Song of the Week 1/7/05

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers - "Room at the Top"

So why is the first Song of the Week for 2005 almost six years old? That's because I'm still stuck in that end of the year nostalgia mode. Since I had to postpone my release party for the 15th anniversary list for family reasons, I shifted it to January 8th. And because everyone coming to the party already had the printed copy of the list and the radio show CDs, I decided I had to come up with some added value to entice people to schlep to Brooklyn. So I decided to make a mix CD of the #1 albums and #1 singles from the past 15 years. "Room at the Top" was the top single in 1999, and to me it always seemed like a perfect disc opener. The Petty album it is taken from, the highly underrated Echo, was inspired by Petty's divorce from his wife and finding a new woman that would become his second one. "Room at the Top" distills all of Petty's bittersweet feelings about his life into one gem of a song. And after getting the shutdown by my latest romantic pursuit during this week, the following lyrics rang true every day as I listened to it on the subway while returning to my own room at the top, the apartment/attic I live in:

"I got a room at the top of the world tonight
I can see everything tonight
I got a room where everyone
Can have a drink and forget those things
That went wrong in their life"
(c) 1999 Adria K Music

Indeed Tom, indeed.