Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers Album: “Anthology Through The Years”

The problem with anthologies, especially those of still-performing artistes, is that you have to have a cut-off point and unless everything post cut-off totally sucks, you're bound to leave off some of the artiste's best work. That's why this album doesn't even pretend to call itself "Best of", "Greatest" etc; firstly because such an album title already exists for Tom Petty and secondly, this album very appropriately calls itself "Anthology" for that's what it is: a chronological representation of what Tom Petty has done up to a point in time.

What's the solution? Either wait for "Anthology Part 2" or like me, get this brilliant album and get the whole albums after this. You won't be doing justice to yourself being satisfied with only 2 or 3 tracks from "Wildflowers" anyway as that brilliant album is already a rock classic in the making and you really need to hear the whole album to appreciate just how good it is.

As for this album, the 34 tracks that are on 2 discs are very well selected and you even get the hard to find duet with Stevie Nicks, "Stop Dragging My Heart Around" here too. The sound quality of this remastered album is also very good seeing as how especially on disc one, the state of the old original masters cannot have been very good and you can only improve upon the master which is also why the sound quality on the later tracks on disc two sound a lot better.

The one downer seems to be the cardboard packaging that opens out into 3 folds with a booklet pasted on the second fold. It seems to me that they could have come up with a better quality design for such a great compilation and thankfully the old adage, "you can't judge a book by it's cover" certainly holds true here.

I see one reviewer complained about 2 discs being more expensive than one but unless you can tell me how you are going to fit 34 tracks onto one disc and seeing as how there are no filler tracks here which would make a second disc superfluous, I really don't know what there is to complain about except for the great value for money that this album really is.

Highly recommended for all Petty fans who want a sampler of what Petty has done before they became fans because of his work after "Full Moon Fever" but don't want to go back and get all the old albums.

The Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers Anothology is a long overdue double CD of hits and standout tracks up to 1990, with one new track.

This compilation effectively expands on the "single CD" greatest hits which left off "Jammin' Me", "Waiting For Tonight", "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around", etc. which are all included here. It is also more accessible than the massive 6 CD "Playback" Box set. The songs all sound great and most stand up real well today and that includes the overplayed hits like "Free Fallin" and "Refugee".

My only 2 complaints are, that it would have been great if it covered their entire recording career up to 2000 and including such albums as "Wallflowers" and "Echo", but due to record company restraints, this is impossible now. Then, where are great songs like "Out in The Cold" and the holiday favorite "Its Christmas All Over Again". Those would have been icing on the cake, had they been included here.

If you are looking for a nice 30+ tracks of Tom & friends highlights this is it, the booklet isn't much, but the music really shines through. Highly Recommended.

THE BAND: Tom Petty (vocals, guitar, keyboards, harmonica), Mike Campbell (lead guitar), Benmont Tench (keyboards), Howie Epstein (bass), Ron Blair (bass), Stan Lynch (drums & percussion). Guest appearances include, George Harrison, Stevie Nicks, Jeff Lynne.

THE DISCS: (2000) 34 tracks on two discs clocking in at approximately 124 minutes (disc-1 with 57:37 minutes, and disc-2 with 66:16). Included with the discs is a 10-page booklet containing song titles/credits, band photos, a 1-page intro from Cameron Crowe, what songs came from which albums and the year released. This compilation follows Petty from his debut in 1976 through this 2000 "Anthology". Digitally remastered sound. Label - UTV Records / MCA.

ALBUM REPRESENTATION: Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers (4 songs), You're Gonna Get It (3), Damn The Torpedoes (4), Hard Promises (2), Long After Dark (3), Southern Accents (3), Pack Up The Plantation (1), Let Me Up - I've Had Enough (2), Full Moon Fever (5), Into The Great Wide Open (3), Greatest Hits (1), Playback (1), Anthology (1), Bella Donna - Stevie Nicks 1981 solo album (1).

COMMENTS: Every music listener needs some Tom Petty in his/her collection. "Damn The Torpedoes" (1979) and "Full Moon Fever" (1989) are essential studio recordings of his. Other albums like his self titled debut, "Long After Dark", "Southern Accents" and "Into The Great Wide Open" are great albums, but I wouldn't classify them as essential Petty necessarily. Petty's "Greatest Hits" (1993) is still a fine representation on one disc, but with this more recent 2-disc "Anthology", the '93 disc is now obsolete. 17 of the 18 songs from his "Greatest Hits" album are here, minus the skippable last track "Something In The Air". THE GOOD: All the staples are here - "Breakdown", "American Girl", "I Need To Know", "Refugee", "Here Comes My Girl", "Don't Do Me Like That", "Even The Losers", "You Got Lucky", "Don't Come Around Here No More", "Free Fallin'", "I Won't Back Down", "Runnin' Down A Dream", "Learning To Fly", "Mary Jane's Last Dance", etc. The minor successes absent from his '93 "Greatest Hits" are here - "Change Of Heart", "A Woman In Love (It's Not Me)", "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around", "So You Want To Be A Rock & Roll Star", "Jammin' Me", "Love Is A Long Road", and "Yer So Bad". There are several deep album cuts (i.e. "Hometown Blues", "The Wild One, Forever", "Too Much Ain't Enough", etc) that are nice inclusions. Chronological order is a bonus here - showcasing Petty's slight changes over the decades. Song selection is top notch. The remastered sound is crisp. THE NOT SO GOOD: Only two things stick out here. First and foremost, there are no tracks from his "Wildflowers" (1994) or "Echos" (1999) albums... most likely due to these 2 albums being on the 'Warner Bros' label (and everything prior on MCA's label). This is a shame because I really feel the songs "You Wreck Me", "Cabin Down Below" and "It's Good To Be King" deserve to be on "Anthology". Perhaps this should've been titled "Anthology - Through The MCA Years". In the same vein, there are no selections from Petty's soundtrack to the movie "She's The One" (1996). Many of Petty's early songs are short (out of the first 8 tracks, the longest song is three-and-a-half minutes), and with that being said why not throw a few more songs on both discs and utilize the free space (22 unused minutes alone on disc-1). OVERALL: A ton of music and all the major hits (despite the 2 omitted albums from Warner Bros). To date, this is the best Tom Petty compilation... period (5 stars).

THIS NEW ANTHOLOGY RECAPS 20+ YEARS OF AWESOME MUSIC. IT IS MUCH LIKE THE BOXED SET "PLAYBACK" BUT WITHOUT ALOT OF THE LESSER KNOWN MATERIAL. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS TO ANYONE!

Tom Petty's years with MCA have already been well-compiled with the succinct Greatest Hits and the generous-yet-reasonably-priced Playback box. In addition, the original albums remain readily availible. But I guess MCA (now Universal) is hoping that there's somebody out there who hasn't heard enough of this material already. On the plus side, you get "Rebels" and "Jammin' Me", two classics that missed the cut for Greatest Hits. On the minus side, "Something Big" and "Kings Highway" remain conspicuously absent. If Universal really felt compelled to do another Petty compilation, they should've licensed a few of his recent songs and done it right. The low-ish rating here is not for the quality of the material, but for the shallowness of the concept.

I guess Tom can take solace in not having been subjected to the humiliation of a "millenium collection" (yet).