Warren Zanes is the author of
Petty: The Biography. From his conversation with
Jamie Blaine at The Weeklings:
Reclusive, ambitious, mysterious, meticulous, focused, businessman, coolest guy in the room – your book describes Tom as all of these things. “Tinted windows on his soul” was my favorite. One always got the feeling that Tom Petty was a hard guy to get a handle on. How did you approach that as a writer?
I simply responded to the situation Tom gave me. He opened the door and invited me in. We talked, for many hours, over a few years. But I saw, sitting next to him, that he could be all the things you describe. Without contradiction. Rock and roll has the remarkable, beautiful capacity to change people’s lives. Glen Campbell, Elvis Presley, Joe Strummer, Carl Perkins, Tom Petty. But in changing those lives, rock and roll also demands a lot of the person undergoing such changes. They need to be several people, they need to find ways to protect themselves, they need to figure out how to trust and when not to. When pressed, I would have to say that I hope my own sons don’t get such a formidable task presented them. I hope rock and roll gives them its gift without taxing them so heavily. They probably wouldn’t be able to do it as well as Tom Petty has. Here’s a guy that’s kept the band together for forty years. Holy shit, right? And he’s still...[read on]
--Marshal Zeringue
Warren Zanes is the author of Petty: The Biography. From his conversation with Jamie Blaine at The Weeklings: