Tom Petty appeared on the rock and roll scene in the mid-‘70s with his five-piece band The Heartbreakers. He had some modest success in the UK early on but was on the verge of bankruptcy before his third album, Damn the Torpedoes (1979) launched him in the States.
Early critical appraisal liked to point out how he married the classic UK blues rock of the Stones with a poppier, folkier American sound more along the lines of The Byrds. However you define it, it worked. Petty released 13 studio albums with The Heartbreakers, and three more as a solo act. He also put out several albums with his long-time side project Mudcrutch, and two with supergroup The Traveling Wilburys. And there were plenty of live recordings and compilation albums as well. All in all, the man created a lot of music.
I don’t deny the Stones/Byrds marriage scenario. But I like to look at Petty, especially with the Heartbreakers, as the inventor of Southern Rock. I’m distinguishing this from Country Rock. Some Petty tracks veer in that direction, but there was a profound difference between Petty and bands like Molly Hatchett or Lynyrd Skynyrd, contemporaries who had success in the 1970s but did not have sustained runs.
Tom Petty has a deep catalog with non-singles that should not be ignored
Petty is Florida, and Florida may share some space with the ‘South,” but it really is not the “South.” Florida is its own thing, and so is Tom Petty. I’m calling it Southern Rock here, but that only scratches the surface, as we are about to see.
Whether with the Heartbreakers or as a solo act, Tom Petty released more than fifty singles, and many of them became rock & roll standards over the last quarter of the twentieth century.
But beyond those very popular singles, Petty has a deep and varied back catalog. I’m going to rank his ten greatest songs that were not released as singles. Actually, you’re getting a bonus track here. I’m going to rank eleven songs. But that’s only due to a strange little loophole. One of Petty’s most beloved songs was not initially released as a single, and to the best of my knowledge, its classic original recording has never been released, though another version of it has been. So I’m throwing in one extra song.
Here then are Tom Petty’s eleven greatest non-singles, counting down from eleven to one.
No. 11 - “WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN MY LIFE” (1979)
Damn the Torpedoes features the career-making “Refugee,” as well as quality tunes like the proto-emo “Even the Losers,” the earworm “Don’t Do Me Like That,” and the ragged puppy-dog love song “Here Comes My Girl.” So it’s easy for some of its other songs to get lost in the shuffle.
“What Are You Doing in My Life” is a blues rocker that showcases one of the Heartbreaker’s primary weapons – Benmont Tench – pounding away on the piano. This is highly representative of the dichotomy found in early Petty – somehow managing to be ragged and tight at the same time, while also blending righteous anger into a great pop tune. Damn the Torpedoes marked the entrance of producer Jimmy Iovine into Petty’s life, and the music takes a step forward from his first two albums as a result.
No. 10 - “ZERO FROM OUTER SPACE” (1996)
Edward Burns' 1996 rom-com She’s the One was nothing special. Sure, it had Jennifer Aniston and Cameron Diaz, but the best thing about it some thirty years on was the soundtrack, which Petty would release as his ninth studio album.
“Zero From Outer Space” is a grungy blues rocker that comes about as close as Petty ever would to ZZ Top. This is also kind of the flip side of “Even the Losers.” Whereas that was a heartfelt paean to the romantically downtrodden, this one is an unabashed anthem, raucous and unapologetic as it glories in being a nobody. It’s a great rock and roll subject and a great rock and roll song.
No. 9 - “SOMETHING GOOD COMING” (2010)
The Stones and The Byrds may have been major influences on Petty. But no one was bigger than the artist he would team up with in the Traveling Wilburys. Petty and the Heartbreakers had backed Bob Dylan on his 1986 tour and the mutual respect was obvious.
“Something Good Coming,” from one of the Heartbreakers' final albums, is Petty’s take on Dylan’s heart-wrenching “Not Dark Yet” from Dylan’s Time Out Of Mind album in 1997. It almost plays as a photo negative of Dylan. It features some of Petty’s simplest and most beautiful poetry. “And I’m thinking about mama – And about the kids – And the way we lived – And the things we did – How she never had a chance – Never caught a break – And how we pay for our big mistakes.” Each verse ends with a hopeful “something good coming,” but it remains terribly wistful and sad, more prayer than belief. It’s a beautiful, mature song.
No. 8 - “COOL DRY PLACE” (1990)
Nowhere in all of Petty’s output is the debt to Dylan as pronounced as it is on this galloping satire on success in the music business from the Traveling Wilbury’s second and final album. I can’t be sure that Petty wrote this one – all four remaining Wilburys shared equal songwriting credit on the album.
But he sings it as a solo and unless Dylan ghost-wrote a few lines, this sounds like Petty. “We got solids and acoustics and some from plywood boards – And some are trimmed in leather and some are made with gourds – There’s organs and trombones and reverbs we can’t use – Lots of DX7s, and old athletic shoes.”
The music begins jangly but gradually builds to almost rococo proportions as horns and saxes offer little bursts of exclamation. I remember the first time I heard it, assuming it was Dylan singing. It wasn’t til I listened again that it became clear the voice wasn’t quite rough enough. Then I decided it was simply the best Bob Dylan song that Bob Dylan never did.
No. 7 - “A MIND WITH A HEART OF ITS OWN” (1989)
Full Moon Fever was Petty first entirely solo album, and it stands as one of his singular achievements. It combines elements of the Heartbreakers (primarily in his right-hand man, guitarist Mike Campbell) with elements of the Wilburys. It had at least five significant hits, including his epic “Free Fallin’” along with “I Won’t Back Down,” and “A Face in the Crowd,” both products of his collaboration with fellow Wilbury Jeff Lynne.
For me, the absolute standouts are “Runnin’ Down a Dream” and “Yer So Bad,” but “A Mind With a Heart of Its Own,” is right there with them. It’s tucked into the back half of the album, the second-to-last track, a banger of a romance with witty lyrics and a great jangle sound.
Over the years, Petty dabbled with different producers and collaborators. Though he never moved too far from his origins in southern blues rock, the experiments continually refreshed his sound. On Full Moon Fever, he got production help from the past – in the person of Mike Campbell – and from the present – in the person of Jeff Lynne. And it resulted in a sound that was both old and new.
No. 6 - “A THING ABOUT YOU” (1981)
Musically, this infatuation song from Hard Promises follows up on “What Are You Doing in My Life,” and a lot of other early Petty. In many ways, I think this defines the early Petty sound as well as any song he ever did. But it didn’t come as easy as it sounds.
Hard Promises arrived right after Petty’s huge breakthrough, Damn the Torpedoes, and he engaged in epic and well-publicized fights with his label on how to release and price the album. Might that be why there is an edge of anger in what is, on the surface, a simple rocker about love? Many of Petty’s best songs have such a dichotomy – sadness amidst hope, or vice versa.
In a way, it serves as a counterpoint to Hard Promises’ most famous song, “The Waiting.” Whereas that track laments a love just out of reach, “I Got a Thing About You” seems to caution that even when it’s right there in front of you, there’s something dangerous lurking – “Somewhere deep in the middle of the night – Lovers hold each other tight – Whisper in their anxious ears – Words of love that disappear.”
No. 5 - “FULL GROWN BOY” (2014)
From the final Heartbreakers albums, just a couple of years before Petty’s death, we now find him playing with a bossa nova beat and a final recognition of the dichotomy that always existed in the rocker who was capable of great warmth. “I like to move on slow and easy – Like a cat creeps through the grass – And the full moon seems to know me – ‘Cause I’ve found myself at last – I’m a full grown boy.”
Tench’s mellotron underpins the slinky rhythm, like that cat creeping through the grass, and Campbell plays as clean a guitar as there ever would for the Heartbreakers. The album was called Hypnotic Eye, and this was as hypnotic as it would get.
No. 4 - “TOO MUCH AIN’T ENOUGH” (1978)
Petty’s second album, You’re Gonna Get It!, is often seen as a minor step back from the raw power of his debut and the groundbreaking third album. But time has been kinder and the wealth of quality songs is apparent. “Too Much Ain’t Enough” demonstrates the Stones' influence that critics liked to call out in early Petty. It’s a fairly straightforward blues rock workout that showcases how much of a chameleon Campbell was with a guitar in his hands.
This wasn’t country rock, but it wasn’t exactly the Stones either. “American Girl,” from the first album may have begun carving out Petty’s unique brand of pop rock, but this is where I think we get the real evolution of southern rock. Not quite the hard blues of ZZ Top or the pop of “American Girl,” “Too Much Ain’t Enough” promised something familiar but with a twist. And just one year, that promise would be delivered upon with Damn the Torpedoes.
No. 3 - “ONE STORY TOWN” (1982)
“One Story Town” completes a little musical triptych running from “What Are You Doing in My Life” to “I Need to Know” and ending with this track from his often-overlooked fifth album Long After Dark. This one moves away from concerns about love to a broader concern about being stuck, not simply in romance, but in life.
By this point, the Heartbreakers' original bassist, Ron Blair, had left the band and was replaced by Howie Epstein. Blair, who would rejoin the band after Epstein’s death in 2002, was a fine player. But Epstein’s arrival hearkened a stronger floor on which Campbell and Tench could craft their soaring guitar and keyboard flourishes, as well as fuller harmonies. That is instantly apparent on “One Story Town.” The song opens with one of Petty’s most succinct statements of his career – “I’m all for standing up, I’m breaking free – I don’t want fate handed down to me.”
No. 2 - “TIME TO MOVE ON” (1994)
Wildflowers, Petty’s second solo album, is jam-packed with some of his very best songwriting. Though there are rockers (“Honey Bee” was one of the songs that just missed making this list) the album is built on its softer ballads. “Time to Move On” is a beautiful, loping song that looks to the future with about as optimistic an eye as Petty ever showed.
Though a solo album, the Heartbreakers were very much present. They sometimes switched roles, as on this track where Campbell picked up the bass, leaving Petty alone on guitar. This is one of the brief excursions into country, but it remains firmly grounded in Petty’s unique pop sensibility. “It’s time to move on, it’s time to get going – What lies ahead, I have no way of knowing – But under my feet, grass is growing – It’s time to move on, it’s time to get going.” Petty was essentially a musical institution by this point, but he was ever restless for a new way to serve up his music.
No. 1 - “WILDFLOWERS” (1994)
This is your bonus track. It is one of Petty’s most beloved songs and one of the most poignant and beautiful love songs of the pop music era. There is none of the anger or anxiety associated with early Petty love songs. It is pure bliss – with just Petty strumming a peppy acoustic guitar, Campbell on bass, and Tench sliding in romantic flourishes on his keyboards.
Four songs were released as singles from Wildflowers in 1994, but the title track was not among them. In 2020, when a more complete version of the original album was released (Wildflowers was initially intended to be a double album, but was put out in a shortened form in 1994), a home recording of “Wildflowers” was in fact released as a single. That version is a little softer and a little slower than the original album cut. The song is so perfect that it can stand up to a lot of interpretations, but that original non-single is definitive.
There you have it. Eleven awesome songs, none of which was deemed commercial enough to be released as a single. They would constitute a great career for many artists. For Tom Petty, they are just further testament to the remarkable breadth and scale of his talent.