Stevie: Well, this is gonna be a fun take.
Tom [Petty]: Which is the first song?
S: This is a song that I wrote after the second screening of ‘Beauty and the Beast’ of which I am gonna buy a copy of if it costs me a thousand dollars because it is SO fabulous.
T: Did you see the one with George C. Scott?
S: No, I saw the one with… who was it? We don’t even know, it’s French! It’s all French; subtitles. It’s incredible, it couldn’t possibly, be, I mean, there’s this thing in it that is so real that it’s kinda scary. But the story of the Beauty and the Beast is so incredible, cause he’s so ugly and he’s so good and he’s so kind and he has her to pay back a debt from his father but when she goes back to all her gay and fun friends, you know. And she keeps this mirror and she’ll look in the mirror and she’ll see his face and he’s just like, “I’ll grieve if you don’t come back, I’ll die.” You, just, in your own life you think, ‘Boy, you can have all the riches and this and that in the world,’ but if you don’t have the look of that in someone else’s eyes, forget it! It’s NOT happening! And she rushes home to get him and she’s going, “Ma bête, ma bête! Where are you?” You know, she’s searchin’ and searchin’ and he’s laying on the ground and he’s dyin’. And he said a beast can only die. A man could fight but the poor beast can only die. It killed me; anyway, I’ll get it up here again and when I do I’ll call you. [Sticks something in her mouth so the rest of the speech is a little hard to understand.]
T: Mmhmm
S: So I saw it once, I was knocked out with the photography. The candleholders that were real hands that would point, oh it was SO weird. The fire place with the two heads on each side, where the guys like were real and they were going [pause], oh it’s incredible, isn’t it Tom?
T: Yeah, it was pretty good.
S: It’s SO strange, the only part we didn’t like, the end, we thought fell apart a little bit.
T: Yeah
S: But the all of it up until the last three minutes was just INCREDIBLE. I mean, the fairy tale of all fairy tales. I didn’t even remember the story so I was totally blissed out because I was expecting this dumb and unpleasant show. So this is the story and in this song, both people are switching back and forth to the roles of beauty and the beast, because in true life, you know, if you’re going with someone. Whether if you’re the man of the woman, you are the beauty and you are the beast sometimes because you just are and when you see the movie you’ll know what I mean.
S:[starts playing and singing] You're [stops] I know I do that, sorry. This is SO complicated, it doesn't seem it, but it is.
[plays] [sings] [Tom plays in the background]
S: Oh, this is hard, I can't see it. [sings and plays] This is a really hard song to play. I mean to get though it one time would be...
T: [mumbles] Yeah.
S: [starts to shuffle some papers]
T: Hard chords?
S: Umm, well...
[both mumble]
S: Whoops, dripping wax, huh? [shuffles papers some more]
T: [fiddles with guitar]
S: I'm ingenious, sometimes, I even, surprise myself.
T: [laughs] I can't believe you didn't know.
S: Taping the words to the candle, making history here. You know what, if I had my glasses, if I had my glasses,
T: Where are they?
S: Upstairs [Tom laughs], I could see. Let's try it this way. [shuffles and starts to play] Do you want me to just play chords for a minute? Play the verse all the way through without singing?
T: Ah, no, you can go ahead and sing.
S: 'K, I'm gonna do it a little slower [plays]
T: I just need to hear it a bunch of times [plays]
S: [sings] You're... No, wrong chord [starts again] [fiddles with notes and words] Alright, second verse. This is the chorus [sings] wait a minute, I'd rather start it lower [restarts] and the middle part will go "C", "A", or whatever that is.
T: [plays and repeats some lyrics]
S: [sings] Kinda understand it a little? Do you think it's good to do the solo in that and go out on it or come back to something else like it, I mean, do you hear a little orchestration? I mean there's some heavy...
T: No, it's nice
S: It says, 'My darling lives in a world that is not mine' It's hard for me to read and play cause it's so dark, 'An old child, misunderstood but out of time. Timeless is the creature who is wise but timeless is the prisoner in disguise.
T: Beautiful.
