I was taking a break at the Workshop when I scanned my Newsfeed and saw Tom Petty had passed .. I called a friend in So Cal that worked at KLOS and confirmed the news, because, these days, you never know .. by that time, the list of some of the greats passing on had gotten fairly long :: Prince, Bowie, Greg Allman, Chuck Berry, etc .. I wrote here on ECF my thoughts, and, franky, it was tough to write about Petty in the past tense ..
Warren Zanes, Petty's biographer, tells a story that goes a bit like this ..
Tom was at his best when he talked about anything that dealt with life before he became Tom Petty .. and was just another kid crazy about Rock and Roll and what that kid meant to him .. Petty would harken back to that simpler time ..
When Zanes would visit Petty for a periodic interview, there was always a tray with coffee mugs and a fresh, large thermos of coffee .. at one point, Zanes complimented Petty on how good the coffee was and always consistently good .. Petty agreed and launched into a lengthy discussion on coffee .. what it was supposed to be, how to recognize it, etc .. the upshot being that Petty, after he had achieved fame and fortune, discovered the perfect cup of coffee at a Malibu diner .. and, it turned out to be Maxwell House .. "Good To The Last Drop .."
Petty quized the diner's owner and was shown the Bunn Professional Coffee maker setup back behind the counter .. subsequently, having a Bunn set up installed in his home .. later, he discovered that if the measuring for each cup was exact, the coffee would be even better ..
Later in the biography process, Petty went on to tell Zanes that it was in a small diner in Gainesville, FL that he could get a "bottomless cup" and sit for hours, high on the low grade "material" of the day and wrapping his hand around a mug of coffee, without being pressured to leave or order a meal if he did not have the money to pay for anything but the coffee .. Zanes makes a most poignant observation .. that Petty sat in that booth / workshop and built scale models of his Dreams .. a cup of coffee with which the World could be poured ..
Zanes says he can't remember a time he did not see Petty without a cup of Maxwell House ..
All of us share in the little things in life .. it's been a year today since Mr Petty left us ..
Take a listen, please ::