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The recent release of "Runnin' Down A Dream," the documentary film by Peter Bogdanovich that recounts the entire career of the blonde guitarist from Florida and his fabulous band, gives us the opportunity to talk about one of his albums perhaps too quickly forgotten.
Released in 1981, "Hard Promises" has the only unforgivable flaw of being placed, in Tom Petty's discography, between "Damn The Torpedoes," a masterpiece of sound balance rich with songs that have now become rock classics, and "Long After Dark," a winning and compact record propelled to success by a couple of well-chosen singles.
Re-listening closely to "Hard Promises" today, one realizes that it finds its model of inspiration precisely in "Damn The Torpedoes," and, after years, it is still unclear why the public and critics received it with lukewarm enthusiasm, nonetheless awarding it fifth place on the American charts. Yet, it has many reasons to be remembered. The opening "The Waiting" is one of the great songs that Our Hero has written in his thirty-year career. Byrds-esque in every way, it remains an unsurpassed and hard to forget piece. The same goes for "A Woman In Love", a direct rock piece ennobled by an inspired and precise Mike Campbell and for the rhythmic and guitar-driven "The Criminal Kind." Petty does not forget to pay tribute to his musical heroes, so "Something Big" has a Dylan-esque singing style that offers it a pleasant folk charm, and "Letting You Go" sounds like a lost piece by Roger McGuinn. However, the album certainly doesn't stop there as it has other winning cards to play. These are two superb ballads that alone are worth the entire work. "Insider"" is a heartfelt duet with his friend Stevie Nicks who, at the time, was so intertwined with Tom Petty's musical life that she was even willing to leave Fleetwood Mac to join the Heartbreakers, while the concluding "You Can Still Change Your Mind," touches the strings of the deepest feelings. These are the happiest notes of an album that perhaps paid too much for the underlying relaxation that inhabits and surrounds it.
Furthermore, interesting is Petty's new vocal approach which results more personal, mature, and thoughtful than the nervous and impetuous one of his early records. An artist so mature that, before the release of the album, he decided to oppose with a legal battle—then won—against his own record label that wanted to increase the price of "Hard Promises" by a dollar.
Returning to "Runnin' Down A Dream," Bogdanovich's film is presented in an elegant box set containing the entire documentary, lasting four hours and rich with rare footage, on two DVDs, a concert recorded in September 2006 in Gainesville, Tom's hometown, and a CD of unreleased tracks from the film. The concert DVD is absolutely unmissable. Tom Petty plays at home and the Heartbreakers perform with great pleasure. The blonde musician revisits his classics from "Free Fallin'" to "Listen To Her Heart", from the piano-driven "Southern Accents" to the psychedelic "Don't Come Around Here No More." He dusts off the beautiful "Handle With Care" by the Traveling Wilburys and thrills his audience with "You Wreck Me" and the anthem of "American Girl." Not satisfied, he gifts unexpected and inspired versions of "I'm A Man" with a Yardbirds flavor, a spirited "Oh Well" by Fleetwood Mac, and in the finale "Mystic Eyes" by Van Morrison. Guest of the evening is a renewed Stevie Nicks with whom Tom duets in several tracks including the famous "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around", a 1981 hit that wouldn't have been out of place on "Hard Promises".
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