Tom Petty

Tom Petty casually rolled back the sliding glass door at his rustic beach house in Malibu and stepped out onto the deck for a clear look at the waves crashing on the sand a dozen yards away. Surveying the picture-perfect blue sky and sparkling water to match, the 59-year-old rocker took in the view surrounding him and couldn't help noticing two young women sunbathing topless in front of the house next to his. The record business may be in disarray, but on days like this, it's still good to be a rock star — a job Petty has fulfilled admirably for more than 30 years now. A couple of decades earlier things might have transpired differently, but on this day, Petty simply cracked a wry smile at the scene next door and stepped back inside.

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers will play a rare small-theater show later this month to benefit a local public radio station so marginal its ratings should be characterized not as off the chart, but in search of one. U2 has donated a customized green Gretsch Falcon electric guitar, signed by all four band members, that could fetch $150,000 or more during the station's fall pledge drive. Mick Jagger, Coldplay, Sheryl Crow and other power players also are pitching in. So what's suddenly so compelling about KCSN-FM (88.5)

Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers "The Live Anthology" Reprise It's invigorating to see musical veterans make the most of new opportunities. Earlier this year Neil Young issued the "Archives, Vol. I," a massive box set that utilized Blu-ray technology to give fans comprehensive access to 10 discs' worth of Young's early material. Tom Petty, another classic rocker, has assembled an impressive collection of his live work with his band the Heartbreakers that's similar in spirit to Young's remarkable anthology if not quite as expansive.

It's extremely difficult to identify any "school" of Baldessari. But it's easy to find grateful students. Here, five of them share campus and off-campus memories. Jim Welling, B.F.A. CalArts, 1972, and M.F.A. CalArts, 1974: John was on leave when I arrived at CalArts, but I took his post-studio class as soon as I could. The main thing I remember about the class is that John would have this old, funky suitcase spray-painted black, full of art catalogs from Europe. He would spread them out so we could look at them.

It's not often a rock star opens up his bedroom closet to the world. Tom Petty did and the results are on display at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland, which is showcasing Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers in an exhibit that opened Friday.

The Eagles come home to roost next month for concerts at Staples Center and the Arrowhead Pond, and Ticketmaster's prices are $25 to $175. For U2 at Staples Center in November, tickets are going for $51 to $171. When Paul McCartney returns to the Southland the same month, the asking price ranges from $49.50 to $250. And when the Stones arrive in November, seats for performances at the Hollywood Bowl and Anaheim Stadium are running from $60 to $454.50.

Nothing feeds a performer's already inflated ego more than his latest rock video. So it's a testimony to how secure Tom Petty feels about his niche in pop stardom that of all the characters he plays in his new video, the one he seems to relish the most is . . . a lowly roadie.

Most Southern rock just sounds like heavy metal with a Dixie accent. The musical strains may be different, but both styles revolve around themes that celebrate the "live fast, love hard and die young" mentality. One difference is most heavy-metal fans outgrow the nonsense once they pass their teens, while many Southern rock fans remain good ol' boys forever. That's what gives Tom Petty's new "Southern Accents" its character.

Is it Tom Petty or isn't it? That's what pop fans have been wondering about a new B.F. Goodrich Co. tire commercial that aired briefly before it was ordered off the air by a federal judge Wednesday. The 30-second TV ad features a vocalist who sounds remarkably like Petty, singing "Baby Has Got Something New," a jingle celebrating one of the firm's new tire brands. Petty's management got a U.S.

TOM PETTY got plenty of mileage out of the Mad Hatter persona in the 1980s, but on a recent afternoon he staggered to answer his mansion door looking like a surlier version of the Scarecrow from Oz's cornfields. In denim and tattered flannel, and with a gimpy knee buckling beneath him, the 55-year-old rock star sized up the visitors on his porch, shrugged and handed off a lit cigarette to his wife. "OK, so where are we doing this photo?"

Tribune Interactive is partnering with TomPetty.com, the website for rock musician Tom Petty and his band, the Heartbreakers, to launch an online hub as part of the band's 40-city "Mojo" tour. That site, which launches Monday, offers music, merchandise and concert tickets. It can be reached through the main navigation bar of any of Tribune's newspaper or TV station websites, including the Los Angeles Times (www.latimes.com) and KTLA-TV Channel 5 (www.ktla.com).

Tom Petty casually rolled back the sliding glass door at his rustic beach house in Malibu and stepped out onto the deck for a clear look at the waves crashing on the sand a dozen yards away. Surveying the picture-perfect blue sky and sparkling water to match, the 59-year-old rocker took in the view surrounding him and couldn't help noticing two young women sunbathing topless in front of the house next to his. The record business may be in disarray, but on days like this, it's still good to be a rock star — a job Petty has fulfilled admirably for more than 30 years now. A couple of decades earlier things might have transpired differently, but on this day, Petty simply cracked a wry smile at the scene next door and stepped back inside.

SERIES America's Most Wanted: America Fights Back: The series hosted by John Walsh travels to Chicago for a look at crime in the Windy City (9 p.m. Fox). Saturday Night Live: "30 Rock's" Alec Baldwin hosts and Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers perform on the sketch series' season finale (11:29 p.m. NBC). SPECIALS Sandra Bullock: Heartbreak to Happiness: This special charts the highs and lows in the personal and professional lives of the Academy Award-winning actress (10:30 p.m. Style)

A list of upcoming shows across the Southland, with on-sale dates in parentheses. Staples Center: Lady Gaga, Aug. 11 (Sat.) Hollywood Bowl: Kings of Leon, July 12 (Sat.); Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, May 22 (Mon.) Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre: Country Throwdown Tour with Montgomery Gentry, June 19 (Fri.); Kings of Leon, July 14 (Sat.); Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, June 3 (Mon.) San Manuel Amphitheatre: Iron Maiden, June 19 (Sat.) Greek Theatre: Thirty Seconds to Mars, May 15 (Sat.

Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers "The Live Anthology" Reprise It's invigorating to see musical veterans make the most of new opportunities. Earlier this year Neil Young issued the "Archives, Vol. I," a massive box set that utilized Blu-ray technology to give fans comprehensive access to 10 discs' worth of Young's early material. Tom Petty, another classic rocker, has assembled an impressive collection of his live work with his band the Heartbreakers that's similar in spirit to Young's remarkable anthology if not quite as expansive.

Tom Petty is no newcomer to the Hollywood Bowl. He's a frequent visitor, seeming to find both comfort and inspiration in its vast open-air setting, a space well-suited to his epic tales of young antiheroes and world-weary survivors.

With their indictments of mediocrity in general and the music biz in particular, the most in-your-face songs on Tom Petty's new album have suddenly turned the veteran rock musician into a sort of pop-culture vigilante, a longhaired Dirty Harry just begging a trembling record company weasel to make his day. During his concert at the Grand Olympic Auditorium on Tuesday, Petty addressed this portrayal, which has been slapped on him since the release last week of "The Last DJ."

Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers showed on Wednesday at the sold-out San Diego Sports Arena that they can still make your heart race when they slip into such uplifting '70s and '80s anthems as "Refugee" and "American Girl." Too often, however, the songs from Petty's last three albums are rather slim and anonymous character studies that lack the urgency and insight of the early classics. So why is he selling more records and concert tickets than ever?

THE misadventure began, as so many do, in a dingy Florida strip club. This one was called Dub's, and it was cinder-block roadhouse in Gainesville where, in the early 1970s, a dancer named Bubbles shimmied for students, townies and truck drivers while a band with the unfortunate name of Mudcrutch played muscular music that melded old-man country with new-kid rock. It was a Southern solution to the British Invasion. Mudcrutch was better than good too.

Two new rock 'n' roll documentaries come to television this week. Tonight, Sundance Channel screens Peter Bogdanovich's four-hour jog through the 30-year career of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, "Runnin' Down a Dream." ("Four-hour documentary on Tom Petty" will tell you right away where you stand on this thing.