There’s a story they tell about Tom Petty breaking his hand in frustration during the recording of the track “Rebels” on the Heartbreakers’ album Southern Accents. Continually comparing their recording with his original demo, Petty left the studio after their latest attempt and punched the wall. This story is a lesson for perfectionists everywhere, because the truth was that there was nothing wrong with their latest take. Eventually the problem was “fixed” by replacing the organic human drums with a drum machine.

Well, it was the 80s.

I never really liked Southern Accents, because it sounded like it was made in the 80s. As much as I love Springsteen, I listen to Born in the USA and Tunnel of Love with gritted teeth (ears?) because record production in the 80s was a shitshow. The perfect storm of novel new studio toys and the dreaded click track. The grid. I mean, I’ve seen them do “Don’t Come Around Here No More” with a live drummer, so I blame bloody Dave Stewart for the drum machine nonsense.

My personal theory is that people had been whispering in Tom Petty’s ear since 1979 that Heartbreakers drummer Stan Lynch wasn’t very good, or at least not very subtle. Step forward, Jimmy Iovine. I don’t think Petty himself believed that, but I can see how it might have been easy to blame Stan rather than, say, the drugs when things weren’t going well in the studio. So when it came to recording his first solo album, Full Moon Fever, Petty used a session drummer. And then again on Wildflowers, after which Stan was out, replaced by Wildflowers session guy Steve Ferrone.

I can imagine that Stan was the kind of guy who wants to go on partying when everyone else wants to go to bed. Or wants to go on partying when everyone else wants to start looking after themselves and heads to rehab.

Anyway, this collection. You get to hear “Rebels” before it was ruined, which is nice, though not “Don’t Come Around Here No More”, which I’ve realised I can’t watch these days without crying.

The conceit here is that this is a journey through Tom Petty’s career not including the long established live set standards, the familiar signposts of “American Girl” and “Don’t Do Me Like That” and “Free Fallin’”, “Learning to Fly” etc. This isn’t even as-selected-by-Tom-himself outtakes, because that was the 1995 boxed set Playback. Instead, this feels like a last trawl through the archives by his friends and family — those who, unhampered by Petty’s perfectionism, can say, here, this stuff is worth a listen.

In other words, don’t start here if you’re new to Tom Petty.

You get to hear the version just-before-they-nailed-it of many songs, versions perhaps with slightly less push, or sometimes with just a little bit more air and swing. Or you hear a live version which uses a different approach than they eventually settled on; or just outtakes which for whatever reason didn’t make the final release.

Over four hours and ten minutes, you hear Petty and his group evolve from that ebullient and prickly bar band of the late 70s to the sardonic and bewhiskered elder statesmen of latter days. Available in two versions, Deluxe and non-, I’d say that the 26 track non-Deluxe would probably suffice for most.