Tom Petty - Highway Companion
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Music CD Cover
Artist: Tom PettyEdition: Music CD
Audio: English (Original Language)
CD Release Date: 2006-07-25
Music Label: American
Product features:
- PETTY TOM & THE HEARTBREAKERS HIGHWAY COMPANION
- Saving Grace
- Square One
- Flirting With Time
- Down South
- Jack
- Turn This Car Around
- Big Weekend
- Night Driver
- Damaged By Love
- This Old Town
- Ankle Deep
- The Golden Rose
Free Music Notes for Highway Companion
Free Music Review: Superb songwriting, spirited playing, stellar production...an instant classic
Hit: 5 Stars
Tom Petty's timeless HIGHWAY COMPANION is one of those albums that needs some time to marinate in your CD player, iPod, computer, or soul...wherever you best like to house your favorite music. For the most part, it doesn't leap out of the speakers and grab you by the throat, so much as it slips up behind you and drapes a friendly, understanding arm across your shoulders. For that reason, I've waited a week before writing this review, to allow the songs to soak in; and I can honestly say that after listening to it more than twenty times in the past seven days, I'm still finding new bits to love about it every time.
First of all, it starts with the quality of the songs themselves. Tom Petty takes a backseat to no one lyrically. He is as fine a lyricist as there is in this generation, spanning everyone from Bob Dylan to Smokey Robinson to Van Morrison. There are so many incredible one-liners and epiphanies throughout this one CD that it would be a career's worth for many writers. For example ...
* "It's hard to say/who you are these days/but you run on anyway/don't you baby?"
* "Last time though I hid my tracks/So well I could not get back"
* "He was caught up in a lie/he half-believed"
* "You're flirting with time baby/flirting with time, and maybe/time baby/is catching up with you"
* "Create myself down South/impress all the women/pretend I'm Samuel Clemens/wear seersucker and white linens"
* "If you don't run you rust"
...and there are so many more, but I'll let you discover them for yourself.
TP's masterful way with a melody doesn't disappoint either. Each song works its way into that spot in your brain that later triggers bouts of humming, whistling, and meditative la-la-la-ing.
Several of the songs are flat-out gorgeous, particularly "Square One," "Damaged By Love," and "Golden Rose" (which can best be described as a Pink Floydian sea chanty). Others mine a bluesy vein: the John Lee Hooker-esque boom-boom of "Saving Grace," the "Last Dance with Mary Jane"-esque hum of "Turn This Car Around," and the "You Don't Know How it Feels"-esque shuffle of "This Old Town." Elsewhere, "Flirting With Time" flies with the Byrds, "Jack" is spare pop with cool martial breaks and surfing guitar, while "Big Weekend" and "Ankle Deep" are delightful returns to the rollicking country rock of Petty and producer Jeff Lynne's Travelling Wilbury days.
Speaking of Jeff Lynne, he shows once more why he is one of the best and most respected producers in the history of rock and roll. His sensitivity to Petty's songs, coupled with his unparalleled studio craft, results in a sound rich in subtle brilliance. Lynne's enthusiasm and obvious love of the recording process is a somewhat needed kick in the pants/fresh drink of water for Petty, who's previous effort (with the Heartbreakers), THE LAST DJ, was excellent, but dour...and remains underappreciated by the general public. On HIGHWAY COMPANION, you can tell these guys are having a blast, even when the subject matter is serious, or when the tone is delicate.
The playing is spirited throughout, with a core band of Petty, Lynne, and longtime Heartbreaker Mike Campbell handling the instrumentation. Make no mistake: Mike Campbell is one of the great rock guitarists EVER and he shines alongside TP and Lynne, who are no slouches, either, when it comes to working the frets. Even though the name of Rick Rubin does not appear on any credits, the fact that this album is released through his American Recordings label is notable, and his spirit infuses this entire project with a heightened sense of honesty and integrity.
The CD packaging--especially the beautiful sepia-toned booklet--is topnotch and pleasing to the eye...quite befitting the quality of the project overall.
To sum up: I don't want to add a lot of hype to an album that is so wonderfully understated, but I sincerely believe that it's not only one of the best albums of this year, but certainly one of the best of this decade and one that will stand the test of time...an enduring classic for anyone who loves good music made by real people on real instruments, with lots of love and soul.
Key tracks: all, but especially "Saving Grace," "Down South," "Square One," "Flirting With Time," and "Damaged By Love"
BONUS INFORMATION: For a highly enjoyable and informative book on Tom Petty and his monumental career, check out CONVERSATIONS WITH TOM PETTY by Paul Zollo. It contains wonderful, warm stories about the many artists with whom TP has worked, as well as a virtual clinic on how to write classic songs.
Highway Companion Poster
PETTY TOM & THE HEARTBREAKERS HIGHWAY COMPANIONFour years after he took Elvis Costello's advice and bit the music/radio biz hands that have simultaneously fed and frustrated him for decades on the scabrous The Last DJ, Tom Petty returned to the studio with more personally introspective matters on his mind. Reuniting with producer/Wilbury sideman Jeff Lynne sans Heartbreakers for his third solo release proper, the veteran doesn't so much retool his trademark sound here as allow it the freedom to roam. The sonic landscape here is bluesier ("Saving Grace's opening shuffle, the haunting "Turn This Car Around") and more country-fried (the twangy energy of the blue collar lament "Big Weekend"), a return to familiar roots that produces subtly different results this time around. That sensibility now seasons songs as different as the stoned-elegant languor of "Night Driver" and the playful "Jack," where Petty and Lynn give a knowing nod and wink to the contemporary pop milieu. The stately, pop-perfect closer "Golden Rose" may lean on the Beatle-y side of their familiar sound, but it's a cliché the duo use both sparingly and shrewdly throughout, forging one of the veteran's most free-ranging and warmly satisfying efforts in a decade. Jerry McCulley
Recommended Tom Petty Discography
 The Last DJ |  Anthology: Through the Years |  Wildflowers |
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