Tom Petty quotes

Born
October 20, 1950 Gainesville, Florida, U.S.

Died
October 2, 2017.

Occupation
Singer, songwriter, musician.

Tom Petty was an American singer, songwriter and musician. He was the lead singer of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.

Most things I worry about never happen anyway.
– Tom Petty

As time goes by, you seem to weed out the things that were making your life hard.
– Tom Petty

I love history, doesn’t matter what era, I’m fascinated.
– Tom Petty

I have turned down a lot of money for things that would have made me feel cheesy.
– Tom Petty

I’ve been more and more into production lately, and I really, really love that. I love recording.
– Tom Petty

I would never put my songs in a commercial.
– Tom Petty

I like to be an optimist, but I like to be a realist, too.
– Tom Petty

‘Free Fallin’ is a very good song. Maybe it would be one of my favorites if it hadn’t become this huge anthem. But I’m grateful that people like it.
– Tom Petty

I’m barely prolific and incredibly lazy.
– Tom Petty

It’s very easy to be cynical about the hall of fame. But on the other hand, it’s really a beautiful thing for someone like me. I dedicated my entire life to this music.
– Tom Petty

Music is probably the only real magic I have encountered in my life. There’s not some trick involved with it. It’s pure and it’s real. It moves, it heals, it communicates and does all these incredible things.
– Tom Petty

What I’ve learned about marriage: You need to have each other’s back; you have to be a kind of team going through life.
– Tom Petty

I’m not exactly a guy who makes new friends easily.
– Tom Petty

The radio has so many rules, and songs don’t. You don’t necessarily write to a rule book unless you’re, like, just doing it professionally, which has never been my thing.
– Tom Petty

I don’t know, my music has always just come from where the wind blew me. Like where I’m at during a particular moment in time.
– Tom Petty

If you’re not getting older, you’re dead.
– Tom Petty

I didn’t think you could just become a rock and roll singer.
– Tom Petty

I think if I’d quit years ago, I’d never have known what I was capable of doing.
– Tom Petty

I don’t treat the band like I’m above them or that they’re a hired hand for me. We’ve never worked that way. So I’m a team player. I would be very uncomfortable having to do this alone.
– Tom Petty

It’s funny how the music industry is enraged about the Internet and the way things are copied without being paid for. But you know why people steal the music? Because they can’t afford the music.
– Tom Petty

When I decided to be a musician I reckoned that that was going to be the way of less profit, less money. I was sort of giving up the idea of making a lot of money. It was what I loved to do. I would have done it anyway. If I’d had to work at Taco Bell I’d have still been out at night trying to play music.
– Tom Petty

A good song should give you a lot of images; you should be able to make your own little movie in your head to a good song.
– Tom Petty

Sometimes, giving up your privacy is a little like going to the dentist and we have let him have access that no one’s ever had.
– Tom Petty

I love doing my ‘Buried Treasure’ show.
– Tom Petty

An average show is two hours. And that’s usually right up to the curfew or the union triple time. I always feel like I could have played a little longer or something, but it’s hard for me to pay attention to anything for longer than that.
– Tom Petty

My family wasn’t involved in the college. They were more of just your ‘white trash’ kind of family. And so I have that kind of background, but I always kind of aspired to be something else, and I made a lot of different friends over the years that were passing through.
– Tom Petty

When I met Elvis, we didn’t really have a conversation. I was introduced by my uncle, and he sort of grunted my way. What stays with me is the whole scene. I had never seen a real mob scene before. I was really young and impressionable. Elvis really did look – he looked sort of not real, as if he were glowing.
– Tom Petty

You and I will meet again, When we’re least expecting it, One day in some far off place, I will recognize your face, I won’t say goodbye my friend, For you and I will meet again.
– Tom Petty

When my record company rejected ‘Full Moon Fever’, I was hurt so bad. I was pretty far along in my career at that point. I’d never had anything rejected; I’d never really even had a comment. So when that happened, it was really just a board to the forehead. But then, finally, I picked myself up.
– Tom Petty

It’s hard for me… If I don’t have a project going, I don’t feel like I’m connected to anything. I don’t even think it’s that healthy for me. I like to get out of bed and have a purpose.
– Tom Petty

There’s nothing like that feeling of having just written a song that you know is ‘the song,’ and you know it’s really great, and you can’t wait to share it with people; you can’t wait to record it.
– Tom Petty

I tend to write on an acoustic guitar or the piano. I have kind of a rule: if I can’t sit down and play this and get the song over, I don’t take it to the band, because most any good song, you can sit down and deliver it with a piano or a guitar.
– Tom Petty

I developed a problem with authority. Any time that authority was what I interpreted as being unjust, I stood up to it, and that became my personality.
– Tom Petty