By Brad Gallagher:
Anyone who has ever entered a competition, or played a sport, or played the lottery has at one point or another learned what it is like to win, and what it is like to lose. I know I have. Winning is a tremendous feeling which brings with it excitement and joy. Losing, on the other hand, can cause quite the opposite feeling. I have a tendency to be very competitive, so when I don’t win, I tend to temporarily lose some of my joy.
It is not only in competitions that we can lose though. We can also lose in some of the normal events of life. Like for instance, when we don’t score as high on an exam as the rest of the class, or when a coworker gets promoted before us even though we had worked there longer. However, there are times when even though we lost, we can still see the joy in the experience. And that was how it turned out for the subject of today’s story.
As The Story Goes:
Back when Tom Petty was in junior high school in Gainesville, Florida he liking a girl in his school named Cindy. Cindy was attractive and hung out with the cool kids, and at that time Tom was just a normal guy who’s group of friends were just normal guys too. And even though he had tried over and over to get her to like him, she just rejected him throughout all of junior high and high school. Then, after graduation, Tom left Gainesville to attend college.
In 1969, at the end of the spring semester, he returned home for the summer break. Once home, he connected with his old friends from school, and was invited to a party. Cindy was also at that party, and believe it or not she chose to hang out with Tom that whole night. He had always had a crush on her, but at that party he really fell in love with her. Unfortunately for him, however, when morning came she informed him that it was just for that one night. She told him that heir relationship could not go on even though she had liked him that night and had had a good time.
As the years passed, Petty tried to connect with her from time to time but she always pushed him away. Her liking him for that one night and then rejecting him from that point on scarred him for life. And it was years later as he reflected on the memories of that night that he wrote the song “Even The Losers”. It was a song written straight from his heart about his love for her and her rejection of him as heard in his lyrics:
“Baby, time meant nothing, anything seamed real
Yeah, you could kiss like fire and you made me feel
like every word you said was meant to be
No, it couldn’t have been that easy to forget about me”
And:
“Two cars parked on the overpass
Rocks hit the water like broken glass
I should have known right then it was too good to last
God, it’s such a drag when you’re livin’ in the past”
And of course:
“Baby, even the losers get luck some times
Even the losers keep a little bit of pride
They get luck some times”
You see, what he lost that night was “the the love of his life” as soon as that night ended, but he always considered himself lucky to have spent that one night with her. And…. it was also on that night that he realized, for whatever reason, that he needed to be in a rock and roll band. And the rest is history.
“Even The Losers” appeared on Petty’s 1979 album “Damn The Torpedoes” which peaked at #2 on the Billboard Top 200 Albums chart. The song was never released as a single in the US, but in 2017 it reached #11 on the Billboard LyricFind charts. And many critics maintain that it was the best song he ever wrote. But, why don’t you be the judge of that. Now that you know the back story, click the link below to listen and decide for yourself. You can even hear the hurt that is still in his heart as he sings the words more than ten years later.
And come back and see me soon, right here on As The Story Goes.
“Even The Losers” live in 1980 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNMT4AYf6Xo
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AS THE STORY GOES 