Tom Petty and Bob Dylan grew close through a musical collaboration and a slew of tour dates in the 1980s. Petty said he considered Dylan a good friend after they toured together. He proved their friendship by decorating his home studio with Dylan’s artwork.
Bob Dylan and Tom Petty toured together in the 1980s
Petty considered himself a Dylan fan long before he became famous himself.
“We hadn’t heard Dylan [growing up in Florida] until ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ was released as a single,” he explained, per American songwriter. “And we loved it right away. We learned it, we did it on the show. We have learned all of his singles. We didn’t have Dylan albums before blonde on blonde [1966]. I had heard Highway 61 revisited [1965]. A friend of mine had this. But I actually bought blonde on blonde. This is where I really liked Bob. And I started to really dig his thing.
Although he had looked up to Dylan for years, Petty said he treated the other musician like a normal person. It helped them form an easy friendship during their tour and after.
“I always found that if I asked Bob a direct question, I would get a direct answer. So maybe our friendship wasn’t that difficult, because I decided to treat him like anyone else. who else,” he explained. “Although I was certainly in awe of his talent. But people are just people. And I don’t remember asking him a question when he didn’t give me a straight answer.
Tom Petty kept Bob Dylan’s works in his home
Besides being a singer and songwriter, Dylan is a visual artist. The musician welds, paints and draws. His work even appeared in an exhibition at the Patricia and Philip Frost Art Museum in Miami. He explained that he finds artistic inspiration in many places.
“Seeing many of my works years after I finished them is a fascinating experience,” the musician said, per Smithsonian Magazine. “I don’t really associate them with any particular time or place or mood, but I see them as part of a long arc… One can be so deeply influenced by events in Morretes, in the Brazil, only by the man who sells El Pais to Madrid.”
Some items that would not have been in the exhibit were the artworks at Petty’s. In his home studio he once kept a framed charcoal drawing of Dylan (by The small archives).
In 2014, Petty hosted Uncut in his studio. The article noted that “there are still plenty of indications that this is one musician’s idea of a man cave, such as the enviable array of guitars on stands that line the walls of the check-in space, the deeply upholstered gray sectional sofa and vintage red Coca-Cola machine in the living room. Personal memorabilia — like a painting whose thick brushstrokes mark it as the work of Petty’s friend Bob Dylan — decorate the walls.
Stevie Nicks once said it was fascinating to see the two men at odds
Although Petty considered Dylan a good friend, they sometimes disagreed. Stevie Nicks, who joined the pair on tour, said it was fascinating to watch them bicker.
“I got to see them put their personalities together, and it was fascinating,” she recounted in a 1989 interview with the Austin American Statesman. “I looked at some – well, not exactly rows – but a little back and forth between them.”
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