More Tom Petty from his biographer, musician Warren Zanes.

In 1979, I was an undersized FM-generation high-school junior with a voice that wouldn’t change, a stressed single mom, and a bedroom in a rented gray two-family house in which I had to play my stereo low so I wouldn’t disturb all the people living close around me. And then my daily affront at this complete lack of agency found validation when some skinny blond dude calling his album “Damn the Torpedoes” uplifted my evenings with a simple phrase about being cut down to size on a regular basis: “Don’t do me like that.” He wasn’t celebrating humiliation—he understood the condition, which is, foremost, the inability to make the humiliation stop. There was nothing to do except to say to hell with annoying Mom and the neighbors and, in my alarmingly pitched treble that sounded like a radio veering between frequencies, to sing out that ambrosial phrase right along with Petty: “Don’t do me like that.”

Source: The Proud Pain of Tom Petty | The New Yorker

Just watched “History of the Eagles, Part I” today. It was an entertaining look into the life of a rock and roll band when it was on top of the world.

Don Felder, one of the long-serving members of the band, talked about what the documentary didn’t cover.

So it was with considerable trepidation that Felder, now a solo artist who recently released his second album, Road to Forever, sat down to watch Allison Ellwood’s two-part History of the Eagles documentary, commissioned by Henley, Frey and longtime manager Irving Azoff and broadcast on Showtime. Nonetheless, he found plenty to appreciate in the authorized film.

Source: Don Felder Gives ‘History of the Eagles’ a Mixed Review – Hollywood Reporter

I love this story of how John Lennon came to work on David Bowie’s first #1 song, Fame.

By late 1974, David, having moved to RCA Records, had already recorded most of his ninth studio album, Young Americans, but the record was in a holding pattern while David went through the necessary legalities to break all ties with his shady management contract with Tony Defries. Staying in a New York hotel during this period, David had a little party that John Lennon, together with his girlfriend May Pang showed up for. Record producer Tony Visconti was also in attendance and recalled later that both John and David were high on cocaine and Cognac and while sketching caricatures of each other were having a dark discussion about “what does it all mean?” – with “it” being “life.” As a side note, it was at this party where May Pang first met Tony Visconti and the two would eventually marry in 1989.

After the party, the ice was properly broken between John and David and a week or two later in early January 1975, John got a phone call from David who explained he was at New York’s Electric Lady Studios working on a cover of John’s Beatles classic “Across The Universe” for his Young Americans album. Unbeknownst to John, Young Americans didn’t need any further material. David was apparently seizing the opportunity to get a Beatle on his record and make a replacement or two of some of the tracks – if it turned out okay, that is. John obliged David and came down to the studio to sing backing vocals and play acoustic guitar on “Across The Universe” with David and his band. John was later to comment that Bowie’s version of “Across The Universe” was the best one. After jamming with the band on a 1961 hit by The Flairs called “Foot Stompin’,” they teamed up with guitarist Carlos Alomar, who had been playing with David since the previous year, and the three of them wrote “Fame” on the spot.

Source: The Beatles Rarity » #askNat – concerning John Lennon’s contribution to David Bowie’s “Fame”:

I’m sad to hear that David Bowie died yesterday from cancer. He was an amazingly-talented musician and artist.

David Bowie, the self-described “tasteful thief” who appropriated from and influenced glam rock, soul, disco, new wave, punk rock and haute couture, and whose edgy, androgynous alter egos invited fans to explore their own dark places, died Jan. 10, two days after his 69 th birthday.

The cause was cancer, his family said on official Bowie social media accounts. Relatives also confirmed the news but did not disclose where he died.

With his sylphlike body, chalk-white skin, jagged teeth and eyes that appeared to be two different colors, Mr. Bowie combined sexual energy with fluid dance moves and a theatrical charisma that mesmerized male and female admirers alike.

Source: Singer David Bowie dies at 69; mesmerizing performer of many alter egos – The Washington Post