Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers

Live At The Fillmore, 1997

WARNERS The Heartbreakers’ 20-date San Fran residency distilled.

“We’re the house band here at the Fillmore,” Tom Petty semijokes, during his 20-date residency at the legendary San Francisco venue in 1997. And on this 72-track collection compiled from the final six shows, he and the Heartbreakers certainly live up to the job description.

Mostly playing covers of songs that inspired them, they revel in classic rock’n’roll boogies (Lucille, Around And Around), blues workouts (I’d Love To Love You Baby, Crazy Mama) and psychedelic Americana (The Zombies’ I Want You Back Again), and even have a surf country crack at Goldfinger. Roger

McGuinn and John Lee Hooker arrive to front sections devoted to their songs, and the Heartbreakers themselves tribute the likes of the Stones, Bo Diddley, JJ Cale, The Kinks, Patti Smith and (unsurprisingly faithfully) Bob Dylan.

The band’s evident love for the material floods the performances, even though they can overdo the jamming when they get a groove going, and reverence dampens Hooker’s guest spot. But Petty’s own songs, deployed sparingly, sound infinitely fresher and tighter: American

Girl and I Won’t Back Down are stripped back to harmonysmothered acoustic singalongs; Runnin’ Down A Dream and You Wreck Me are speedster rock high points; Free Fallin’ feels like a glider ride over a gleaming LA. Songs like California, Angel

Dream and Walls (Circus) from 1996 soundtrack album She’s

The One represent Petty’s lustrous country folk reaching sublime heights.

As Petty and the Heartbreakers fulfil a fan’s shout-out for Heartbreaker’s Beach Party and revisit their first ever recording, On The Street – essentially a hyped-up pop Dylan – you get the sense of an inclusive month of warm indulgence, a band coasting on 20 years of accumulated powers.