John Mayer Pens Note In Remembrance Of Tom Petty

Guitarist John Mayer mostly focused on career-spanning originals over the course of his The Search For Everything tour, but at almost each show he did work in a cover of Tom Petty’s “Free Fallin’.” Mayer is among the many musicians from nearly every corner of the music world to weigh in on the tragic and sudden death of Tom Petty.

Mayer, who heads to South America later this month before Dead & Company’s fall tour begins in November, penned a beautiful note about what Tom Petty meant to him. The guitarist referred to Petty as “one of the high priests of the Sonic Church of California” and discussed how Tom’s songs made him feel as a kid growing up in suburban Connecticut in the late ’80s. “Tom Petty’s music was the only thing like it, both on the radio and on MTV. He made me believe in two things: that songwriting was everything, and that California must have felt like his music sounded,” Mayer wrote. “It did. And it always will.”

Here’s the full text of John Mayer’s touching tribute:

Tom Petty. One of the high priests of the Sonic Church of California. He wasn’t born there, but he planted so many songs there, it’s where his music takes place in my mind.

Musically speaking, California is a repository for dreams. Every great song and artist associated with it adds a patch to that sun-faded tapestry. The songs spark these visions, some of them memories, and some of them just seen for the first time in the music and revisited throughout the years. Petty was a major architect of the spirit that makes musicians want to flock to California and write their songs and live the life that both authors them and is authored by them.

Growing up a kid in suburban Connecticut in the late ‘80s, Tom Petty’s music was the only thing like it, both on the radio and on MTV. He made me believe in two things: that songwriting was everything, and that California must have felt like his music sounded.

It did. And it always will.

Musicians leave behind much more than records. They leave with us a shared dream space. A place we can continue to visit, even if after its creator is gone. Tom Petty’s California is my favorite California. It’s the one he painted both photo-real and abstract. It’s the one, like his music always portrayed, that straddles the dichotomy between proletariat and paradise; somewhere between the power lines and the palm trees, between Reseda and Malibu, between restlessness and ecstatic love.

A legend reaches the other side.

Rest In Peace

[John Mayer – Free Fallin’]