Tom Petty - You Take it on Faith, You Take it to the Heart

"Music is probably the only real magic I have encountered in my life. There’s not some trick involved with it. It’s pure and it’s real. And it moves and it heals and it communicates and does all these incredible things. It’s been so good to me that I want to be good to it. I want to make music that’s worth making". Tom Petty

After what seemed like a bizzare night of asking the question "is he still alive or has he passed?" Tom Petty's manager Tony Dimitriades has confirmed that he died at 8.40 last night in hospital surrounded by family, friends and bandmates. 

There had been a lot of confusion because Rolling Stone and CBS News were running articles on their websites saying that he was dead but the Police said that they could not confirm his death and his daughter had posted an extremely strong post against Rolling Stone for reporting his death many hours before it had actually been confirmed.

I went to bed last night not knowing at all what was true after posting a tribute on my fb page. I was slightly tempted to post something here last night but was feeling very upset by the news I was hearing coming out from various sites in the USA.

This morning I woke up to the confirmation that he had indeed passed out of this life just 18 days shy of his 67th birthday.

Live in Gainesville, Florida

I intend later to have a look at his music in a little more depth, spotlighting the great songs and in particular a couple of the career defining albums. For the moment though let the above concert speak about how good he and his band were on stage in front of a sellout hometown crowd.

He'll be missed by many across the globe and our love and thoughts go out today to his family first and foremost and then to The Heartbreakers his long serving bandmates.