Tom Petty made music like it really mattered to him

Tom Petty was one of my private heroes. He made music like it really mattered to him, and it certainly mattered to me and so many other fans. Because at the heart of everything he did, Petty was a fan himself.

He was a music enthusiast, electrified into creative life by Elvis, The Beatles and Bob Dylan, who carried a torch for that first flaming burst of rock 'n' roll energy into a new era, staying true to its core identity for a long and ultimately very fruitful career.

He wasn't an overnight success, and he was never a superstar. But he was one of the best. His work and his presence had an unusual blend of humility and swagger: the humility of someone who felt like he was treading in the footsteps of giants, the swagger of an artist who knows, deep down, he is really, really good.

"Music is probably the only real magic I have encountered in my life," he told me once. "There's not some trick involved with it. It's pure and it's real. And it moves and it heals and it communicates and does all these incredible things. It's been so good to me that I want to be good to it. I want to make music that's worth making."

The stars first aligned for Petty when punk and new wave brought an appreciation for the focused intent, stripped back drive and moral purpose of his music.

Petty was an astutely understated songwriter, polishing phrases to gleaming nuggets that integrated perfectly with melodies and rhythms. His nasal voice carried the implicit sneer of a rebel rocker but his songs were full of empathy and compassion.

There are so many great ones. Breakdown, American Girl, I Need To Know, Listen To Her Heart, Refugee, Here Comes My Girl, Don't Do Me Like That, Even The Losers, Don't Come Around Here No More, Love Is A long Hard Road, Free Fallin', Yer So Bad, I Won't Back Down, Into The Great Wide Open, Surrender. His last album, Hypnotic Eye in 2014, was number one in the US.

His band The Heartbreakers were fantastic live, with a sleek energy and killer musicianship, never flashy or showy but perfectly balanced and elegantly nuanced. They were together, in various incarnations, for more than 40 years, and it showed in the way they could lock in and really groove.

"We're a badass little guitar band and that's all I ever wanted," he said.

Much in demand by other musicians, Petty and his band could often be seen performing with legendary figures including Willie Nelson to Johnny Cash, old rock and rollers such as Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis, contemporaries such as Bruce Springsteen and members of the Beatles and the Stones. He told me once that he was amazed to have become friends with almost everyone he had ever admired.

WATCH the video for Tom Petty's hit track Free Fallin'

"I never really sought them out but they all phoned me up at some point and came around. That was just beyond anything, cos I love that music so much. I just feel so privileged."

It is so hard to believe he is gone, and that music has lost another great one. And, of course, we still have the music. And it will always be great. But I am listening to Tom Petty right now, and the speakers are rattling, and my bones are rattling, and I'm singing along, and I'm raising a toast, because what I can hear is something that defies death, and defies time. I'm listening to Tom Petty, and I'm free falling. So long, Tom, so long. - The Daily Telegraph