antiMusic.com: Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers - Damn the Torpedoes (Deluxe Version) Review

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers - Damn the Torpedoes (Deluxe Version)
by Dan MacIntosh

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Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers have just released an expanded version of what is arguably the group's best album. Damn the Torpedoes finds this L.A. -- by way of Florida -- band reaching the exact right balance between its love of '60s guitar rock, and an unquestionably modern lyrical sensibility.

On the one hand, there's a song like "Here Comes My Girl", which begins with a spoken word verse that hearkens back to all those dramatic early '50s rock & roll songs. Its lyric points to the age old solution to every man's problem; he may hate his job, and might even despise his own life, but when he watches his hot looking girlfriend walk his way, all those worries and doubts just melt away. Yet you realize Petty is not living in the '50s when he sings "Century City", a song named for the entertainment law region of Southern California. Petty had a severe love hate relationship with the music business at the time: he loved the music, but hated the business. So it only made sense that he write a song about the evil empire that resides in that frightening part of the land.

This disc is full of A-game song after A-game song. "Refugee" was the big hit, but "Even The Losers" and "Don't Do Me Like That" were also all over the radio at the time. They still make classic rock radio sound relevant when they come on the air today. Petty has that Southern, but nevertheless lovable snarl, and Mike Campbell plays all the right guitar licks while Benmont Tench adds classic organ and piano fills. To use the torpedo analogy, every Heartbreaker shot hit its mark with this album.

Although it is fun to get a few extra outtakes on the new set's second CD, songs like "Nowhere" and "Surrender" sound merely half-finished. For this reason, it's easy to see why they may have been left off the original release. Far more successful are the added live versions of "Don't Do Me Like That" and "Refugee". After all, why wouldn't this skilled group be just thrilled to try out their latest masterpieces in front of audiences?

Every serious rock & roll fan should experience this lean, mean fighting machine at its best. And with Damn the Torpedoes, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers were the kings of the rock world.

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Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers - Damn the Torpedoes (Deluxe Version)
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