Here are five things about him you may not know about Tom Petty:
1. He was addicted to heroin in the 90s. The strain of touring and recording, on top of a recent divorce, led him to a very dark place. He first addressed his addiction in last year’s Petty: The Biography.
2. Petty never had a #1 album until 2014. “Full Moon Fever?” Nope. “Damn the Torpedoes?” Nope. “Hypnotic Eye” was the first to take him to number one.
3. He provided the voice of “Lucky” for “King of the Hill.” (Please excuse the YouTube video of someone’s iPad playing “King of the Hill.”)
4. Petty makes a lot of money on the road. His take-home pay for the 2014 tour (after paying out the Heartbreakers and everyone else on Team Petty) came out to more than four million bucks.
5. He’s performed on SNL eight times, first appearing in 1979. Here he is from 2/19/83: