What could be cooler in the entire world than for your target demographic to be Tom Petty?, Petty characterized his roots and ambition this way, in the title song of his 1985 album, Southern Accents: I got my own way of talkin/But everything gets done, with a Southern accent. He was born Thomas Earl Petty on October 20th, 1950, in Gainesville, Florida; a brother, Bruce, arrived in 1958. The original four Breakers are all upright as far as I know, he says. He remembers, as a child, a Christmas in L.A. with the Petty and Harrison families Dhani and Adria playing Nintendo with their rock-god dads. Finally, Dylan walked off, forcing Petty to coax him back on as the Heartbreakers kept playing. Send us a tip using our anonymous form. Lynch started to work with various Florida bands, among them Styrophoam Soule and Road Turkey, and when he was 15 he met Ron Blair, who was six years older than Lynch. Lynch felt it wasnt great. He said: I wasnt allowed to hang. We played with X, we played with Gun Club, but we never stopped loving Tom Petty, Zanes said. The session also included Jacksonville native Mike Campbell. Stan and I had some personal conflicts with family here and there, he says. We both started smiling at one point and went, We got something here. (I also remember Rick Rubin, who was with him on what must have been a work break from recording Wildflowers, giving me a very fishy look when we emerged.). He may have fallen, leaving us to try to grow strong without him. We had great eye communication where I could turn around and look at him, and he knew just exactly what I wanted to do. It wasnt the best period in my life, Petty confessed in 2006. Hed be there every day., One of the projects that had been put on hold when Petty died was an expanded reissue of Wildflowers all of the tracks for the intended double album plus additional, unreleased songs followed by a tour showcasing Pettys breakthrough writing on that record. It was also the climax of their 40th Anniversary Tour, a 53-show celebration of the singer-guitarists unbroken lifetime with his band as one of rock & rolls biggest, best and most committed live acts. Thats when it fell apart with Stan., The tensions between Lynch and Petty had been building ever since the late 1980s when Petty recorded with the Traveling Wilburys and followed that up with his first solo album. Among the acts that Tom Petty took with him on the tour for his 1987 album, Let Me Up (Ive Had Enough), was the Del Fuegos, a Boston-based roots-rock band with ties to the New York hardcore scene. Having Stan [Lynch] play on that is very cool. Probably best known for having been the longtime drummer and founding member of Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, Lynch has also toured the world with Bob Dylan, and written and produced songs for Don Henley, the Eagles, the Mavericks and many others. I have a proposition for you, said Campbell, who was on the verge of kicking off his first-ever solo tour, but was going to be without regular drummer Matt Laug for a period in the spring and summer when he had commitments in Europe with Italian superstar Vasco Rossi. And Petty highlighted strong recent work like the heavy-blues rave-up I Should Have Known It, from 2010s Mojo. Petty declared bankruptcy while making Damn the Torpedoes to force his way to a more equitable record deal. I said, Tom, the audience is rockin. via That was one of the great things about him. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Cond Nast. Are you up for it?, Lynchs first instinct was to decline the offer. His last words to me where, I heard you, man. As it was once put to me by Mike Campbell, the unerringly crackerjack guitarist who together with master keyboardist Benmont Tench and Tom formed the irreducible center of the Heartbreakers, Tom calls the shots. Petty ran the complex brotherhood that abbreviates as TPATH as a generally benign dictatorship. Stan Lynch, the band's longtime drummer, who eventually quit in 1994, is unsurprisingly the most critical of Petty. Zanes, now fifty, was telling the tale the other day, while ducking out of the rain for coffee at Benvenuto Caf, in Tribeca. "We all kind of thought Howie would get the job," says original Heartbreakers' drummer Stan Lynch. Were just gonna throw a bunch of records up in the air and see where they fall tonight, Petty told the sold-out crowd in his sandy, slow-as-molasses drawl, early in a two-hour streak of legacy that was, in fact, decisively chosen and largely set in stone throughout the tour. In Pettys interviews with Zanes, he was as forthright and honest as he is in his songs, talking about his abusive father, his failed marriage, and his heroin use. He was pissed, Petty told writer Paul Zollo. Stan Lynch Interview - Songwriting & Producing Records Youve been up there like a soldier, man. We had a nice hug and said we loved each other. After that, at the Bowl, it was backstage, Hi, how you doing?, a little patter between songs.. Tom Petty fired Stan Lynch It's safe to say Lynch's dismissal from the Heartbreakers wasn't a mutual decision. Jimmy Iovine is known to have obsessed over the drum sound in Pettys 1979 album Damn the Torpedos, which Iovine produced, and Lynch became the object of his frustration. Lynchs run ends after a June 26 show in Aspen, Colorado. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers were an American rock band from Gainesville, Florida. He died at 8:40 p.m. the next night, after a daylong vigil by his family, friends and bandmates. "When I listen to our first couple of albums, I think that I sound stiff." He was 66. Ad Choices. Plus: each Wednesday, exclusively for subscribers, the best books of the week. The drummer realized after some point that he didnt want to be in the band anymore due to the personal and musical differences he had with Tom Petty. But the times I was designated to tag along on a couple later tours for magazine profiles, he was always welcoming, inclusive, ready with a quip that came from his slightly mysterious but usually winning vein of humor. I have a memory or running into him in the upper reaches of the House of Blues before a Willie Nelson show, and retreating into a shuttered, empty dining room to smoke one. At times, I think they were looking for some help, like, I need to put a band together. We had this unit. Blank Space: What Kind of Genius Is Max Martin? Editors picks Ive known him since I was 15. Mike Campbell and Stan Lynch on Their Surprise Heartbreakers Reunion From the heart: The 12 best Tom Petty songs - Yahoo Before an encore on Ferrones first tour with Petty in 1995, the singer asked him if he knew Breakdown. The drummer said no; it wasnt on the list of songs he was supposed to learn. I felt like all of the uniforms and emotional and metaphysical stuff about being a drummer, Id sort of outgrown. He got the balance he wanted, Campbell says of the 40th Anniversary shows, and the story he wanted to tell., Very few people beyond the Heartbreakers immediate circle knew that Petty was suffering, at each gig, from a hairline fracture in his left hip, which he planned to deal with after the tour. When I heard what happened, it put me right down on my knees, literally. I had to remind myself that I was full-grown man. The eleven-year-old who first heard Breakdown was always close. 2023 Rolling Stone, LLC. Id rather hear the old songs with the real singer.. The two had not previously met or spoken in twenty years, other than a brief phone call following Petty's death. He was found unconscious at his home in the early morning and was taken to hospital in . We all have our go-to sources of solace, and inspiration, and our personal troves of top-quality, memory-stirring rock n roll and balladeering. He. Billboard is a part of Penske Media Corporation. The documents claim Adria wanted the box set collection to be titled, "Tom Petty" and not "Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers." You couldnt quite believe it. 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He and I had incredibly good communication onstage; he could read the movement of my shoulder. Here's What Happened to the Rest of the Heartbreakers After Tom Petty Died If its just one or two of us, thats one thing. Lynch stated he would be open to playing with the other three original members of The Heartbreakers in the future. " Even though he was still in the band in 1989, Lynch did not perform on any songs on Petty's solo album Full Moon Fever, even though Campbell, Tench and Epstein did. Tom was a completely masculine personality, Nicks says, but it softened him and made him much more understanding. Nicks, who first met Petty in 1978, was never afraid to pick up the phone and explain a situation to him. The two finally met in Gainesville, where Campbell was supposed to go to college but instead ended up playing with Petty in Mudcrutch. I think Stan didn't like Iovine (not sure any of the band except for maybe Petty appreciated him), but he was OK at that point because TP supported Lynch's playing style. Because every night I went out and watched Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. All rights reserved. There were more eyes watching out for you.. Lynch left the meeting before everyone had a chance to say goodbye after he decided to distance himself and relocate to Florida. Wasnt this already the day from hell? We want to hear it. Im not going back out there. Former Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers drummer Stan Lynch recalled working with Stevie Nicks in a July 2021 interview. "He seemed to have a real good . The 50 Worst Decisions in Music History I didnt want to find out anything that would compromise the mans dignity, Zanes said. The Del Fuegos were originally an Oberlin band that Dan Zanes, Warrens older brother, started with some college friends; Warren joined after Andover. Petty spent the downtime recording his . Petty was our guy. He was really good at that, and he knew the songs really well.