Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers: Southern Accents - 1985

 

This 1985 Tom Petty album saw him influenced by contemporary sounds, some vaguely country-ish melodies and also, notably, funk and disco, would you believe. In a similar way to The Rolling Stones in the eighties, he managed to successfully merge his trademark riffy rock sound with rhythms borrowed from popular dance music. This makes this a surprisingly fresh and innovative album. It is one of my favourites of his. 

Rebels has a nice bassy riff underpinning it, and is full of atmosphere, but the main body of the song is frustratingly muffled and Petty’s vocal sounds as if he has just got up with a serious hangover, being equally indistinct. Despite these sonic problems, however, I still like the song. 

It Ain’t Nothing To Me is a classic piece of Stonesy funk rock that brings to mind Dance (Part One) from their 1980 Emotional Rescue album. The bass line reminds me of Queen’s disco dabbling and there is a Mike Garson on Aladdin Sane-inspired piano break too. It boils with white funk grooves, disco-ish horn breaks and razor sharp riffs and is a most unusual departure from the usual for Petty. I love it. 

The big popular track from the album that dominated the airwaves was the anthemic and stately Don’t Come Around Here No More. There is not much to be said other than it is simply a great track, why, I even love the synthesiser breaks. The Free Bird-esque up in tempo at the end is rousing too. Get a load of that wah-wah guitar at the end. The tempo drops on the sombre but balefully appealing Southern Accents, which sees Petty getting all emotional about the Southern States. 

A real favourite of mine is the superbly frothy Make It Better (Forget About Me), which bubbles over with poppy funk in another serious change of style for Petty. It reminds me of Southside Johnny’s brassy, dancey stuff in the eighties. Spike is a brooding, swampy serving of country-influenced rock and soul. It has a captivating backbeat and some Dire Straits style guitar. 

Dogs On The Run is another gem, loaded with uplifting riffs and breaks and a slurringly enticing Jaggeresque vocal. Talking Of Jagger, Mary’s New Car has a really Stones-like riff and some delicious smoky saxophone breaks underpinning it. 

There has not been a sub-standard track on here and the quality continues right up to the end with the typically evocative Petty slowie in the lovely The Best Of Everything. Once more there is a Southside Johnny style brass backing together with a hint of Jackson Browne in the vocal delivery, in places. This was a great album, maybe Petty and his excellent band’s best, for me, anyway.

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