Video - Welcome to Petty Country -

Recently uploaded to Tom Petty's official website, here is the video also available on YouTube, with Petty and other musicians.

In addition to the video, below you  the documentary directed by Sam Jones.

Mike Campbell: 'Country music is in the DNA of Tom Petty'

Decades ago, before the Heartbreakers even existed in their full form, Petty was playing country songs in what he would later describe as "real redneck country" Floridian bars, trying to earn a living as a burgeoning performer.

"[The crowd was] always kind of weirded out by us because we had long hair, playing country music," Petty said in 2005's Conversations With Tom Petty. "And that was completely unheard of in those days."

Petty's country influences were the classics — people like Carl Perkins, George Jones and Conway Twitty — and over the course of his career, he never dropped the torch, collaborating with people like Willie Nelson, Hank Williams Jr. and Johnny Cash. Perhaps the most blatant nod was 1985's Southern Accents album, whose title track emphasized that while "the youn 'uns call it country," Petty didn't feel the need to label his "own way of talkin'."

There came a point where Petty felt country music had lost its way. "I hate to generalize on a whole genre of music, but it does seem to be missing that magic element that it used to have," he told Rolling Stone in 2013. "I'm sure there are people playing country that are doing it well, but they're just not getting the attention that the shittier stuff gets. But that's the way it always is, isn't it?"

This prompted a response from country musician Chris Stapleton, who penned an open letter to Petty. "I, for one, would like to see you put you [sic] money where your mouth is in a tangible way," he said. "So, in the interest of making country music less 'shitty' (your words), I suggest a collaboration. I'm extending an open invitation to you to write songs with me, produce recordings on or with me, or otherwise participate in whatever way you see fit in my little corner of music."

After 11 years, Stapleton has gotten a small part of his wish, recording a version of the Heartbreakers' "I Should Have Known It" for a new album titled 'Petty Country: A Country Music Celebration of Tom Petty,' out June 21. In addition to Stapleton, it features both legends of the industry like Dolly Parton, Willie Nelson and George Strait, plus newer faces like Margo Price, Lainey Wilson and Dierks Bentley, all covering the music of Petty.