katmar's Full Review: Echo by Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers
I love Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers. In fact, I just made a tape with The Wallflowers "Breach" on one side, and Tom Petty's best on the other. Classics like "American Girl" "I Need To Know" "Too Much Ain't Enough" "Hurt" "You're Gonna Get It" "Here Comes My Girl" "Something Big" "The Insider" "You Can Still Change Your Mind" - some of the best rock ever recorded. And then there's "Echo".
I never liked Tom Petty solo, and so I got a little excited when this CD came out, and I read great reviews, how they were back in top form, just like the old days, great melodies, great writing, yada yada. They were wrong.
"Room At The Top" is one of the few decent songs on here, but you know you might be in trouble when a TPHB CD starts out with a ballad.
"I got a room at the top of the world tonight
I can see everything tonight
I got a room where everyone
Can have a drink and forget those things that went wrong
In their life..."
Nice sentiment, but this song doesn't really convey much, other than the fact that he's not coming down out of his room - at least for tonight.
"Counting On You" is the second decent song on here. Lyrically it's reminiscent of "Don't Do Me Like That" "I Need To Know" and alot of other Petty songs where "somebody's gonna let me down". In this song that could have been a little bit chilling, Petty ruins it with lyrics like:
"I want you to be my little lover
I want you to be my power glide"
Or "I want you to drive my Eldorado"
Sounds like a dirty old man. "Little lover"? And then "oh oh oh, little girl, don't misunderstand me". Is it just me, or are you tired of rock and rollers in their fifties still using lines like these? Okay, maybe it's just me. I just know I wouldn't be flattered if my boyfriend said he'd written a song for me and this was it.
"Free Girl Now" is more juvenile middle-aged rock, and check this out for depth:
"I remember when he was your boss
I remember him touching your butt
I remember you counting your blessings
Yeah honey, you had to keep your mouth shut"
Touching your butt?! Is that all that rhymed with "shut"? If you're gonna keep writing songs when you've built up years of respect, you'd better do better than this. Perhaps growing up would be the first big step, Tom.
"Lonesome Sundown" was a song I kept hearing about. Why? I haven't a clue. First we have the perpetual "sweet young thing...brings me dreams in a box she made for me..." (she's still in grade school I guess)
And then we have the chorus, which Tom can't really sing that well, and the melody isn't worth trying to.
"Lonesome sundown, this is gonna be hard
I know...so don't let go, this is gonna be hard."
This song is surprisingly lifeless..
"Swingin'" is probably my favorite song on here. This is what Tom does best. Be a little abstract, lyrically, and kick in on the chorus. I also like it because it's open to interpretation. First verse for example:
"Well she was standing by the highway in her boots and silver spurs
Gonna hitchhike to the yellow moon when a Cadillac stopped for her
And she said, "hey, nice to meet you, are you going my way?"
Yeah, that's when it happened - the world caught fire that day
And she went down...swingin'
Yeah she went down...swingin'"
If you go down swinging, you're in a fight. Did she get hurt when she got in this car? Or is it just a metaphor for fighting to be free? I don't know. That's why I like it. And just the way he sings the word "swingin'" - that's Tom Petty.
"Accused Of Love" has a pretty catchy chorus, and in fact, it isn't a bad song. It just has a few cliches, and Tom didn't used to rely on those that much, but he does now.
"And we don't even know the wrong we've done
And we don't even care anymore
All I know is I believe that you and me
Forever...will stand accused of love"
Did he marry that grade school girl, do you think? Kidding...
"Echo" seems to be the D-I-V-O-R-C-E song. "Yeah daddy had to crash...he was always halfway there you know." But this song lacks the emotional punch of songs like "The Insider" or "You Can Still Change Your Mind". Lyrically he's laying these emotions on the table, but I don't feel anything for him. And I don't hear anything IN him. He just sounds tired. But even weariness over love ought to touch you in some way. This song just leaves me empty.
"Well you just got tired, you just gave in
You took it hard, then you just quit
You let me down, you dropped the ball
You fell on your face most of all
And I don't wanna mean anything to you
And I don't wanna tempt you to be true"
Maybe he just got tired.
"Won't Last Long" is an attempt at rockin' out that just sounds like old men who've been listening to ELO. Instead of making the chorus edgy, they add these airy fairy background vocals, and the lyrics are so agonizingly repetitive... Go put on "I Need To Know" and then listen to this, and you might understand what I mean when I say this band has fallen so far down it may never get up. Though Tom assures us here "I'm down but it won't last long," but I don't believe him. There are too few glimmers of hope on these 15 tracks for a statement like that.
"Billy The Kid" is almost funny. How original is this? "Well I went down hard like Billy the Kid"? Please. I'd much rather listen to Cher's "Just Like Jesse James" if we're gonna do Wild Wild West tunes, wouldn't you?
At least she had some attitude and swagger to knock you down with. Tom just sounds stupid.
"They say be careful who you believe, be careful who you trust
Did you smile when you pulled the trigger that dropped me in the dust?
Well I went down hard like Billy the Kid..."
Good for you. Stay on the floor.
"I Don't Wanna Fight" was provided by the usually stellar Mike Campbell. I was hoping for a break, but apparently Tom's rubbed off, and we get truly asinine drivel here trying to pass for rock with a dash of punk?
Every verse has three of the same lines, with a different line right before the last one.
"I gotta hole in my head
I gotta hole in my head
I'd be better off dead
I gotta a hole in my head"
And the stunningly articulate chorus:
"I don't wanna fight
I don't wanna fight
I don't wanna fight
I'm a lover lover lover"
I'm so inspired, aren't you? Are you kidding me with this? How low can we go here boys? My goodness...
"This One's For Me" and I'm glad, 'cos I don't want it. You want cheese with your whine Mr. Petty, sir?
"Lover the mistakes I've made
Will follow me down into my grave
So much has gone by, so many to please
Well this one I'll keep, this one's for me"
Have you ever called your significant other "lover"? As in, "lover, the phone is for you"? Or "lover, I've been meaning to tell you..." I don't get it.
"No More" is a lie, because he says here, "big money, big plans. You stand with a ticket in your hand. You don't play, you can't win. But I ain't gonna do it till I feel it again... No more... no more..." I don't hear him feeling it. So don't come around here no more!
My God, there's still three more bad songs!!
"About To Give Out" is a teenage romp song. Spring break gone bad and such.
"Yeah I hit town hard last night
Abraham and Moses, some other friends of mine
Moses started drinkin' - he got a little rude
We woke up in the bushes, beat to hell and nude"
I am banging my head against the wall, can you hear me? Oh, but here's another good one. How often have I said this to my mother...just today in fact, I think - "Oh mama I'm about to give out. I'm Davy Crockett in a coonskin town." And then SHE banged my head against the wall... Ouch.
"Rhino Skin"...I want the lyrics to this laminated to hang on my bedroom wall so I can use it for inspiration in the mornings when I wake up. This is almost biblical, this advice here...
"You need rhino skin if you're gonna begin
To walk through this world
You need elephant balls if you don't want to crawl
On your hands through this world"
Got chills just typing that out. Killer, ain't it?
"One More Day, One More Night" is not a song Tom Petty can sing well, nor should he be trying. It does not play to his strengths. And the lyrics? Well, they're about holding on and trying to see your way through (hence the title), but he'd have you believe
"Someone better hurry, I'm all alone
And I keep breaking down
Breaking down, you know?
No one ever taught me to be on my own
And I keep breaking down
Breaking down, you know?"
Yes, I know. I hear you. And you sound like you're breaking down. And I think you should retire and just sing with Stevie Nicks and Jakob Dylan when they ask you to.
I do hold high standards for Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers. That's their fault. They've put out some incredible music over several decades now, and to hear them on "Echo" makes me very very sad.
I didn't want to give this album a bad review, I wanted to love it. I wanted to have another great TPHB CD in my collection. You don't know how badly I wanted that. Well, this CD ain't it.
The basic problem a songwriter faces is finding things to say, and then saying them in ways you haven't said them before. If you don't, you sound cliched, tired, and stale. Given Tom Petty's past, and the amount of stuff he's written, staying fresh has to be hard. On the other hand, you can bring in fresh people to co-write with you. That can be inspiring.
Tom didn't do that. Maybe he should have.
Tom doesn't sing many songs here like he means them. Perhaps he knows they're cliches, but he doesn't have the heart to quit. So he just sings them anyway. That's the problem with genius. Knowing when you've lost it. When to quit. Hang it up. I'm not saying Tom's there, I'm just saying he sounds close. I would bring in fresh people just to see if it makes a difference. Until then I'd stop recording until I had something new to say.
This CD really is just an echo. And I'm sorry.
If you want to get excited about music that's similar to the kind Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers used to make, then check out the Wallflowers new one, "Breach", or Matchbox Twenty's new one "Mad Season". This is classic pop rock, and apparently the new heirs to the kingdom.
Released in 1999, Echo features Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers at their finest, with the songs Room at the Top, Counting on You, and the superb title t...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
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