Tom Petty’s 10 Greatest Songs

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It’ll All Work Out: Inspired by Petty’s brief separation from his wife, Jane, during the making of Let Me Up.

I Should Have Known It: We’d record in one or two takes,” Petty said of 2010’s Mojo.

The Best of Everything: Southern Accents closes with a powerful ballad that Petty calls “one of the best songs I ever wrote.

A Higher Place: It’s a nice hopeful lyric,” says Mike Campbell of the brightest-sounding song on Wildflowers.

Crystal River: This nine-minute-plus, organ-wrapped, Grateful Dead–style guitar jam is a taste of what might have been had Tom Petty.

Waiting for Tonight: When Tom Petty recorded “Waiting for Tonight” with all of the Heartbreakers during a break in the sessions for Full Moon Fever.

Peace in L.A.: Days after the 1992 L.A. riots, Petty rushed into the studio with Mike Campbell to vent his frustrations and plead for calm. 

Yer So Bad: The journey to making Full Moon Fever began by chance, when Petty and Jeff Lynne started talking while stopped next to each other at a red light on Thanksgiving 1987.

Square One: First heard on the soundtrack to Cameron Crowe’s 2005 film Elizabethtown, “Square One.

Rebels: I wasn’t trying to cover the entire South and its story,” Petty said of Southern Accents. 

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