Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers are a big hit at inaugural Arroyo Seco festival

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers celebrated their 40th anniversary by closing out the first day of the inaugural Arroyo Seco festival in Pasadena, California on Saturday night (24Jun17).
The veteran rockers performed a two-hour hits show in the shadow of the fabled Rose Bowl, kicking off with the first song on their first album, Rockin’ Around (With You), and thrilled fans with one or two old classics they haven’t played for years.
Petty introduced 1991’s Into the Great White Open by stating, “We’re going to try one here that we haven’t played in about 30 years. By that I mean we haven’t rehearsed it, either.”
The band leader likened the group’s set to one big hits record, with the needle dropping randomly on a fan favourite, as he and his longtime bandmates Mike Campbell, Benmont Tench, and Ron Blair, ripped though hits like I Won’t Back Down, You Got Lucky, Learning to Fly, Refugee, and Free Fallin’ before returning to the stage for an encore of You Wreck Me and American Girl.
Other highlights of promoters’ Goldenvoice’s new festival at the Brookside Country Club included Dawes, Alabama Shakes, the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, who marched around the site as part of their set, and 77-year-old soul legend William Bell, who stunned the event’s Willow stage with hits like Private Number and Everybody Loves a Winner and new songs from his 2017 Grammy-winning album This is Where I Live.
Actor Jeff Goldblum also hit the high notes with the crowd, playing a six degrees of separation game with fans as part of his set with the Mildred Snitzer Orchestra – the Jurassic Park star asked festivalgoers to shout out names of movie stars and he used films and his co-stars to link him to them.
The cult drinking game began with fans of Kevin Bacon linking him to other film stars via movies and his castmates.
Meanwhile, the highlights of Arroyo Seco’s Sunday include Weezer, The Shins, Andy Grammer, and headliners Mumford & Sons.