Nobody cares Tom, no need to apologize Tom Petty says he regrets displaying Confederate flag on tour in 1980s BY Philip Caulfield NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Wednesday, July 15, 2015, 11:49 AM Matt Smith/AP Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers at the PPL Center in Allentown, Pa., in September. Tom Petty has called his one-time embrace of the Confederate flag "downright stupid." In an essay for Rolling Stone Tuesday, Petty apologized for displaying the rebel flag while on tour for his 1985 album "Southern Accents," saying, "I wish I had given it more thought." "It happened because I had one song on the album called 'Rebels.' It's spoken from the point of view of the character, who … still blames the North for the discomfort of his life, so my thought was the best way to illustrate this character was to use the Confederate flag." "I used it onstage during that song, and I regretted it pretty quickly," the rocker wrote. Petty, 64, said he was forced to confront the decision to flaunt the flag about two years later when fans started showing up to concerts with Stars and Bars bandanas and T-shirts. "One night, someone threw one onstage. I stopped everything and gave a speech about it," Petty said. "I said, 'Look, this was to illustrate a character. This is not who we are. Having gone through this, I would prefer it if no one would ever bring a Confederate flag to our shows again because this isn't who we are." youtube Writing in Rolling Stone, Petty said he regretted displaying the Confederate flag while touring for his "Southern Accents" album in the 1980s. Above, Petty in an interview about the album around the time of its release. After that incident, Petty wrote, "I never saw one again after that speech in that one town." Petty, who grew up in Gainesville, Fla., is among a handful of musicians who have spoken out against the flag in the wake of South Carolina's decision to remove it from its statehouse in Columbia. Drive-By Truckers singer Patterson Hood, who grew up in Florence, Ala., wrote in The New York Times Magazine that the flag "stands for the very things we as Southerners have worked so hard to move beyond." However, rapper-turned-country singer Kid Rock has continued to embrace the flag, saying those calling for its removal could "kiss [his] ass." The Detroit-born singer's stance didn't make sense to Petty. "Isn't Kid Rock from the Midwest?" Petty asked Rolling Stone. "I think they were on the other side of the Civil War."
Never understood the Kid rock thing. He was a white rapper who isn't even from the south...and now he's a country singer? To each his own, I guess. Maybe I'll start flying the Japanese flag around my house because I like their food.
Tom Petty is a good guy. A real rock star and a real Southerner and a real California Granola too now. It's all good. Just don't go on THSS. It's all good. I don't care if uses it or doesn't or feels bad about it. Best concert you can go see and hang out before and after, hands down. I thought he had an album with the rebel flag on the cover, I thought it was Southern Accents.
Sounds a lot to me like "LGBT advocate" Howard Stern writing a couple of books about how all homosexuals are emotionally impaired narcissists with daddy issues who are incapable of growing up. They all seem to have this amazing penchant for being able to "believe" whatever it is that they need to believe, at any given moment, particularly when it allows them to sell the most books or records and/or sign the richest contracts. Convenient that.
