Petty’s relationship with The King isn’t just one of distant fandom. When Petty was 10, his uncle worked on the set of Presley’s 1962 musical comedy movie Follow That Dream. (Americansongwriter)
A young Petty got to stop by on occasion and check it out. There, he saw Elvis with a “fleet of white Cadillacs.”
In the video below, Petty talked about Elvis appearing like “a vision.”
Petty also told Rolling Stone, “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.”
From there, Petty developed a strong fandom. He told Rolling Stone, in 2011, about his favorite songs and here we are, more than 10 years later, eager to celebrate the playlist.
Petty commented on Elvis’ 1957 song “Mean Woman Blues,” saying, “She kiss so hard she bruise my lips/Hurts so good my heart just flips. That was pretty heavy stuff for a little kid like me to hear. He brought in backup singers the Jordanaires and used them as a rhythm instrument, which was usually done in old gospel music. That added a whole other dimension.”
Added Petty, “When it came on the radio, it’d make you swoon every time. He did come back and do a few great
“That’s All Right” is the debut single by Elvis, originally written by American blues singer Arthur Crudup. Elvis’ version was recorded on July 5, 1954, and released on July 19, 1954“Heartbreak Hotel” (1956)
“Heartbreak Hotel,”
Released as a single on January 27, 1956, was Presley’s first on his new record label RCA Victor.
Hound Dog” (1956)
Originally written by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, the song was first recorded by Big Mama Thornton on August 13, 1952.
Can’t Help Falling In Love With You” (1961)
Why Tom Petty Is One of the 100 Greatest Artists
While Presley passed away in 1977, just a year earlier, Petty made his s glistening arrival in 1976 with his debut effort. (Source: Faroutmagazine)
Like many people of the same age as Petty, Elvis was his first introduction into the debauched world of rock ‘n’ roll. Before Petty’s eyes and ears caught the attention of ‘The King’, he lived an innocent childhood in Gainesville, but that came to an abrupt end after he heard the devilish tones of Presley.
When MTV gave these sort of awards to veteran artists the coolest surprise came at the end of the night when Axl Rose joined Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers for “Free Fallin’.”
As the evening reaches its climax. Host Arsenio Hall introduces the final act, Tom Petty, whose solo album Full Moon Fever had been released that April. Petty starts up with the slow, ringing riff of the album's opener, Free Fallin', and sings a verse. And then, slowing emerging from the shadows with that familiar swaying gait, mic stand draped in scarves, it's Axl. And the crowd goes wild.
In 1976, I'd been in Fleetwood Mac for about a year when I heard Tom Petty's debut. I became a fan right then. I loved the way Tom's Florida swamp-dog voice sounded in cahoots with Mike Campbell's guitar and Benmont Tench's keyboards. Tom had the same influences we had — the Byrds, Neil Young, Crosby, Stills and Nash — but he dropped in lots of serious old blues. And Tom is such a great singer and so charismatic onstage. I became such a fan that if I hadn't been in a band myself, I would have joined that one. (Rolling Stone)
When I started doing my first solo album, Bella Donna, my first thought was, "Who produces Tom Petty?" When they said Jimmy Iovine, I got Jimmy, because I wanted my solo work to be as much like Tom's as possible.
In 2014, Petty spoke with CBC and talked about his early love of Elvis. The musician ignited a fire in his belly, one which would change the direction of his life even if Petty was blissfully aware of it at the time. “Elvis was before The Beatles,” Petty explained. “My picture of Elvis was the American dream. Elvis was a kid from the south who had broken all the rules, he had become his own man, and looked like he did whatever he wanted, whether adults liked it or not,” he said with wry laughter.
“That was kind of the picture I had, but that didn’t look like something you could be for me. To be Elvis? Nobody has ever pulled that off, you’d have to be Elvis. You’d have to look like that for one thing, and orchestras would have to come out of the shrubbery and onto the beach. That just doesn’t happen, but, The Beatles looked like something that could be done to me,” he added.
Even though there was something unattainable about Elvis from the beginning, Petty couldn’t hold bad his adoration. However, in his heart, he knew that a kid like him could never be in line to the throne. Yet, Elvis was his first gateway into music, one that sent him down a rabbit hole where he explored, experimented, and eventually discovered his own voice.
