I haven’t been down south, and specifically to my favorite city of New Orleans, for many years. Next month I’ll make up for some lost time quickly, by traveling there twice. First, my regular running-mate Zing and I will be rolling up to the banks of Lake Pontchartrain to attend Hogs For The Cause, which combines two of life’s best reasons for living: live music and barbecue. Among others, we’ll be catching the headliner, Charley Crockett, who may soon require a restraining order from these two pseudo-country fanboys, and sampling the slow-smoked wonders from among the over 90 world-class BBQ teams (and it’s all a benefit to fund pediatric brain cancer research). Then, just a few weeks later, I’ll be returning for the granddaddy of them all, the New Orleans Jazzfest, where my son Max and I will be making a return joint appearance and have already outlined what’s probably an unhealthily packed all-day and all-night music itinerary (while hopefully still finding time for the odd po-boy or cup of gumbo).

So, what’s all this south stuff got to do with Tom Petty? Not that much, you may reckon, but let’s give it a shot anyway.

This week some random channel surfing had me land on “Live from Gatorville,” a 2006 concert film of Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers (along with a prominent guest appearance by Stevie Nicks) taking place in Petty’s hometown and the band’s origin place, Gainesville, Florida. They played raucous versions of plenty of the hits – man, there’s so many of those – but late in the show the setlist veered off the popular course a bit and, well, headed south. Petty began the detour with the song ‘Down South,’ a rather deep cut from his release earlier that same year, Highway Companion – which was actually a Petty solo album, his third and final non-Heartbreakers recording (following the remarkable pair of Full Moon Fever in 1989 and Wildflowers in 1994). And he followed that up with a lengthy introduction for ‘Southern Accents,’ at the time an almost forgotten track from his 1985 album of the same name, detailing with noticeable emotion how he had not sung it for 13 years – in fact, since their last appearance in Gainesville (adding to the gravitas after-the-fact: this would also be the last time he would ever perform it).

From his earliest punk-like image as a sneering, leather-jacketed rogue playing mostly combative songs caked with attitude, it’s sometimes easy to forget Tom Petty was a southerner. But that he was. And I think it would be fair to surmise from the two dramatic performances at this show, a rather proud one at that. But Petty defied the corny southern caricature. His slow drawl hardly made him slow. His easy manner served merely as a comforting cover for his scathing wit. His truest portrait was always reflected not simply in his timeless melodies and chords, but in his unpretentious yet ever-incisive lyrics; an intelligent, contemplative observer of the convoluted world around him, and his rightful place in it, whether, in a decidedly ungentlemanly manner, you wanted to hear it not.

Quite a number of prominent southern men on the current music scene, in fact, are following Petty’s staunch example in taking on trite southern stereotypes and dated touchstones. Jason Isbell, Lukas Nelson, Tyler Childers, Patterson Hood and Mike Cooley of Drive-By Truckers, BJ Barham of American Aquarium, and in a subtler way perhaps even the aforementioned Texan crooner Charley Crockett. No lazily classified rednecks are these, and none are afraid to confront difficult old south truths nor hide from the concepts of progressive thought. And beyond all that, they can all damn well play some boot kickin’ tunes.

Since Petty’s death in 2017, 11 years following the Gainesville concert, it’s the bevy of lesser-known songs like ‘Down South’ that have emerged to move me most. His amazing albums (13 with the Heartbreakers plus the 3 solo ones, then there’s the Traveling Wilburys…jeezus) were all chock full of hits – indelible, impossible-to-not-sing-along-to, genuine classic rock smashes. But revisiting those same records over time has also reminded and sometimes revealed that they were always filled out by more tracks of simple elegance and occasional brilliance. Not infrequently over many years I’d wondered about another close comrade, my friend Greg, someone of wide and respected musical knowledge (as well as a southerner, I guess it should be said), readily proclaiming Tom Petty as his singular favorite artist – not among them, as surely many would concur, but topping the list. I wonder no longer.

Petty’s catalog depth was astounding. Perhaps this was due, at least in part, to his insanely vast knowledge of music and music history, as exhibited to this day in gloriously posthumous fashion, on the Tom Petty’s Buried Treasure radio show. Through the ongoing miracle of satellite radio, I hear Tom – and the countless rock and rhythm & blues artists he features – now more than ever, in round-the-clock replays of the best programmed radio show I’ve ever heard (to echo Greg: not one of the best, the absolute greatest). If I listened to nothing else – though, of course, I do – it would be worth subscribing to Sirius Radio for the overflowing jewels of Buried Treasure alone.

So as I prime myself for the pending southern double-dip, ready to be immersed in the unique beauty of New Orleans – both musical and otherwise – I’ll also be doing so with a new facet of appreciation for that always slyly-grinning southern rocker held in the back of my mind. Tom Petty most famously sang about an ‘American Girl’ – also the show’s final encore in Gainesville – but it should never be forgotten that a significant part of his iconic American identity came from down south.