Stagnant songwriting slows Petty

Tom Petty always had impeccable taste in music, designing himself after Elvis, the Byrds and the Flying Burrito Brothers. However, he severely missed the point of his influences, whose eyes were always on creation and progression. Essentially, the Heartbreakers have been making the same, pretty good record for 25 years now.\nOn The Last DJ, though, Petty comes out swinging at the music business; the album is a lament, musically and lyrically. Usually every Petty album contains a track or two of inane brilliance, but The Last DJ gets seriously bogged down by its theme. Petty tries to cram lyrics into his three or four-chord songs, giving no room for the Heartbreakers to dig into the tracks. \nMike Campbell's guitar melodies were always the key to hooking in the listener (and if you don't think so, consider Petty's "Runnin' Down a Dream" or the Wallflowers "One Headlight"). Here, Campbell is muted by Petty's ranting, although a surprise moment comes at the very end of the record, with Campbell interchanging dissonant and ambient timbres on "Can't Stop the Sun."\nPetty was never a lyrical mogul, but his writing for The Last DJ is so grossly literal that it leaves nothing to the imagination. At the beginning of "Joe," he calls out, "My name's Joe / I'm the CEO."\nA few tracks in, he starts to drag his feet and talks a little bit about love and childhood. By the album's end, Petty has clearly lost his muse, as he resorts to incoherent threats on "Can't Stop the Sun" ("Hey mister businessman / be sure to wash your hands / be careful where you stand").\nA record about the evils of the music industry is commendable, but Petty hardly seems like the right man for the job. He complains about the golden circles and having to watch your favorite star on a screen from the back of a stadium. Well, when was the last time the Heartbreakers didn't do a large arena tour? Petty's not dead yet, but he's starting to show his age.