Some people aren’t cut out for the standard life; a lifelong career, nuclear family, a shiny piece of German engineering shimmering on the drive, and the rest. Needless to say, rock music is an environment that has attracted and fostered the social outliers not fitting into this prosaic mould, with a classic example being the late heartland rocker, Tom Petty.
An instinctively artistic being from as soon as he developed consciousness, it became readily clear to him from early on that a mundane lifestyle such as the one his parents had, was not for him.
Born on October 20th, 1950, in Gainesville, Florida, to say that Petty’s early life was simple in the relatively safe, typical post-war way, would be far from the truth. Petty’s father, Earl, was a travelling salesman, who, when at home, would brutally beat his two songs, leading to much resentment from Tom, even at such a green age. Essentially brought up by his mother Kitty and his grandmother, Petty knew he did not want to turn out like his father.
While it would have been a safe bet that Petty would never be like Earl in a personal sense – a man he openly “resented” throughout his life – the ‘Refugee’ star was afforded immense hope for his future by the exciting developments in rock ‘n’ roll. Something inside of him was entranced by novel, guitar-led grooves of Buddy Holly and Elvis Presley, and luckily for him, he would get a chance to meet the latter, the revered showman dubbed ‘The King of Rock and Roll’. It reset his life’s course.
In 1961, when Petty was just ten-years old, his uncle who was working on the set of the iconic movie Follow That Dream in nearby Ocala, took him to meet Presley. This firsthand taste of true starpower confirmed to him what route he should take in life, and it could not be further from that of a travelling salesman, no matter how ironic it is that he would also spend most of his life on the road.
Keith Harben, a childhood friend and neighbour of Petty’s, once recalled the effect meeting the ‘Hound Dog’ icon had on him: “Once he met Elvis, he keyed on him from that point on”.
“He arrived in a fleet of white Cadillacs,” Petty recalled in Rolling Stone in 2011. “People were screaming, handing records over a chain-link fence for him to sign. I remember his hair was so black that the sunshine was glowing off of it. Just a nod and a hello made your skin tingle. I was high for weeks. It lit a fever in me to get every record I could, and I really digested it. Elvis became the soundtrack of my early years.”
When Petty returned home that Saturday, he eagerly told Harben about what had transpired.
He traded his slingshot for his collection of Presley singles with him, and delved headfirst into the world of the Mississippian legend. This was the kickstart he needed. By the time The Beatles exploded onto the scene with their 1964 performance on The Ed Sullivan Show, there was no looking back.
Editors’ Picks
- 1960s Music
- Childhood Inspiration
- Early Influences
- Elvis Presley
- Gainesville Florida
- Heartland Rock
- Music Icons
- Rock and Roll
- Tom Petty
