Tom Petty: US rock musician dies aged 66

Frontman of the Heartbreakers died on Monday night in Los Angeles after he suffered a cardiac arrest

Tom Petty, the rock musician whose hits included American Girl and I Will not Back Down, died in California at age 66 after suffering cardiac arrest.

Petty was reportedly rushed to UCLA's Santa Monica Hospital after being found unconscious in his Malibu home, but could not be revived.

"We are devastated to announce the premature death of our father, husband, brother, leader and friend Tom Petty," said his manager Tony Dimitriades on behalf of the family.

"He died peacefully at 8:40 pm surrounded by family members, bandmates and friends."
The singer-songwriter and guitarist gained fame in the late 1970s with their band Heartbreakers, which were seen as an integral part of the heart rock movement.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, which introduced Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers in 2002, praised them as "durable, resourceful, hardworking, friendly and unpretentious."

Petty was originally part of the Mudcrutch country rock band, which gained regional popularity in Florida, but did not attract a dominant audience. They separated after Petty and other members joined the Heartbreakers, later reforming in 2007.

In 1977 the new team won success with the song Breakdown, but it was their second album You're Gonna Get It! which became a Top 40 hit.

Throughout the 80's, the band enjoyed great hits like You Got Lucky and Change of Heart, collaborating with Bob Dylan and Stevie Nicks. Petty continued to work with Dylan as part of the Wilburys tour, along with Roy Orbison, George Harrison and Jeff Lynne.
"It's shocking and overwhelming news," Bob Dylan told Rolling Stone in a statement. "I thought of Tom's world. He was a great interpreter, full of light, a friend, and I'll never forget it."

Petty also enjoyed a solo success but always returned to the Heartbreakers, releasing their latest album in 2014. "I do not see that I have anything to offer as a solo artist that I can not do within the group better," he told Sun. " We get along so well that it's really embarrassing. It's a love party! "

The band had been on a 40th anniversary tour since April that ended last week at the Hollywood Bowl. In an interview with Rolling Stone in December, he suggested that it would probably be the last.

"We're all in the back of the 60's," he said. "I have a granddaughter now I would like to see as much as I can.I do not want to spend my life on the road.This tour will take me for four months.With a child, that is a long time.
Petty was open in his protection of the rights of artists, questioning the record companies on several occasions about what he believed were unfair practices. Earlier this year he was named MusiCares person of the year for his "career-wide interest in defending the rights of artists" as well as for his charity work with homeless people in Los Angeles.

Throughout his career, he sold more than 80 million records worldwide.

Petty, born in Florida, captured the rock'n'roll bug after his uncle introduced him to Elvis Presley, who was filming the film Follow That Dream in Florida in 1960.

He said he started working on music seriously after seeing the Beatles at the Ed Sullivan Show in February 1964.

He would talk of being consumed by rock music from childhood, to the point where his father, whom Petty later said he hit savagely, thought was "mental."

Stunned by the Byrds 'guitars, the Beatles' melodic genius and Dylan's lyrics, he was surprised to see other children feeling the same way. "You would go and see another guy with long hair, this was about 65, and go, 'Wow, there's one like me,'" he said in 1989. "You would go and talk and he would say, 'I have a set of percussion.' 'You do it? That was my whole life!
Amidst his successes, Petty also suffered dark periods during a career spanning five decades.

A 2015 biography of the singer, Petty: The Biography, revealed his heroin addiction in the 1990s.

Author Warren Zanes said in an interview with the Washington Post Petty succumbed to the drug because "he had encounters with people who made heroin, and he reached a point in his life when he did not know what to do with the pain he felt."

Petty also suffered from depression, channeling his pain in 1999 Echo, during which he was also dealing with a divorce. In 2002, she married Dana York and said she had been in therapy for six years to deal with depression.

"It's a funny disease because it takes a long time actually to come to terms with the fact that you're sick - medically ill, you're not suddenly out of your mind," he said at that moment.