WEBVTT - Tom Petty's Wildflowers II with Adria Petty 0:00:08.200 --> 0:00:14.280 Pushkin. Just a quick note here. You can listen to 0:00:14.320 --> 0:00:17.280 all of the music mentioned in this episode on our playlist, 0:00:17.320 --> 0:00:19.400 which you can find a link to in the show 0:00:19.440 --> 0:00:23.119 notes for licensing reasons, each time a song is referenced 0:00:23.160 --> 0:00:28.360 in this episode, you'll hear this sound effect all right. 0:00:29.000 --> 0:00:32.640 Enjoy the episode. It's been twenty six years since the 0:00:32.680 --> 0:00:37.319 release of Tom Petty's mid career masterpiece Wildflowers. On an 0:00:37.320 --> 0:00:41.120 early episode of Broken Record, Rick Rubin, who produced Wildflowers, 0:00:41.520 --> 0:00:44.600 recalled how Tom recorded more than twenty five songs for 0:00:44.680 --> 0:00:47.920 what was originally meant to be a double album. Those 0:00:47.920 --> 0:00:51.720 extra ten songs had been shelved and definitely until now. 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:57.480 That's Lee Virginia alone, one of the brilliant newly unearthed 0:00:57.480 --> 0:01:00.960 Petty songs from the box set Wildflowers and all the rest. 0:01:01.920 --> 0:01:04.600 Along with those ten extra tracks, the box it also 0:01:04.640 --> 0:01:08.480 includes dozens of never before her demos and live recordings. 0:01:09.440 --> 0:01:13.240 The comprehensive collection was championed by Tom's daughter, Adria Petty, 0:01:13.520 --> 0:01:17.560 an accomplished director who shot music videos for Beyonce, Coldplay, 0:01:17.720 --> 0:01:21.520 and Regina Spector. Adria was born right around the time 0:01:21.600 --> 0:01:25.039 her dad formed The Heartbreakers, and she remained incredibly close 0:01:25.040 --> 0:01:28.800 to him until his death in twenty seventeen. In today's interview, 0:01:28.920 --> 0:01:31.280 Rick sits down with Adria, who's known for a long 0:01:31.400 --> 0:01:34.360 time together. They listened to some of the demos that 0:01:34.360 --> 0:01:37.200 were found in Tom's closet after he passed, and she 0:01:37.200 --> 0:01:45.000 shares intimate details about her dad's creative process. This is 0:01:45.080 --> 0:01:48.800 broken record Liner notes for the digital Age. I'm justin Richmondton. 0:01:53.680 --> 0:01:58.120 Here's Rick Rubin and Adria Petty. The interesting thing about 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:00.800 the podcast for me is that for people that I know, 0:02:01.720 --> 0:02:04.000 I get to ask them about stuff that we just 0:02:04.040 --> 0:02:07.640 never comes up in normal life. So like, what was 0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:11.960 it like growing up in the house with Tom and 0:02:12.000 --> 0:02:16.000 your mom? Was that? Like? It was weird? I mean, 0:02:16.040 --> 0:02:17.760 it's been a lot of time to reflect on it. 0:02:18.639 --> 0:02:21.880 At the beginning, it was really exciting because I was 0:02:22.160 --> 0:02:25.720 born right when the Heartbreakers were born. So there were, 0:02:25.840 --> 0:02:28.160 you know, times when we all lived in motels together. 0:02:28.320 --> 0:02:31.720 There were times when we all traveled together, or there 0:02:31.720 --> 0:02:34.880 were group houses that everybody lived in and you know, 0:02:34.960 --> 0:02:38.680 my recollection doesn't quite go back that far, but there 0:02:38.760 --> 0:02:44.000 was definitely an exciting camaraderie and community of people around us, 0:02:44.240 --> 0:02:46.919 and they sort of treated me as an equal from 0:02:46.919 --> 0:02:48.840 the time I was six, so I was just kind 0:02:48.840 --> 0:02:52.799 of like another person in this gang of friends and artists. 0:02:53.720 --> 0:02:57.320 It was always like a lot of music, a lot 0:02:57.360 --> 0:03:00.560 of music playing, a lot of reggae, and a lot 0:03:00.560 --> 0:03:04.960 of like just kind of great energy coming from the 0:03:05.000 --> 0:03:08.240 stereo all the time, or from Dad's acoustic guitar. Can 0:03:08.280 --> 0:03:13.280 you remember when you first realized that everybody's life was 0:03:13.360 --> 0:03:16.919 not the same as that? Yeah, when was that? There 0:03:17.080 --> 0:03:21.239 was a time when I was about seven, when Damn 0:03:21.280 --> 0:03:25.360 the Torpedoes came out, and you know, leading up to that, 0:03:25.480 --> 0:03:28.120 we really kind of lost Dad, like to Jimmy Ivy 0:03:28.160 --> 0:03:29.520 and like that. You can see that in a lot 0:03:29.560 --> 0:03:31.400 of documentaries and stuff where they were literally on the 0:03:31.440 --> 0:03:34.400 phone day and night or in the studio day and 0:03:34.480 --> 0:03:37.680 night trying to perfect that record and bring it somewhere. 0:03:38.560 --> 0:03:42.080 And after that record came out, my father's mother died 0:03:42.520 --> 0:03:45.280 and he didn't go to the funeral, and I remember 0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:48.240 him sitting by the window just looking like just he 0:03:48.440 --> 0:03:51.400 just changed, like something changed in him. And I was like, 0:03:51.480 --> 0:03:53.760 why didn't you go? And he was like, because I'll 0:03:53.760 --> 0:03:57.360 just be a distraction. I can't go, and distraction because 0:03:57.720 --> 0:04:01.360 of music or distraction because of their relationships in the family, 0:04:01.480 --> 0:04:05.080 because he was famous, because it was he would have overshadowed, 0:04:05.880 --> 0:04:08.000 you know, her life as a churchgo or her life 0:04:08.000 --> 0:04:11.240 in her community. Like the world that they had in Gainesville, 0:04:11.280 --> 0:04:17.200 which was very very I mean Kitty, Kitty Avery Petty, 0:04:17.400 --> 0:04:22.159 our grandmother. Kitty was like magical and compassionate and sweet. 0:04:22.920 --> 0:04:25.920 And I got to meet her before she died a 0:04:25.920 --> 0:04:29.760 few times and I remember her, but um, she loved 0:04:29.760 --> 0:04:32.120 my dad, I mean the sunshine out of my dad 0:04:32.160 --> 0:04:34.760 and his brother for her, and she was very loving person. 0:04:35.640 --> 0:04:39.960 But he changed after she died, and damned the torpedoes 0:04:39.960 --> 0:04:42.960 came out and people started like shout shooting our windows 0:04:43.000 --> 0:04:46.480 and stuff like doing weird stuff in the eighties, like 0:04:47.080 --> 0:04:50.240 and we started having a lot more a presence of 0:04:50.279 --> 0:04:54.160 like security, or a presence of handlers or people who 0:04:54.200 --> 0:04:56.520 cleaned our homes or things like that. That just wasn't 0:04:56.520 --> 0:04:59.760 normal at all, and it kind of I think that 0:05:00.120 --> 0:05:03.200 kind of got worse and worse, like does in terms 0:05:03.200 --> 0:05:05.440 of like living in the house with them, you know 0:05:05.560 --> 0:05:08.280 that feeling of like wow, the room is getting further 0:05:08.320 --> 0:05:11.640 and further away, and there's an intercom and there's there's 0:05:11.640 --> 0:05:14.479 all these other people that do basic functions that other 0:05:14.480 --> 0:05:17.640 people can do for themselves. And I think that there's 0:05:17.640 --> 0:05:22.279 this sort of mythology that if you're successful, you're isolated 0:05:22.320 --> 0:05:24.880 from people. You're up a long driveway, and other people 0:05:24.960 --> 0:05:26.920 do all these things that are so annoying to do. 0:05:27.560 --> 0:05:30.200 But when you stop doing those things for yourself, I 0:05:30.279 --> 0:05:34.200 think you get really disconnected and aimless about your own existence. 0:05:34.360 --> 0:05:37.719 Like you don't understand how much mess you're making around 0:05:37.760 --> 0:05:40.279 the house, or you don't understand what groceries you actually 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:42.440 need as opposed to what this random person goes and 0:05:42.480 --> 0:05:45.240 buys for you, or you know, there's just a sort 0:05:45.240 --> 0:05:48.360 of disconnect that starts to manifest in depression. And the 0:05:48.520 --> 0:05:52.760 successful people that I've grown up around and with, and 0:05:53.480 --> 0:05:56.599 my dad was so down to earth that we would 0:05:56.600 --> 0:05:58.839 go to Florida every year and now have no one 0:05:59.240 --> 0:06:02.159 for a few months and we clean our own house 0:06:02.200 --> 0:06:05.520 and be with my uncle and normal people that they 0:06:05.560 --> 0:06:08.600 grew up with. And he would sort of isolate enough 0:06:08.800 --> 0:06:12.479 with normal people to stay pretty pure, cool guy. Yeah, 0:06:12.839 --> 0:06:15.599 did he enjoy those times. He loved it. Yeah, he 0:06:15.720 --> 0:06:18.000 loved that. And you know, there was a lot of 0:06:18.040 --> 0:06:21.600 songwriting and a lot of inspiration drawn from that time 0:06:21.640 --> 0:06:23.760 at the beach in Florida, and we still have that house, Like, 0:06:23.800 --> 0:06:27.400 that's a really special place. I remember when he got 0:06:27.440 --> 0:06:31.920 it and being really excited about it. Yeah, I mean 0:06:32.040 --> 0:06:34.360 we had been going there renting for years. And like 0:06:34.480 --> 0:06:38.000 you know, he was a very pragmatic guy, my dad. 0:06:38.120 --> 0:06:40.400 You know, he didn't like to live beyond his means. 0:06:40.440 --> 0:06:43.080 He didn't extend credit, he didn't take mortgages. He just 0:06:43.200 --> 0:06:46.560 he liked to keep things simple. But things got less 0:06:46.600 --> 0:06:49.560 simple after he became famous. How much time do you 0:06:49.600 --> 0:06:52.000 spend on tour when you really live all the time, 0:06:52.240 --> 0:06:54.560 all the time, all the time. Did you ever go 0:06:55.680 --> 0:06:58.200 We didn't have enough money to take the families with 0:06:58.320 --> 0:07:01.960 us until the late eighties when my house burned down 0:07:02.680 --> 0:07:06.400 and we went on the Dylan Petty tour. And that's 0:07:06.440 --> 0:07:08.880 actually when me and Jacob met was on that tour 0:07:08.960 --> 0:07:11.280 and we traveled the world together for most of the year, 0:07:11.400 --> 0:07:15.280 and we went to Egypt and Israel. Together. It was wild. Yeah, 0:07:15.320 --> 0:07:18.720 I mean being a Carni folk or whatever it is 0:07:18.760 --> 0:07:21.840 that you know, the child of a musician becomes, you 0:07:22.040 --> 0:07:26.400 learned how to deal with transitional lifestyle like living out 0:07:26.440 --> 0:07:28.360 of a suitcase, having her bag packed every day and 0:07:28.440 --> 0:07:32.680 unpacking it every night, or so different from being the military, 0:07:32.880 --> 0:07:36.320 like you know, just being it's not and there's a 0:07:36.320 --> 0:07:38.960 camaraderie and there's a bro code, and there's a sort 0:07:38.960 --> 0:07:43.640 of you know what do we call it road etiquette, 0:07:44.200 --> 0:07:46.400 so where they used to us as kids, like you know, 0:07:46.480 --> 0:07:48.840 you don't walk certain places on stage, you don't trip 0:07:48.840 --> 0:07:52.040 over wires, you don't get people's way if you can help, 0:07:52.080 --> 0:07:55.640 you help. You know, there's a certain road etiquette to 0:07:55.720 --> 0:07:58.800 watching a road crew work. And my dad's road crew, 0:07:58.840 --> 0:08:01.520 you know, he famously had multigenerations of people that would 0:08:01.520 --> 0:08:03.560 just like replace themselves with their sons, and it was 0:08:03.600 --> 0:08:07.400 like forty years of taken care of those people. So 0:08:07.560 --> 0:08:11.000 once we started going on the road, that road etiquette 0:08:11.040 --> 0:08:14.120 and that sort of ability to be able to transition 0:08:14.160 --> 0:08:17.840 into any situation. I think for me and some of 0:08:17.880 --> 0:08:21.080 my friends that have grown up similarly, that has not changed, 0:08:21.120 --> 0:08:23.280 Like we always want to be on a plane, or 0:08:23.480 --> 0:08:25.240 like I became a director so I could shoot all 0:08:25.240 --> 0:08:27.760 over the world and have these little stints and I 0:08:27.760 --> 0:08:29.760 would be living in a hotel and here I am again, 0:08:30.160 --> 0:08:35.120 Like it's a different it's a different sense of feeling settled. 0:08:35.160 --> 0:08:37.600 But you can kind of feel settled anywhere, which is 0:08:37.679 --> 0:08:41.200 kind of nice. Gift, really nice. That sounds great. Do 0:08:41.240 --> 0:08:44.239 we know how the house that your dad wrote Wildflowers 0:08:44.240 --> 0:08:47.520 in burned? Do we know the story of that? It's 0:08:47.520 --> 0:08:51.680 a crazy story telling the story. I wish I could. 0:08:53.040 --> 0:08:56.199 I wish I could. The answer is, I have suspicions, 0:08:56.240 --> 0:09:01.840 but I can't. I can't publicly say them. I'm curious 0:09:01.840 --> 0:09:06.120 that I always wondered, like, yeah, I mean it was 0:09:06.640 --> 0:09:09.800 Losing a house like you did is a super emotional thing, 0:09:10.000 --> 0:09:13.400 and I know a number of men in particular who 0:09:14.080 --> 0:09:16.400 really took it hard when they lost their family home 0:09:16.520 --> 0:09:19.920 where they had their children, etc. Because I think it 0:09:20.040 --> 0:09:22.320 just is a symbol of something. It's a symbol of 0:09:22.480 --> 0:09:25.400 really being able to take care of your family. And 0:09:25.559 --> 0:09:29.960 I think it's it's a sacred wound. It feels really, 0:09:29.960 --> 0:09:31.920 even if you weren't that attached to the house or whatever, 0:09:31.920 --> 0:09:34.880 you know, it just feels like really have the rug 0:09:34.920 --> 0:09:38.360 pulled out from underneath you. In our case, it became 0:09:38.600 --> 0:09:43.120 a very important nexus of the journey of my father's 0:09:43.200 --> 0:09:46.720 career and his life. And without it, I don't believe 0:09:46.720 --> 0:09:48.920 he would have said he would be a backing band 0:09:48.960 --> 0:09:52.720 for anyone. I think the necessity of just let's get 0:09:52.760 --> 0:09:55.840 us on a bus and we'll figure this out. He 0:09:55.960 --> 0:09:58.800 was at a really interesting point in his career and 0:09:58.840 --> 0:10:00.400 I don't want to get the dates ru but it's 0:10:00.400 --> 0:10:03.920 like post Southern accents, and they'd gotten really sober. They'd 0:10:03.920 --> 0:10:06.760 have been trouble with the drugs and sobriety before that, 0:10:07.440 --> 0:10:10.160 and he was sort of reinventing himself and had this 0:10:10.200 --> 0:10:13.080 opportunity to go out with Bob and have the band 0:10:13.120 --> 0:10:15.920 really put through its paces in a cool way. And 0:10:15.960 --> 0:10:18.400 that was the birth of meeting George and the Wilberries 0:10:18.480 --> 0:10:22.319 coming together and sort of elevating not just the music 0:10:22.360 --> 0:10:25.240 but the consciousness and just feeling a certain amount of 0:10:25.280 --> 0:10:28.080 like you're not the only one dealing with this man. 0:10:28.160 --> 0:10:30.960 It's really hard to be a rock star. It's really confusing, 0:10:31.000 --> 0:10:34.000 and actually rock and roll has sort of been something 0:10:34.200 --> 0:10:36.920 on the fringes since the seventies, and this is like 0:10:37.880 --> 0:10:40.199 he found he found his soul mates through being thrown 0:10:40.200 --> 0:10:43.520 out into the world and not just staying home. And 0:10:43.600 --> 0:10:49.640 that was for us. That fire was regenerative. It was 0:10:49.720 --> 0:10:53.440 definitely it elevated him to the next level as opposed 0:10:53.480 --> 0:10:56.640 to knocking him down. Yeah. Do you think that those 0:10:56.679 --> 0:11:02.480 relationships with George and Bob and Jeff were the first 0:11:02.520 --> 0:11:04.920 time he had that sense of community beyond just the 0:11:04.960 --> 0:11:09.520 guys in the band. I definitely feel like he had 0:11:09.559 --> 0:11:12.000 it with certain people, like there were there were certain 0:11:12.160 --> 0:11:15.400 magical people to my dad, like Del Shannon or Roger 0:11:15.480 --> 0:11:20.040 mcgwin that he had really deep connections with musically, but 0:11:20.080 --> 0:11:22.560 he was sort of reverential to, like he didn't feel 0:11:22.559 --> 0:11:25.040 he was on the same footing with I mean, they 0:11:25.040 --> 0:11:28.600 were his heroes and and he didn't feel that way 0:11:28.600 --> 0:11:32.280 about Georgia, Bob or Jeff either. I mean he thought 0:11:32.320 --> 0:11:35.160 the world of them. He was in all of them, 0:11:35.360 --> 0:11:40.400 probably until he died, you know. But he he felt 0:11:40.440 --> 0:11:43.479 like he was responsible for the band and their families 0:11:43.600 --> 0:11:46.440 and the crew and keeping the Tom Petty and the 0:11:46.480 --> 0:11:51.800 Heartbreakers organization running and seeing that other people handled that 0:11:51.920 --> 0:11:56.439 different ways and that they had already gone two decades 0:11:56.520 --> 0:12:00.600 deep into this experience, or him trying to fathom what 0:12:00.640 --> 0:12:03.520 it was to be a Beatle or to live with 0:12:03.600 --> 0:12:06.439 that sort of scrutiny that Bob had lived with for 0:12:06.480 --> 0:12:09.160 so long, and the intensity I mean, we saw a 0:12:09.240 --> 0:12:11.720 lot of crazy people on those tours with Bob, and 0:12:11.760 --> 0:12:14.800 there were bomb threats, and there were crazy fans that 0:12:14.880 --> 0:12:16.760 had changed our last name to Dylan and have like 0:12:16.800 --> 0:12:18.840 figured out how to pull their idea out and sneak 0:12:18.840 --> 0:12:21.320 into hotels, and like there were there were sort of 0:12:21.360 --> 0:12:26.199 like really really weird people around on that made our 0:12:26.240 --> 0:12:31.239 life look like so uneventful. I think it definitely changed perspective. Yeah, 0:12:31.280 --> 0:12:33.320 and I think he liked not being the frontman for 0:12:33.320 --> 0:12:36.160 a second. It gave him a perspective on what a 0:12:36.200 --> 0:12:39.480 good frontman he was in certain ways. And also like 0:12:39.720 --> 0:12:43.280 just sort of like digging off of, you know, Bob's 0:12:43.360 --> 0:12:46.440 energy that that tour. I mean, I still think as 0:12:46.480 --> 0:12:49.960 a fan and Jacob too, I think I think we 0:12:50.080 --> 0:12:53.840 all feel that that music it was really important that 0:12:53.840 --> 0:12:56.520 they made during that tour. In my dad before he died, 0:12:56.600 --> 0:12:57.920 one of the last things he took me in the 0:12:57.920 --> 0:12:59.679 studio and played, because he would always get giddy and 0:12:59.720 --> 0:13:04.360 take me stadium play stuff was Dylan petty stuff and 0:13:04.600 --> 0:13:07.480 then playing with Roger mcgwinn and some things that were 0:13:07.480 --> 0:13:09.520 special from that tour that he had in his archive. 0:13:10.600 --> 0:13:14.760 But yeah, he definitely changed after that. He saw a bigger, 0:13:14.840 --> 0:13:18.840 brighter picture, a simpler picture, and I think that that 0:13:19.080 --> 0:13:21.640 got him to Wildflowers. I mean that got him to 0:13:21.679 --> 0:13:25.160 the point of wanting true independence. And there were different 0:13:25.200 --> 0:13:27.360 stages in that. There was fulm and fever as the 0:13:27.400 --> 0:13:30.080 first step of going, hey, I really am not stuck 0:13:30.080 --> 0:13:35.079 in this swamp rock world at all. I'm a songwriter 0:13:35.240 --> 0:13:37.160 and I'm in the car with my kids listening to 0:13:37.240 --> 0:13:40.520 Top forty and I my dad always listened to everything. 0:13:40.720 --> 0:13:43.040 People would not have believed with the kind of influences 0:13:43.080 --> 0:13:46.080 he had. But I mean, we had an eight track 0:13:46.120 --> 0:13:48.520 of Yello, for example. I remember when we were poor, 0:13:48.760 --> 0:13:51.640 like really poor before down the Torpedoes in the seventies, 0:13:52.240 --> 0:13:55.760 and you know, I remember that ll eight track going 0:13:55.800 --> 0:13:58.400 in and snapping into that deck and listening to that 0:13:58.520 --> 0:14:03.200 until it broke. The thing you mentioned about him liking 0:14:04.080 --> 0:14:06.000 not being the frontman for a minute, I got to 0:14:06.000 --> 0:14:08.560 see the same thing when we did the album with 0:14:08.760 --> 0:14:14.440 Johnny Cash, where he loved being in the band and 0:14:14.600 --> 0:14:16.640 not having to be the bandleader and not having to 0:14:16.679 --> 0:14:18.920 sing the songs, but just get to make music and 0:14:19.320 --> 0:14:22.640 play different instruments on different songs and just be in 0:14:22.680 --> 0:14:26.160 the creative experience with no sense of pressure. You know, 0:14:26.440 --> 0:14:30.240 there was no pressure on him in this because his 0:14:30.360 --> 0:14:33.000 face wasn't on the cover of that album, and he 0:14:33.120 --> 0:14:34.880 just felt like he was free to just play and 0:14:34.960 --> 0:14:38.400 he loved it. He loved that projects so much. I mean, 0:14:38.400 --> 0:14:41.120 he loved John. John and June were always around. There 0:14:41.200 --> 0:14:44.840 were fixtures at shows and would show up and he 0:14:45.040 --> 0:14:47.880 just loved John so much. And you know, they're such 0:14:47.880 --> 0:14:51.920 a special family and such kind people. But I know 0:14:52.000 --> 0:14:53.560 that when my dad could be a bass player, he 0:14:53.600 --> 0:14:57.480 would come in from like those unchanged stations or whatever 0:14:57.520 --> 0:14:59.440 and like bounce in the room like I got to 0:14:59.480 --> 0:15:01.920 be the bass, Claire, I'm just playing bass, like you'd 0:15:01.960 --> 0:15:05.400 tell you multiple times, and he would be so proud that, like, hey, 0:15:05.440 --> 0:15:07.520 I'm free and free. They just tell me when to 0:15:07.560 --> 0:15:09.840 do things and I do them, you know. And I 0:15:09.880 --> 0:15:11.240 think he felt like that when he worked with the 0:15:11.280 --> 0:15:13.800 Shelters and mentored them. I think he felt like that 0:15:14.560 --> 0:15:17.640 whenever he got to just sort of like be a 0:15:17.680 --> 0:15:20.560 part of something groovy like that. But it wasn't often 0:15:20.680 --> 0:15:23.400 he would let go of the rains, as you know. Yeah, 0:15:23.800 --> 0:15:29.000 from the outside, most people think of the rock star 0:15:29.120 --> 0:15:34.800 lifestyle as one of excess in terms of parties and 0:15:35.000 --> 0:15:40.280 people and being out all night and my experience of him, 0:15:40.320 --> 0:15:43.600 and I want to ask if this is correct or accurate, 0:15:44.160 --> 0:15:47.280 but he would watch TV and read and be home 0:15:47.480 --> 0:15:50.280 and other than that he was either on tour or 0:15:50.360 --> 0:15:54.800 writing music. Yeah, pretty much. I mean he wasn't doing 0:15:54.800 --> 0:15:58.680 any normal stuff. He wasn't doing any social stuff. No, 0:15:58.720 --> 0:16:03.360 I've been here. I mean friends, there were eras of 0:16:04.080 --> 0:16:08.080 you know, being social. I think you know, in the 0:16:08.720 --> 0:16:12.560 early eighties, the band still all hung out together, all 0:16:12.600 --> 0:16:15.480 their families would come over. There was still this sort 0:16:15.520 --> 0:16:18.520 of like camaraderie around us that was very social, but 0:16:18.600 --> 0:16:20.880 it was still just within you guys. It was a 0:16:20.960 --> 0:16:24.040 very heavily vetted group. I mean, my dad was married 0:16:24.080 --> 0:16:27.400 really young, he had kids really young, he had responsibilities. 0:16:27.440 --> 0:16:29.120 A lot of the other guys didn't have My cad 0:16:29.320 --> 0:16:32.320 a daughter year after him, so you know, he was 0:16:32.400 --> 0:16:36.480 in a similar groove. But you know, Jane and Tom 0:16:36.560 --> 0:16:39.800 did not have normal childhoods where they had sort of 0:16:39.840 --> 0:16:44.240 a reference for what a normal life would be. So, 0:16:44.400 --> 0:16:45.920 you know, he had a room that he would go 0:16:45.960 --> 0:16:48.200 in and he would write, and that was like when 0:16:48.200 --> 0:16:50.920 I was like five years old on roblar near Owner 0:16:51.000 --> 0:16:53.760 Valley Vista where we lived when my dad was probably 0:16:53.800 --> 0:16:57.320 writing like Breakdown and all those songs or whatever. You know, 0:16:57.400 --> 0:16:59.560 even in those times and they didn't have any money, 0:16:59.560 --> 0:17:03.000 they would make sure they had a little scrappy room 0:17:03.040 --> 0:17:07.119 and that discipline was his. That was his sort of practice, 0:17:07.320 --> 0:17:10.920 like that was his existence. Was every day, no matter what, 0:17:11.000 --> 0:17:12.720 I pour my coffee, I go in this room, I 0:17:12.840 --> 0:17:16.040 drummed this guitar. And would he usually be right when 0:17:16.080 --> 0:17:19.040 he woke up, like coffee it was first thing after coffee. 0:17:19.119 --> 0:17:21.600 I think it would be like in the afternoon when 0:17:21.640 --> 0:17:24.760 he was like very awake and very like much like 0:17:24.880 --> 0:17:28.840 through with whatever first impressions of the day. And then 0:17:29.000 --> 0:17:30.919 he would be in the room by himself with the 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:34.360 door clothes. Oh yeah, yeah, it's a private process. And 0:17:34.680 --> 0:17:37.439 even now hours would you say that would typically be 0:17:38.640 --> 0:17:41.000 It would vary. Sometimes he'd go in for a little 0:17:41.000 --> 0:17:43.560 bit and sometimes he'd go in for weeks, like you 0:17:43.760 --> 0:17:46.040 just did not even see him. I remember one time 0:17:46.080 --> 0:17:48.840 he got really stuck on All or Nothing, which is 0:17:48.880 --> 0:17:51.439 a song on Into the Great Wide Open. It's a 0:17:51.440 --> 0:17:54.840 really cool song that has a great wailing guitar on it, 0:17:55.560 --> 0:17:58.840 and I was just like, God, he's got to solve 0:17:58.880 --> 0:18:01.159 this one. We had hearn this song for like months, 0:18:01.280 --> 0:18:04.320 is like, and it was it was like he was 0:18:04.440 --> 0:18:06.800 haunted by it. And it was one of the few 0:18:06.800 --> 0:18:09.080 where I just saw him like going, I can't figure 0:18:09.119 --> 0:18:12.000 this out. But he ended up obviously making it into 0:18:12.040 --> 0:18:15.359 a really beautiful song. But I think that these things 0:18:15.760 --> 0:18:17.800 they seemed to come easy to him, and he liked 0:18:17.800 --> 0:18:20.720 them to seem simplistic and like they came easy to him, 0:18:21.480 --> 0:18:24.680 but they were so kind of crafted and cared about 0:18:24.720 --> 0:18:28.280 and instinctive and by wrote, and he would listen and 0:18:28.359 --> 0:18:31.040 listen and listen and play until he would get this 0:18:31.200 --> 0:18:34.320 really sort of essence of something and the soul of something, 0:18:34.359 --> 0:18:35.720 and then he'd laid it down and know that it 0:18:35.800 --> 0:18:40.119 was good enough. And I think, you know, his discipline 0:18:40.119 --> 0:18:43.240 in reading was like amazing. He read all the time. 0:18:43.320 --> 0:18:47.040 He watched every film, he watched every classic film, every 0:18:47.080 --> 0:18:50.960 new film. He was a great lover of art and 0:18:52.000 --> 0:18:55.199 had a diverse knowledge of anything he was interested in. 0:18:55.320 --> 0:18:57.359 And he would go and like get every book on 0:18:57.400 --> 0:19:01.280 all of every book on JFKs fascination, every book on 0:19:01.520 --> 0:19:03.520 you know, you know, he never really got to like 0:19:03.640 --> 0:19:05.880 Google like he kind of was like, Google's a little 0:19:05.880 --> 0:19:08.760 too much for me. But he loved to sit down 0:19:08.800 --> 0:19:12.600 and just read three hundred pages on anything that vaguely 0:19:12.640 --> 0:19:16.040 interested him. No, he didn't hit. In the Wilbury years, 0:19:16.080 --> 0:19:18.679 they socialized a lot, they went out a lot. Yeah, 0:19:18.800 --> 0:19:22.200 they pushed boundaries that tried new things. Yeah. That also 0:19:22.280 --> 0:19:24.440 might have been Jeff's influence, because I think Jeff liked 0:19:24.680 --> 0:19:30.080 to be out more. Not Jeff George, Joe George. Yeah, 0:19:30.200 --> 0:19:33.119 Jeff's like that. Jeff was like just wants to be 0:19:33.119 --> 0:19:36.159 either in the studio or just chilling, you know. I 0:19:36.200 --> 0:19:37.800 think I thought it was more of a pub a 0:19:37.880 --> 0:19:39.800 pub guy. He might be. I don't know, I've never 0:19:39.920 --> 0:19:42.120 been down the pub with Jeff, but I'd take him 0:19:42.119 --> 0:19:47.920 as a pretty serious, disciplined creator of music absolutely, you know, absolutely, 0:19:47.920 --> 0:19:50.159 and it keeps his head in those clouds. That's one 0:19:50.200 --> 0:19:54.240 of the things that I think really benefited our experience 0:19:54.240 --> 0:19:56.639 together working on Wildflowers was the fact that he had 0:19:56.680 --> 0:19:59.679 just worked with Jeff for two albums. Right, Because Jeff 0:19:59.840 --> 0:20:06.280 was it seemed to be a real song disciplinarian and 0:20:07.160 --> 0:20:15.840 got your dad into really good, simple, super well crafted songs. 0:20:15.840 --> 0:20:18.119 Not that your dad didn't always have that ability. He 0:20:18.160 --> 0:20:20.439 always had that ability and would do it sometimes, but 0:20:20.520 --> 0:20:22.600 with Jeff it was like it was always that or 0:20:22.640 --> 0:20:26.119 it was nothing. And there was a side to your 0:20:26.160 --> 0:20:29.920 dad's music that was more blues based. That like, if 0:20:29.920 --> 0:20:31.600 you think of what it was like going to the 0:20:31.600 --> 0:20:36.080 film war shows, it might not be as song song 0:20:36.240 --> 0:20:40.000 song based, but more on great musicianship and playing great 0:20:40.000 --> 0:20:42.400 songs and great grooves and great vibes. And your dad 0:20:42.440 --> 0:20:46.560 resonated on that stuff too, But Jeff really hammered home 0:20:46.720 --> 0:20:52.080 the power of the melody and the concise songwriting. And 0:20:53.560 --> 0:20:58.240 I think the strength of Wildflowers is having that kind 0:20:58.280 --> 0:21:03.360 of rigor in the songwriting influenced by Jeff, and then 0:21:03.640 --> 0:21:07.480 taking off the shackles of that kind of production that 0:21:07.560 --> 0:21:12.360 Jeff does, which I also love, but it's much more perfect, 0:21:12.680 --> 0:21:17.120 it's less organic. He's a recording artist, he's someone who 0:21:17.240 --> 0:21:20.960 really his music is based in studio. Yeah, it's not 0:21:21.240 --> 0:21:24.560 based in the room. Yeah. But the difference between you 0:21:24.640 --> 0:21:27.399 and Jeff and the evolution of coming from Jeff to you, 0:21:27.520 --> 0:21:30.199 which I think is a really interesting part of me 0:21:30.359 --> 0:21:34.000 discovering Wildflowers and going back through all this stuff, is 0:21:34.080 --> 0:21:37.200 that my dad always kind of hid in the Heartbreakers. 0:21:37.600 --> 0:21:41.000 He was always in this sort of like full octane 0:21:41.480 --> 0:21:44.720 rock band, Let's rock, you know, and they just kind 0:21:44.720 --> 0:21:48.200 of wear this incredible sound, and they had this incredible shorthand, 0:21:48.200 --> 0:21:50.480 and they all came from the same place and they 0:21:50.520 --> 0:21:52.640 had this thing. And then when he went with Jeff, 0:21:52.680 --> 0:21:55.280 it was all sort of stripped down, and all that 0:21:55.440 --> 0:21:58.919 technique and all that ability was compartmentalized, almost like it 0:21:58.960 --> 0:22:01.760 was into a computer, right like it was. It was 0:22:01.960 --> 0:22:05.359 organized through a board, through this like little stems, and 0:22:05.560 --> 0:22:09.280 the process of creating much more automated, and this sort 0:22:09.320 --> 0:22:12.400 of yeah, you needed a machine in order to execute 0:22:12.440 --> 0:22:17.440 this vision and this sort of duplicating voices and all 0:22:17.480 --> 0:22:20.240 of the stuff that makes those big free fall in 0:22:20.359 --> 0:22:24.320 and I won't back down sounds with the beautiful jangle 0:22:24.400 --> 0:22:27.320 that Dad could do. But when you look at Wildflowers, 0:22:27.320 --> 0:22:29.280 and this is what's so cool about this box set, 0:22:30.160 --> 0:22:33.280 it seems like the journeying boys for him to trust 0:22:33.359 --> 0:22:38.520 you to bring him back to himself, and the poetry 0:22:38.560 --> 0:22:42.160 of Wildflowers and the song Wildflowers, I believe is that 0:22:42.720 --> 0:22:46.879 sometimes what's deep inside of us is just allowing ourselves 0:22:46.880 --> 0:22:51.200