Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers
by Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers

Tom Petty's debut album is full of enjoyable unpretentious rock'n'roll. Featuring some good songs; breakdown, and, anything that's rock'n'roll, are fine, but without doubt the best track is the superb, American girl, still Petty's best song in my opinion. Petty would go on to make better albums(Damn the torpedoes, being his best), but this is one of his most enjoyable. A good start to a great career.

From Repo TOP 100 COMMENTER 11/28/2017 03:09 | #202201 | TOP COMMENT Vote up your preferred comments and the comments with the most votes will be flagged.

THE OTHER ANGRY YOUNG MAN

So many bangers. Could slum it with the punks, drink with the rednecks, smoke with the hippies, and get deep in conversation with the folkies, often all at once. A natural pop songwriter in the truest sense, his ability to knock out a seemingly effortless three-minute wonder was almost unrivaled, and didn't desert him for a good two decades, from the mid-'70s to the mid-'90s (and possibly later, though I'm unfamiliar with his more recent stuff). I'm a relatively late convert, and I definitely get the sense that his music spoke more openly to Americans than it did Europeans, but it's no less devastating. - The Immortal Skinny

Some friends of mine and me stayed up all through the night
Rockin' pretty steady till the sky went light
And didn't go to bed
Didn't go to work
I picked up the telephone
Told the boss he was a jerk (Anything’s That Rock n' Roll)

The rock critics called them the three angry young men - Costello, Jackson, and… and…. you know… that other guy. But, to me their were only two that mattered - Elvis Costello and Tom Petty. Petty & his Heartbreakers were the American answer to England Pub Rock. Taking the torch from The legendary Flamin’ Groovies and bringing fun, fresh fireworks back to rock in the good ol’ USA.

But Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers weren't just some retro revivalists. They took rock BOTH forward & backward at the same time. Often in the very same song. Taking rock back to its primal, ass kicking basics, but adding a freshness and punch that just wasn’t there before. More snotty. More keyboards.. And way more vocal tics & idiosyncrasies. The hallmarks of New Wave are all over this album, and it could easily be proffered up as the FIRST New Wave classic. Hell, on some songs, such as Luna, they really weren’t that far from what Ric Ocasek would achieve with The Cars debut (easily one of the greatest New Wave albums of all time).

Tom Petty nowadays has the rep of being a retro artist, but his early records were clearly pointing mostly in one direction - the future.

Grade: A. Interestingly, if Petty had only made this debut, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers would probably have been considered a a New Wave pioneer - packaged on one of those Rhino CD collections of 70s New Wave nuggets. It just so happened that Petty had other ideas.

A-side: My only gripe with this album is that it’s pretty obvious that American Girl was tacked on at the end as “the single..” It just doesn’t flow from the preceding track, Luna. Talk about minor quibbles. In other words, this album is fantastic. Especially considering American Girl is one of the best Rock n’ Roll singles of the 70s.

A mixture of The Byrds and Bob Dylan in many ways, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers created an irresistible sound for the future to come!

Solid debut album from an enduring band. American Girl and Breakdown are all time classics. The rest is solid too.

From Bork TOP 100 COMMENTER 08/21/2010 03:15 | #14559 | TOP COMMENT Vote up your preferred comments and the comments with the most votes will be flagged.

Three strong singles (with American Girl being excellent), but the rest is rather dull stuff.