Top 33 Tom Petty Quotes

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.

I think television’s become a downright dangerous thing. It has no moral barometer whatsoever. If you want to talk about something that is all about money, just watch the television.

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

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.

TV does not care about you or what happens to you. It’s downright bad for your health now, and that’s not a far-out concept. I think watching the TV news is bad for you. It is bad for your physical health and your mental health.

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.

When you get older, your health becomes important to you, things start breaking down, you’ve always got a different ache or pain.

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.

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.

I’m barely prolific and incredibly lazy.

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.

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

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.

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.

The energy of the crowd is insane. Twenty thousand people. It’s the biggest jolt of adrenaline. It’s very hard to explain. You know the old story about the woman lifting the car off her kid? It’s in that realm. You can actually hurt yourself and not know it.

If you’re not getting older, you’re dead.

Most things I worry about never happen anyway.

I would never put my songs in a commercial.

I could come home, and I would spend the rest of the night just lying on the floor or the sofa listening to albums. It was like a movie to me. I still do, really, and doing the radio show ensures that I’ll be sitting there listening.

It’s kind of a lonely work, because you just have to keep your pole in the water. I always had a little routine of going into whatever room I was using at the time to write in and just staying in there till I felt like I got a bite.

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.

The first time I tried to write was when I was 14, after I got an electric guitar. I put a song together, and it wasn’t that bad! The writing came natural to me.

‘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.

You get into your late fifties, people start falling like flies all around you. I don’t take life for granted any more. I’m really glad to be here.

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.

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

I feel sorry for kids these days. They get so much homework. Remember the days when we put a belt around our two books and carried them home? Now they’re dragging a suitcase. They have school all day, then homework from six until eleven. There’s no time left to be creative.

When I go to see people, I always kind of hope they are going to play some kind of songs I know. So you’ve got to know your audience. It’s kind of something that is a blessing and a curse in a way. You’re obligated to play some of that stuff that people know, but I don’t think that’s all you have to do.

There used to be this real sense of community integrity in rock. It has really eroded. Everyone seems to be on their own now.

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.

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.

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.

Go after what you really love and find a way to make that work for you, and then you’ll be a happy person.