Tom Petty was never one to scare easily. From the various legal troubles he found himself in to someone setting his house on fire, Petty would always stand in defiance to anyone in his way, willing to go down with the ship rather than have someone intimidate him. Although Petty may have been able to stand tall against any kind of musical adversary, the only thing that ever made him nervous came from his own music.
As Petty arrived in the late 1980s, he had already gone through a hellish few years. Following the release of his album Hard Promises, his mother had passed away, leading to him overdoing a lot of his vices when making the almost-concept album Southern Accents. After breaking his hand during the recording, Petty’s luck began to change when he was asked to work alongside Bob Dylan on his next tour, serving as his backup group for most of Dylan’s sets.