Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
By Lynn Van Matre
Chicago Tribune - June 19, 1987
SUBJECT: Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers
PLAYERS: Tom Petty (pictured), vocals and guitar; Mike Campbell, lead guitar; Benmont Tench, keyboards; Stan Lynch, drums; Howie Epstein, bass and vocals.
HOME TURF: Los Angeles
SOUND: Guitar-driven rock and roll with '60s roots and a Southern accent.
CLAIMS TO FAME: Three million-selling albums ("Damn the Torpedoes," "Hard Promises," "Southern Accents"); two gold albums, signifying sales of at least 500,000 ("Long After Dark," "You're Gonna Get It"). Latest album, "Let Me Up (I've Had Enough)," is in the Top 30; current single, "Jammin' Me," is Top 20.
PETTY DETAILS: Growing up in Gainesville, Fla., Petty played in high school bands before joining Campbell and Tench in a group called Mudcrutch. Group left Florida for Los Angeles in 1974, but broke up soon after. Petty landed deal with Shelter Records and put together the Heartbreakers with Tench, Campbell, Gainesville native Lynch and bassist Ron Blair, who was later replaced by Epstein. Group released self-titled debut album in 1976 and scored first Top 10 hit single, "Don't Do Me Like That," in 1979. In the late 1970s and early '80s Petty triumphed over record company legal battles, personal bankruptcy and a broken hand, which kept him out of action during much of 1984. Band's 1986 tour with Bob Dylan was one of the year's hottest tickets.
GOOFIEST GIGS: As teenagers, Petty and Campbell played in a band hired by a topless club to accompany the scantily clad female dancers' bump-and-grind gyrations. "It was really lewd stuff. I'd never seen anything like it before in my life," recalls Petty. "We had to play really good, really burn, to get any attention. The one thing we learned was that it was a lot easier to be in a rock band than to be a topless dancer."
TOM'S TIP FOR STRUGGLING BANDS: "Be yourself. Although you're always going to be influenced musically, you've got to stay true to what you believe in and express through your music. It's no easy trick, but the more you do it, the better you're gonna be at it."
WHERE TO CATCH THEM: Friday at Alpine Valley and Saturday at Poplar Creek on triple bills that also feature the Georgia Satellites and the Del Fuegos.
Music: Petty leads celebration with passion, precision
By Tim Roets
The Milwaukee Sentinel - Saturday, June 20, 1987
East Troy -- They called the three-band blowout "Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' Rock & Roll Caravan," a celebration of potent, bare-bones rock 'n' roll that thrilled the estimated 8,000 in attendance at Alpine Valley Music Theater.
Petty and company always put on emotionally charged shows, and Friday night was no exception. But they couldn't go wrong with such a strong repertoire and symbiotic musical relationship.
Clad simply in jeans, white T-shirt and black leather vest, Petty seemed more dynamic than ever. Eyes twinkling, he sang with a plaintive nasal tone that shone with barely restrained passion and played his guitar with understated precision.
From the loping, funky kick of "Breakdown" to the beautifully crafted pop of "American Girl" and the neo-psychedelia of "Don't Come Around Here No More," the Heartbreakers laid down a masterful backdrop that glowed with sturdy, compelling musicianship.
Lead guitarist Mike Campbell, a master of wringing feeling from his electric guitar, joined with Petty in chiming, cascading patterns on "Here Comes My Girl" and "The Waiting" and added sweet, subtle filigree on "Breakdown."
Benmont Tench's churning keyboard work was integral to the band's full, layered sound. And the rhythm section -- bassist and ex-Milwaukeean Howie Epstein and drummer Stan Lynch -- was precise and unwavering.
Recently released songs such as the free-wheeling "Think About Me" were just as sturdy as the old songs, and the covers -- Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth" and The Clash's "Should I Stay Or Should I Go" -- was chiseled with the same propulsive Heartbreakers sound.
The Del Fuego's half-hour opening set was an excellent example of back-to-basics rock, but the real kudos go to the Georgia Satellites, four hard-rockin' Rebs from Atlanta who pulled the crowd to its feet with a raw 40-minute set.
'Let Me Up' Has Flare, Fire
By Tom Ford
Toledo Blade - June 20, 1987
"Let Me Up (I've Had Enough)," Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers (MCA).
From the first jangly nouveau-Keith Richards chords of "Jammin' Me," to the last twinge of the title tune, this is a fine, honest album.
Whether one likes Tom Petty's patented slurred-diction delivery or not, he undeniably has a lot to say about the world, and he says it with flare and fire. There is much good music here. It is rough. It is ferocious in places, and it can be tender.
In a time when rock records are becoming homogenized, "Jammin' Me" stands out as an unpolished gem.
While many of the songs here, like all Petty albums, are ostensibly about girls, boys, cars, and love, an underlying protesting voice also sinks home. It is the voice of a generation grown tired of the repetitive pettiness (no pun) of the world.
Tom Petty shakes doldrums, rocks on
By Robert Hilburn
The Pittsburgh Press - June 20, 1987
Tom Petty had no trouble describing his current mood. "Eager," "excited," and "renewed" were among the words he used.
Petty was equally enthusiastic about his new album, "Let Me Up (I've Had Enough)," and a long American tour that began May 26 in Tuscon, Ariz., and is continuing despite a fire nine days earlier that caused an estimated $800,000 damage to his Los Angeles mansion.
That tour, called the "Rock 'n' roll Caravan '87" and also featuring the Georgia Satellites and the Del Fuegos, stops at the Civic Arena for a 7:30 concert tomorrow.
It begins a busy week of concerts here. At 78 p.m. Wednesday, the Beach Boys perform at the arena in the first of the Civic Arena Corp.'s five-show Skyline Series; there is no opening act. Thursday night, three hard-rocking bands that enjoyed their greatest success in the '70s -- Foghat, Molly Hatchet and the Outlaws -- take the Syria Mosque stage beginning at 7:30. Tickets are available for all three concerts.
Petty said he and the Heartbreakers are looking ahead to more dates with Bob Dylan, whose 1986 shows with the quintet were among the year's highlights in rock.
But it was not as easy for the singer-songwriter to find the right word to summarize his mental condition during the time he was making "Southern Accents," a 1985 work he now describes as eccentric. He had discarded the words "disoriented," "bored," and "disillusioned" before settling on "cloudy."
"Yeah, 'cloudy' sums it up pretty well. A lot of things were happening at once, and they all seemed to collide."
Tom Petty has never sounded better
By Jon Bream
Nashua Telegraph - June 21, 1987
"Let Me Up (I've Had Enough)," Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, (MCA)
Album-oriented rock was a major force in popular music from the mid-1970s to the mid-'80s. Just as it is fading in its dominance of the charts and airwaves as well as in its artistic significance, Tom Petty, one of the movement's leading figures, has released his best album in years.
Maybe Petty and his hand were inspired by their stint last year as Bob Dylan's touring band. Musically, the Heartbreakers haven't sounded this frisky and focused since "Damn the Torpedoes," their exceptional LP from 1979. They no longer are groping to add new sonic textures, as they did on "Southern Accents" in '85, or mining the same predictable Byrds-meet-Southern rock sound that established this as album-rock radio staples a decade ago.
"Let Me Up" features the kind of stinging, blowzy rock 'n' blues heard on the Rolling Stones' 1971 classic "Exile on Main Street" yet it sounds as contemporary as Dire Straits. Throw in some evocative, Dylan-inspired lyrics and Petty's record doesn't let up.
The Florida-bred, Los Angeles-based singer-guitarist starts with "Jammin' Me," an angry guitar-driven rocker that rejects everything from acid rain and Iranian torture to Eddie Murphy and Apple computers. (Dylan was a co-writer of this number.) The song echoes the Stones as do the closing numbers, the longing, sassy-sounding "How Many More Days" and the intentionally sloppy sounding "Let Me Up (I've Had Enough)."
Petty can play tenderly as well as tough, as he demonstrates on "It'll All Work Out," a striking ballad of resolve framed by mandolins. But mostly Petty and the Heartbreakers rock out, whether he's singing about love fulfilled or unrequited or the angry state of things.
Video Beat: Rating The New Rock Videos
By Ethile Ann Vare
Oswego Palladium - June 22, 1987
What's the state of rock videos? It's rather like that little girl with the little curl in the middle of her forehead. When it's good, it's very, very good; when it's bad, it's horrid. But most of the time, it's simply mundane.
Flipping 'round the TV dial...
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers -- "Jammin" Me." The videoclip recaptures the exuberance of the Cars' hit "You Might Think" with its delight in the sheer mechanical wizardry of the medium itself. The succession of images and their inventive juxtaposition make up for any lack in the song itself -- and there are many. Worth seeing even with the sound turned off.
Rating: Very, Very Good.
Petty, Heartbreakers having fun performing again
By Gary Graff
The Vindicator - Monday, June 22, 1987
Tom Petty and his mates have tightened their ranks and knit up internal problems to emerge a stronger, more cohesive musical unit.
The spirit of their new album, "Let Me Up (I've Had Enough)," and the band that made it, is summed up in one simple line in the credits: "All songs performed and arranged by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers."
No big deal, you say. After all, it has been Petty and his four Heartbreaker cohorts for the last 11 years, ever since their first album came out. But there's more to it than that.
"Everyone has a real band buzz," said guitarist Mike Campbell. "I just want to play right now. We're all digging playing together. It hasn't been this easy for a long time, or this fun."
In review: Petty's caravan carries honest rock
By Scott Mervis
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - June 23, 1987
Tom Petty sure keeps good company. Last year it was Bob Dylan, who seemed to turn Petty's inspiration level up to high. This year it's the Rock 'n' Roll Caravan with the Georgia Satellites and the Del Fuegos.
The caravan is something of a celebration of the rock the way its founding fathers meant it to be played -- hard, gritty, with heart, soul, conviction and a sense of what is going on in the world.
As Petty said last night of the radio, "They call the records rock 'n' roll but what they are is a bunch of [crap]." The caravan he brought to the Civic Arena last night was on the road to rock.
Tom Petty works up an appetite for rock
By Pete Bishop
The Pittsburgh Press - Tuesday, June 23, 1987
Tom Petty once described the music he and the Heartbreakers make as "meat and potatoes" rock, and that quintet and two other bands proved at the Civic Arena last night it can be both filling and tasty.