocals, Petty had a damn supergroup rallying around him to make sure that the record came out sounding exactly right.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Related Topics<\/p>\n