Tom Petty Kept a Treasured Note From Johnny Cash for Years
Tom Petty had the chance to work with one of his idols when the Heartbreakers backed Johnny Cash on his album Unchained. According to Petty’s daughter, Cash was one of several influential figures in her father’s life. Petty was nervous about working with Cash, but he cherished the time they spent together. Years after Cash’s death, Petty still held onto a postcard from him.
Tom Petty’s daughter said Johnny Cash was an important person in his life
Petty surrounded himself with a number of powerful people in the music industry. His daughter Adria believed that this increased his confidence.
“I know that Leon Russel was very generous to my dad when he was young,” she said in the book Petty: The Biography by Warren Zanes. “And I know that when he was in the studios with producers, certainly Denny Cordell but even a Jimmy Iovine or someone like that, when there were other men that believed in him, Bob Dylan or Johnny Cash, I think it gave him an incredible sense of confidence. I even think Jeff Lynne nurtured him. It’s a lot of men, powerful men that came into my father’s life. But George Harrison was something special.”
Tom Petty kept a note from Johnny Cash
While Petty was not as close with Cash as he was with Harrison, he said that he had a great time working with the Man in Black.
“Oh man, we had a ball. We’re really proud of that album,” he told BAM in 1997, per The Petty Archives. “We actually did two albums — we did 33 tracks. I think there’s another volume that’s gonna come out. That was a gas. We were doing that at the same time we were doing the She’s the One soundtrack, so we were really overworked and scattered. We were in the studio night and day. With the Johnny Cash thing what was so good was we could wander to any instrument we wanted, and did. I played the bass a lot. I played the keyboards, organ — what do they call that thing? — the mellotron [laughs]. I’m spacing out.”
Cash and Petty got to know each other well while working together. The “Ring of Fire” singer sent Petty a postcard with the message, “Tom, you’re a good man to ride the river with,” scrawled on the back. According to Zanes, this was “one of a few treasures” Petty kept in his home. He held onto the note for years.
Stevie Nicks later used the same quote when talking about Petty
After Petty’s death, his close friend Stevie Nicks referenced Cash’s words while speaking about her late friend.
“The loss of Tom Petty has just about broken my heart,” she said, per HuffPost. “He was not only a good man to go down the river with, as Johnny Cash said, he was a great father, and he was a great friend. He was one of my best friends. My heart will never get over this.”
