Tom Petty Quotes

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Tom Petty

Profession : Musician

Birth : October 20, 1950

Do something you really like, and hopefully it pays the rent. As far as I'm concerned, that's success.

Tom Petty

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. It moves, it heals, it communicates and does all these incredible things.

Tom Petty

It's funny how the music industry is enraged about the Internet and the way things are copied without being paid for. But you know why people steal the music? Because they can't afford the music.

Tom Petty

Most things I worry about never happen anyway.

Tom Petty

Rock n' roll was one thing, and then they chopped off the 'roll' and called it 'rock,' which became a sort of umbrella term for anything with a guitar in it. Like hair bands. How could we possibly believe that? It's just gotten downright silly, to the point where now it's sort of become like professional wrestling.

Tom Petty

I'm not exactly a guy who makes new friends easily.

Tom Petty

I feel sorry for kids these days. They get so much homework. Remember the days when we put a belt around our two books and carried them home? Now they're dragging a suitcase. They have school all day, then homework from six until eleven. There's no time left to be creative.

Tom Petty

I like to be an optimist, but I like to be a realist, too.

Tom Petty

I'm barely prolific and incredibly lazy.

Tom Petty

As time goes by, you seem to weed out the things that were making your life hard.

Tom Petty

If you're not getting older, you're dead.

Tom Petty

I don't eat fish and chicken and all that. But I will have some eggs. So I'm not technically a vegan. But I eat pretty sensibly, and before a tour, I will usually work out a lot. I'll get a trainer, or I have a guy I've known a long time.

Tom Petty

A good song should give you a lot of images; you should be able to make your own little movie in your head to a good song.

Tom Petty

My family wasn't involved in the college. They were more of just your 'white trash' kind of family. And so I have that kind of background, but I always kind of aspired to be something else, and I made a lot of different friends over the years that were passing through.

Tom Petty

Go after what you really love and find a way to make that work for you, and then you'll be a happy person.

Tom Petty

There used to be this real sense of community integrity in rock. It has really eroded. Everyone seems to be on their own now.

Tom Petty

I think television's become a downright dangerous thing. It has no moral barometer whatsoever. If you want to talk about something that is all about money, just watch the television.

Tom Petty

I think if I'd quit years ago, I'd never have known what I was capable of doing.

Tom Petty

I don't think it's a good attitude in your life to feel that you have to be rich to have self-esteem.

Tom Petty

Making a record? You've got to have the song, then you create a record. I think it's the same with a live performance. If the material is strong, you're already 90% there. I always tell young people it's all about the music, the songs. Work on the songs, work on the songs, work on the songs.

Tom Petty