S Poddar
It’s never an easy task for a veteran artist who has been active for decades to rank their albums relative to one another. While some artists spend years crafting each effort, others see their albums or two as basically distinct rather than competing in terms of quality. But Tom Petty, the rocker and singer-songwriter, had one album that held a special place in his heart: 1981’s Hard Promises.
Coming off the massive success of Damn the Torpedoes, Petty found himself thrown into the whirlwind of fame and industry pressures. Hard Promises was something of a throw-off from that momentum, a much more introspective and personal look at his life and experiences.
Of course, heart-wrenching tunes like “The Waiting” and “Insider” bring album of the year attention, but other aspects of Petty’s darker side come to light as well. He dabbles with outlaw country in “The Criminal Kind,” and Southern Gothic colors “Something Big.”.
Despite the problems he encountered with his record label, Petty still regarded the album highly. He was often overheard speaking of how personal the album was: “I think I’ll always be a little partial towards Hard Promises. It’s really the one that meant the most, at the time and now. I got most of the ballads out of my system with that, and it was, you know, well-liked by a lot of people.”
While being hardly known for such anthems, this album incorporates a perfect mix of rock, country, and ballads. For instance, songs such as “A Woman In Love (It’s Not Me)” and “Kings Road” draw more of his energetic side to rock, while “Insider” and “You Can Still Change Your Mind” present himself in more introspective territory.
Thus, Hard Promises is the testament of Tom Petty’s artistry and his capacity to reach out to his audience on the deepest possible level of human expression. It is a record that keeps going for so many because it helps glimpse the heart and soul of one of the most treasured figures in rock music.
