Tom Petty (9,724 views)

[Henny Macc]

Thomas Earl Petty (October 20, 1950 - October 2, 2017)
Years active: 1968-2017
Country of origin: United States of America
Recorded vocal range: C2-B♭5 (C2-A♯5) - 3⅚ octaves

Band history:

• 1968-1970 - The Epics (bass, vocals)
• 1970-1973 - Mudcrutch (bass, backing vocals)
• 1973-1974 - Mudcrutch (lead vocals, rhythm guitar, bass, harmonica)
• 1974-1975 - Mudcrutch (lead vocals, rhythm guitar, harmonica)
• 1976-2017 - Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers (lead vocals, rhythm guitar, harmonica)
• 1988-1991 - The Traveling Wilburys (lead vocals, acoustic guitar)
• 1989-2017 - Tom Petty (lead vocals, guitar, bass, keyboards, drums)
• 2007-2017 - Mudcrutch (bass, backing vocals, harmonica)
  

Recorded high notes:
A♯5/B♭5: "I Need to Know"
G♯5/A♭5: "Make It Better (Forget About Me)"
G5: "Century City"
F♯5/G♭5: "Anything That's Rock 'n' Roll", "Century City", "Make It Better (Forget About Me)"
E5: "A Thing About You", "Fooled Again (I Don't Like It)", "It Ain't Nothin' to Me", "Makin' Some Noise", "Mary Jane's Last Dance", "Refugee", "Out in the Cold"
D♯5/E♭5: "The Same Old You"
D5: "Even the Losers", "Fooled Again (I Don't Like It)"
C♯5/D♭5: "Anything That's Rock 'n' Roll", "Dogs on the Run", "Restless", "Shadow of a Doubt (A Complex Kid)"
C5: "All or Nothing", "Baby's a Rock 'n' Roller", "Century City", "Change the Locks", "No Second Thoughts", "Refugee", "Shout" live Richfield 1983, "Tonight Will Be My Night"
B4: "Anything That's Rock 'n' Roll", "Century City", "Dogs on the Run", "Don't Do Me Like That", "Even the Losers", "Fooled Again (I Don't Like It)", "Hurt", "Kings Road", "Make It Better (Forgot About Me)", "Out in the Cold", "Restless", "Something in the Air", "Straight into Darkness", "The Same Old You", "We Stand a Chance", "What Are You Doin' in My Life", "The Wild One, Forever"
A♯4/B♭4: "Deliver Me", "The Same Old You")
A4: "A Thing About You", "Baby's a Rock 'n' Roller", "Big Weekend", "Breakdown", "Century City", "Change the Locks", "Counting on You", "Crawling Back to You", "Dogs on the Run", "Don't Come Around Here No More", "Don't Do Me Like That", "Even the Losers", "Flirting with Time", "Fooled Again (I Don't Like It)", "Free Fallin'", "Hometown Blues", "Hurt", "Jammin' Me", "Letting You Go", "Make It Better (Forgot About Me)", "Rebels", "Red River", "Refugee", "Rockin' Around (With You)", "Runnin' Down a Dream", "Shout live Richfield 1983[", "Something in the Air", "Spike", "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around", "Supernatural Radio", "The Criminal Kind", "Too Much Ain't Enough", "We Stand a Chance", "When a Kid Goes Bad", "You and I Will Meet Again", "You're Gonna Get It", "You Tell Me"
G♯4/A♭4: "All Mixed Up", "All or Nothing", "Anything That's Rock 'n' Roll", "A Wasted Life", "Between Two Worlds", "Fault Lines", "Here Comes My Girl", "I Need to Know", "Jammin' Me", "Let Me Up (I've Had Enough)", "Lonesome Sundown", "Luna", "Needles and Pins" live at The Forum 1981, "Nightwatchman", "Restless", "Shadow of a Doubt (A Complex Kid)", "Something in the Air", "Straight into Darkness", "Strangered in the Night", "Tonight Will Be My Night", "Too Much Ain't Enough", "Turn This Car Around", "What Are You Doin' in My Life", "When a Kid Goes Bad"
G4: "Ain't Love Strange", "American Girl", "Between Two Worlds", "Big Weekend", "Billy the Kid", "Blue Sunday", "Breakdown", "Century City", "Deliver Me", "Don't Come Around Here No More", "Don't Do Me Like That", "Even the Losers", "Flirting with Time", "Fooled Again (I Don't Like It)", "Good Enough", "Grew Up Fast", "House in the Woods", "How Many More Days", "Hurt", "I Need to Know", "I Should Have Known It", "I Won't Back Down", "Jammin' Me", "Joe", "Louisiana Rain", "Lover's Touch", "Luna", "Make It Better (Forget About Me)", "Mary's New Car", "Nightwatchman", "Rainy Day Women #12 & 35" live Madison Square Garden 1992, "Rebels", "Red River", "Room at the Top", "Shadow People", "Something in the Air", "Spike", "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around", "Straight into Darkness", "Strangered in the Night", "Supernatural Radio", "Takin' My Time", "The Best of Everything", "The Dark of the Sun", "The Golden Rose", "The Same Old You", "The Waiting","The Wild One, Forever", "Think About Me", "Tonight Will Be My Night", "Turn This Car Around", "What Are You Doin' in My Life", "Won't Last Long"

Recorded low notes:
D3: "Accused of Love", "A Face in the Crowd", "A Self-Made Man", "Asshole", "Big Weekend", "Blue Sunday", "California", "Change the Locks", "Climb That Hill", "Crawling Back to You", "Depending on You", "Don't Fade on Me", "Down South", "Dreamville", "Echo", "Full Grown Boy", "Hard on Me", "Have Love Will Travel", "High in the Morning", "Hung up and Overdue", "Into the Great Wide Open", "It'll All Work Out", "It's Good to Be King", "Joe" live, "Like a Diamond", "Money Becomes King", "No More", "No Reason to Cry", "One More Day, One More Night", "Room at the Top", "Saving Grace", "Something Big", "Something Good Coming", "The Last DJ", "This One's for Me", "Time to Move On", "To Find a Friend", "Too Good to Be True", "Walls (Circus)", "Walls (No. 3)", "Won't Last Long", "You and Me"
C♯3/D♭3: "All Mixed Up", "Here Comes My Girl", "Night Driver", "Square One", "The Ballad of Easy Rider" live Jacksonville Memorial Coliseum 1981
C3: "A Face in the Crowd", "All Mixed Up", "All or Nothing", "Ankle Deep", "A Self-Made Man", "Echo", "Joe", "Learning to Fly", "Mary Jane's Last Dance", "Room at the Top", "Running Man's Bible", "Southern Accents", "Spike", "The Last DJ", "The Man Who Lives Women", "To Find a Friend", "Wildflowers"
B2: "Alright for Now", "Angel Dream (No. 2)", "Angel Dream (No. 4)", "Anything That's Rock 'n' Roll", "A One Story Town", "Cabin Down Below", "Candy", "Change the Locks", "Depending on You", "Good Enough", "Like a Diamond", "Runnin' Down a Dream", "Time to Move On", "You Don't Know How It Feels"
A♯2/B♭2: "Joe" live, "Let Yourself Go", "Southern Accents"
A2: "Baby Please Don't Go" live, "Big Weekend", "Change the Locks", "Depending on You", "Echo", "Here Comes My Girl", "It's Good to Be King", "Make It Better (Forget About Me)", "Room at the Top", "Running Man's Bible", "Turn This Car Around", "The Man Who Loves Women"
G2: "Echo", "Joe", "Money Becomes King", "Something Good Coming", "The Man Who Loves Women"
F♯2/G♭2: "The Ballad of Easy Rider" live Jacksonville Memorial Coliseum 1981
F2: "Don't Fade on Me", "Room at the Top", "Walls (Circus)"
E2: "Alright for Now", "Baby Please Don't Go" live, "Burn Out Town", "Lonesome Sundown", "Wake Up Time", "What Are You Doin' in My Life", "Yer So Bad" live on PBS Soundstage 2003
D2: "Don't Fade on Me", "Out in the Cold", "Rhino Skin", "Wake Up Time"
C♯2/D♭2: "Wake Up Time"
C2: "Room at the Top"

SPOILER: Click to show

{Questionable notes}
D♯1/E♭1: "Joe" live Las Vegas 2002 - sustained fry note

.......................................................
*Blue marks soft falsetto notes.
*Grey marks heavily fryish notes.
*Italics mark non-melodic notes.
*Underlines mark notes in backing vocals or otherwise muffled/obscured in the song mix.

The beloved late frontman of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, he's not someone that many people think of as being a rangey singer, but has a surprising amount to find if you dig deep enough in his discography. He had a bit of a weird tone - very nasal throughout his mid/high range, to the point where people on TRP2 seemed to think he could be a baritenor due to how light much of his singing sounded, but in reality he actually had a fairly low voice, which he demonstrated more of as his career went along.

During Petty's early years, however, he was much more focused on high singing, and actually sang melodies up to B4 often enough with surprising ease, even getting as high as D5 in a melody line in "Fooled Again (I Don't Like It)" off the debut Heartbreakers album. Most everything higher than that was just gritty rock 'n' roll screams, however, aside from some falsetto E5s in "Mary Jane's Last Dance". Around the '90s, however, he became more reserved with high notes and usually topped songs around A4, while instead songs with second octave notes started to become more common. Unfortunately, I'd have to consider him a case of someone who never demonstrated the full potential of his low range though (hardly an anomaly among rock singers), as most of his melody singing bottomed around G2 or so, despite clearly having comfortable room for more below that. He definitely recorded musical examples of notes below that as shown here, but many of them were either short notes or spoken passages in songs.

SPOILER: Click to show

{Best displays of vocal range}
"Out in the Cold" (D2-B4-E5)
"Make It Better (Forget About Me)" (A2-G♯5)
"Room at the Top" (C2-G4)
"What Are You Doin' in My Life" (E2-B4)
"Anything That's Rock 'n' Roll" (B2-C♯5-F♯5)
"Lonesome Sundown" (E2-G♯4)
"Mary Jane's Last Dance" (C3-E5)
"Change the Locks" (A2-C5)
"All or Nothing" (C3-C5)
"Joe" (G2-G4)

I've notewatched all of Petty's material with the Heartbreakers and as a solo artist, but haven't touched any of his stuff with Mudcrutch or The Traveling Wilburys, so feel free to drop links if you've heard those albums and know anything worth sharing from them.

[motorist]

This the live low note in "Yer So Bad" you were looking for?

[Henny Macc]

Holy shit it is! Thank you so much - I've been trying to retrace that note since at least 2017 now; I thought it was lost for good!

[motorist]

You're welcome, it's certainly a cool line delivery. Easy performance to find now but it seems to have been missing for years. Looks like there were other people who were desperately looking for that performance in the comments too. Wish YouTube could fix this somehow, I get that uploaders have a right to delete content but it's unfortunate when a performance with hundreds of thousands of views, or just music with comments, just disappears because a creator with no relation to the artist decided so.

Also Tom Petty probably is my favorite "nasally" toned voice, usually never like that style but he turned it into something cool.

[motorist]

Is this an E5 in "Out in the Cold" at 3:08? If so that makes it his highest range vocal performance D2-E5. If not, D2-B4 is the range of that song so still worth including in that section.

[Henny Macc]

Yeah, I think I disregarded that note initially because I considered it too much of a yelp, but listening back it actually does have a decent amount of tone to it for being a short scream like that, so I could probably be convinced to add it after all.

[motorist]

In "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around", I hear A4s in the choruses (1:00, I would consider it lead for how easy it is to hear, idk) and G4s in the verses (1:31)



Edit:
Also I think there is a C#5 in "Shadow Of A Doubt (A Complex Kid): youtu.be/xPwHYkVnLCI?t=160
It's pretty short but I found the pitch to be surprisingly clear, more so than the "Out in the Cold" yelp.

Here's an A4 I missed in "Out in the Cold": youtu.be/19Z06genVX8?t=185

[Henny Macc]

Jun 14, 2022 20:42:08 GMT motorist said:

In "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around", I hear A4s in the choruses (1:00, I would consider it lead for how easy it is to hear, idk) and G4s in the verses (1:31)

Huh those A4s are indeed a very borderline case of lead vocal or backing vocal - it feels like they're being treated as main harmony notes in the song context, but they do get kinda mixed out by the other harmonies when they happen. Leaning towards counting them as backing vocal, but I'll take other opinions on them.

Jun 14, 2022 20:42:08 GMT motorist said:

Edit:
Also I think there is a C#5 in "Shadow Of A Doubt (A Complex Kid): youtu.be/xPwHYkVnLCI?t=160
It's pretty short but I found the pitch to be surprisingly clear, more so than the "Out in the Cold" yelp.

Here's an A4 I missed in "Out in the Cold": youtu.be/19Z06genVX8?t=185

Yeah, these are a couple other notes that I disregarded when I made this thread cause I considered them too yelpy/aimlessly shouted at the time, but in hindsight it seems pretty harmless to count them. However, I think I'm gonna leave out the "Out in the Cold" A4 because it happens right before the E5 that I already have listed, so there's no need to list a second note from that same passage unless it's like a major standout or something.

[motorist]

I found four F2s in "Free Fallin". They are all notably short and that might be a reason not to count them, but they seem to be intentionally pitched to work with the F3s in the vocal lines as a part of the melody. You can hear them at 0:56, 1:02, 1:41, and 1:46:


edit: just noticed the one at 1:02 is closer to G2, but the others seem to be pitched right.. at least worth putting in questionable notes. Come to think of it I might look in other songs for things like this...

[Bink]

Oct 31, 2022 4:33:06 GMT motorist said:

I found four F2s in "Free Fallin". They are all notably short and that might be a reason not to count them, but they seem to be intentionally pitched to work with the F3s in the vocal lines as a part of the melody. You can hear them at 0:56, 1:02, 1:41, and 1:46:


edit: just noticed the one at 1:02 is closer to G2, but the others seem to be pitched right.. at least worth putting in questionable notes.

Speaking of "Free Fallin'" if you ever decide to add bolds to this thread, the A4s in the chorus are an easy pick

[Henny Macc]

Oct 31, 2022 4:33:06 GMT motorist said:

I found four F2s in "Free Fallin". They are all notably short and that might be a reason not to count them, but they seem to be intentionally pitched to work with the F3s in the vocal lines as a part of the melody. You can hear them at 0:56, 1:02, 1:41, and 1:46:


edit: just noticed the one at 1:02 is closer to G2, but the others seem to be pitched right.. at least worth putting in questionable notes. Come to think of it I might look in other songs for things like this...

Yeah those are definitely questionable notes - they *technically* exist, but they're way too brief and uninteresting to be worth featuring as actual controlled notes from that song. He has a lot of really short low notes on anacruses like that - most of the notes I have listed in the E2-C2 range are actually kinda like that, but at least a bit more pronounced to the point that I feel like they're worth acknowledging. I wouldn't be very fussed about super brief ones that are just barely noticeable like that though.

[laurielou]

Have y'all heard this Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers song before? Do you think it's in the same Tom Petty lead vocal range as the other songs above?

"You Come Through" on 1995 Playback boxed set disc 6

I'm getting D3 to F5 when I try to figure out TP's range on this one. I'm just surprised how low and high he goes on this funky soul jam.

What do y'all think? Any comments much appreciated.

In the book Conversations with Tom Petty by Paul Zollo, Tom said: "I love that track. I really love it. I just kick myself that I didn’t put it out."... " I was trying to do a thing like Sly Stone used to do. Go down really low and come back. So that was probably the inspiration for that."

This track is an outtake recorded during the Let Me Up I've Had Enough album sessions but not finished in 1986. In 1995 it was finished after they gave it to Lenny Kravitz, and he put the drums, the bass, and the background vocals on the track. Released in 1995 on the Playback boxed set disc 6.

YouTube version says remastered in 2015 for Nobody's Children record.

youtu.be/2O0vK5ndpSQ?si=9mSyYDFMkpAAc0KR

[Henny Macc]

Hadn't heard that one before no, so good find! That's actually probably the best singing below G2 I've heard by Tom so far - there are strong lines down to F2 on every verse, and then some nicely thicc E2s at 2:08! I always knew he had those kinds of notes in him, but hadn't heard him really sing proper melody lines in that range yet, so this finally gives some nice confirmation to that.

As for the highs in that song, it mostly tops at G♯4/A4 for Tom's parts, but there are some falsettos/screams up to F5 at 3:32, 3:56, 4:04, and 4:25. However, all of those sound like Lenny Kravitz to me - I think the vast majority of those vocal ad libs in the last two minutes of the song are him.

[PerhapsXarb]

Dec 24, 2023 6:33:36 GMT Henny Macc said:

Hadn't heard that one before no, so good find! That's actually probably the best singing below G2 I've heard by Tom so far - there are strong lines down to F2 on every verse, and then some nicely thicc E2s at 2:08! I always knew he had those kinds of notes in him, but hadn't heard him really sing proper melody lines in that range yet, so this finally gives some nice confirmation to that.

As for the highs in that song, it mostly tops at G♯4/A4 for Tom's parts, but there are some falsettos/screams up to F5 at 3:32, 3:56, 4:04, and 4:25. However, all of those sound like Lenny Kravitz to me - I think the vast majority of those vocal ad libs in the last two minutes of the song are him.

I hear the 2:08 line as getting all the way down to D2 ("matter" E2, "ba-" Eb2, "-by" D2)

[Goober]

Link to the spoilered Eb1?

[Henny Macc]

Dec 25, 2023 1:11:30 GMT PerhapsXarb said:

Dec 24, 2023 6:33:36 GMT Henny Macc said:

Hadn't heard that one before no, so good find! That's actually probably the best singing below G2 I've heard by Tom so far - there are strong lines down to F2 on every verse, and then some nicely thicc E2s at 2:08! I always knew he had those kinds of notes in him, but hadn't heard him really sing proper melody lines in that range yet, so this finally gives some nice confirmation to that.

As for the highs in that song, it mostly tops at G♯4/A4 for Tom's parts, but there are some falsettos/screams up to F5 at 3:32, 3:56, 4:04, and 4:25. However, all of those sound like Lenny Kravitz to me - I think the vast majority of those vocal ad libs in the last two minutes of the song are him.

I hear the 2:08 line as getting all the way down to D2 ("matter" E2, "ba-" Eb2, "-by" D2)

Actually now that you mention it, I think I may hear it getting as low as C♯2 on that last word! It's just a question of whether it would be countable or not...

Dec 25, 2023 2:39:12 GMT Goober said:

Link to the spoilered Eb1?

vocaroo.com/1kQhGscHxFRo

[laurielou]

Dec 24, 2023 6:33:36 GMT Henny Macc said:

Hadn't heard that one before no, so good find! That's actually probably the best singing below G2 I've heard by Tom so far - there are strong lines down to F2 on every verse, and then some nicely thicc E2s at 2:08! I always knew he had those kinds of notes in him, but hadn't heard him really sing proper melody lines in that range yet, so this finally gives some nice confirmation to that.

As for the highs in that song, it mostly tops at G♯4/A4 for Tom's parts, but there are some falsettos/screams up to F5 at 3:32, 3:56, 4:04, and 4:25. However, all of those sound like Lenny Kravitz to me - I think the vast majority of those vocal ad libs in the last two minutes of the song are him.

Thank you for checking this out! I see what you mean, that it's probably Lenny Kravitz doing the falsettos/screams near the end, yeah. Alright, it's time to turn it up loud and dance around the house. Have a good one.