Tom Petty Didn’t Think He Could’ve Handled Seeing George Harrison Before His Death
Tom Petty and George Harrison formed an immediate friendship once they met. The two men were musical collaborators, but Petty also said that they were almost like family members. Harrison’s wife Olivia confirmed that the couple spent more time with the Pettys than nearly anyone else. Petty did not go to see Harrison toward the end of his life, though. He explained that he does not regret this decision, as he doesn’t know if he’d have been able to handle it.
Tom Petty and George Harrison were close friends
Petty and Harrison formed a friendship even before they played in The Traveling Wilburys together. Harrison’s wife said that Petty and his wife were like family.
“Almost as soon as we met them, we spent more time with Tom and Jane Petty than with anyone but the Keltners,” Harrison’s wife Olivia told Warren Zanes in the book Petty: The Biography. “They were family.”
Petty said the friendship was healing for him.
“I think I needed a friend really badly,” he explained. “My friendship with the band was a different kind of friendship. And it was frayed. I’d become very lonely. George came along, and we got so close; it was like we had known each other in some other life or something. We were pals within minutes of meeting each other.”
The Heartbreakers frontman wasn’t sure if he could have seen Harrison before his death
Harrison died of cancer in 2001, and many of his friends and former collaborators came to visit him leading up to his death. Petty was not one of them.
“When we came, in 2001, to Malibu, George was really ill and going through some treatment,” Olivia Harrison explained. “We didn’t see Tom then.”
Petty explained that he wasn’t sure he could have handled seeing his friend at that point. He’d already, to some extent, felt like he’d lost him after Harrison was stabbed in a home invasion. He didn’t want to go through that again.
“I don’t know if I could have handled it, seeing George then,” Petty said. “But I don’t struggle with my decision. Everyone has their own way. I often feel George around me. Still.”
Tom Petty comforted George Harrison’s wife
After Harrison’s death, Petty did his best to support Olivia Harrison.
“I saw Tom and Dana [York] shortly after George died,” she said. “He came to the Concert for George and he was amazing. Eric Clapton reached out to him, and Tom flew his whole band over. He was all over it, the rehearsals, the show.”
She explained that he later comforted her on a more personal level.
“I saw him again, back here in LA,” she said. “Both Tom and Dana. They were so kind. They sat in a room with me, put their arms around me. We all cried. And Tom said, ‘Don’t worry, we’re not leaving you.’ And he meant that not just for the moment but for life. I have a special fondness for him. It makes you feel a little bit safer to know that someone like Tom is there for you. It’s a good umbrella to be standing under.”
