Tom Petty Will Release New Album This Summer

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers have almost completed work on a new album. Although there is no set release date, the band plan to have the 11-track ‘Hypnotic Eye’ out at some point this summer.

After the bluesy sprawl of 2010′s ‘Mojo,’ the new album finds Petty returning to their roots in ’60s garage rock. “I knew I wanted to do a rock n’ roll record,” Petty told Rolling Stone. “We hadn’t made a straight hard-rockin’ record, from beginning to end, in a long time.

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This was a conscious decision. Sessions for ‘Hypnotic Eye’ began in August 2011, and a few of the new songs were rejected because they sounded too similary to the ‘Mojo’ material. Rolling Stone describes the tracks as having either “power-treble and clipped-fuzz guitars, “swamp-snake organ lines” or a “bar-band charge.” As with ‘Mojo’ and 2009′s ‘The Live Anthology’ box set, ‘Hypnotic eye will be produced by Petty, his longtime collaborator Mike Campbell and Ryan Ulyate.

“I always say this, but I’m tremendously excited for this one,” Petty said last summer. “It’s morphed into songs we would’ve written around ‘Wildflowers’ or ‘Damn the Torpedoes,’ but much more distorted.”

Petty also confirmed that plans are underway to give his 1994 solo album ‘Wildflowers’ the Deluxe Edition treatment. They will add ten songs to the record, which he hopes will be available by Christmas. A live album culled from last year’s rarity-heavy summer tour is also reportedly in the works.