Review: Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers ‘Long After Dark (Deluxe Edition)’
By Hal Horowitz
Among the numerous pleasures and intriguing aspects of Tom Petty’s bulging catalog is the sheer amount of great/good songs and even well-meaning experiments, primed for rediscovery. Sprinkled amongst his best known titles on the 13 recorded with his band, along with three solo offerings, are dozens of terrific, even definitive tracks that have been relegated to the sonic no-man’s-land as “deep cuts.”
The administrators of Petty’s recorded legacy have kept a firm grip on releases after his untimely 2017 demise. A handful of slick, classy packages have appeared, ranging from multi-disc gatherings of rarities and live performances to extended re-issues of his most popular works (Damn the Torpedoes and Wildflowers), remastered with extra material.
But this enhanced copy of 1982s Long After Dark, released Oct. 18, is slightly different. Although the 10- song album, Petty’s fifth, was a Top 10, gold selling item, it hasn’t attained the status of the two (1979s Torpedoes and Hard Promises from 1981) preceding it. While few would consider it a failure, especially since such iconic entries as “You Got Lucky,” with its MTV heavy rotation video, and the striking “Straight Into Darkness,” (a darker composition reflecting the recent divorce from his first wife), were included, Petty seemed to be treading artistic water, especially arriving after those two classics.
Forty-two years later, it’s ready to be reassessed in this expanded edition which adds a dozen more tunes, seven previously unreleased. David Fricke’s liner notes mention Petty acknowledging that some recordings during the sessions for Long After Dark, left on the cutting room floor after producer Jimmy Bovine convinced him they wouldn’t work, might have made it stronger.
We get a chance to weigh in on that, since they are now officially available on the second platter, along with rare live in the studio performances for French TV and other leftovers. While a few such as the strummy ballad “Never Be You,” a #1 country hit for Rosanne Cash, should have made the cut, others like the mid-tempo pop of “Don’t Make Me Walk the Line” arguably deserved to be set aside. Regardless, even Petty’s lesser work during this fertile period is more accomplished than many other artist’s best, so everything needs to be kept in perspective.
Better still are songs that did appear on the final lineup and have been largely forgotten. Selections such as the throbbing rocker “We Stand a Chance,” the driving “Finding Out” and the rugged, riff laden “Deliver Me” are somewhat hidden gems in Petty’s oeuvre that deserve a second shot. The opener “One Story Town” with its ringing chords could easily have been included on Damn the Torpedoes and even the dreamy, Tropicalia-styled closer “A Wasted Life” would be a highlight for lesser songwriters, although it’s not considered one of Petty’s better creations.
More than just a tactic to get Petty fans to re-purchase Long After Dark, this buffed-up version, available with and without a Blu-ray component which remixes the sound into Dolby Atmos, allows us to hear a very good album that never got the respect it deserved. Over four decades later, it feels nearly as fresh as when it was first recorded.
“Keeping Me Alive (French TV)”
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