Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers' Legendary Fillmore Residency Receives The Documentary Treatment

The 'waiting' will be 'the hardest part' once again!

Since Tom Petty's 2017 passing, there has been a steady stream of documentaries released, covering different eras of the "Time To Move On" singer's illustrious career. Fans will soon get to witness a brand-new documentary examining Petty and his Heartbreakers' legendary residency at the Fillmore in 1997.

The band's famous residency was officially released for the first time in November and will be given the documentary treatment, courtesy of Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers guitarist, Mike Campbell. The Heartbreakers' Benmont Tench, Steve Ferrone and Scott Thurston are featured in the documentary's minute-long teaser trailer!

Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers didn't have to play the Fillmore.

As Petty told Mojo Magazine in the late nineties, "We had no reason to do it, other than we wanted to do it." (via Spin)

The Heartbreakers had been together for two decades at that point and had several radio hits under their belt. 'TPATH' is responsible for some of the most popular rock and roll songs of the last century, including "American Girl" and "Refugee."

The idea of playing the Fillmore was an idea that was close to the band's hearts. Petty and Campbell were both fond of the idea.

"San Francisco always had a special place in our hearts," Campbell once said, "because when our first record came out, it pretty well got ignored except for San Francisco. I think KSAN and Boston played a little bit of it, but San Franciso was one of the first places that ever acknowledged we existed."

Petty and The Heartbreakers put their all into playing the Fillmore gigs. The shows took place over a month in the winter months of 1997, and the band gave audiences a massive taste of their talent. As Spin Magazine revealed, some nights "stretched all the way to the four-hour mark, with the entire encore consuming 90 breathtaking minutes. It was an anything goes environment where you had to stay on high alert."

The Heartbreakers' Fillmore residency finally got its due via a four-hour long box set in November of 2022. Fillmore audiences not only got the best of Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers, but the band also played a number of cover songs instrumental to their collective musical upbringing. TPATH covers songs by Little Richard, The Rolling Stones, and Bob Dylan.

The box set for TPATH's Fillmore residency contains 72 tracks total; the visual representation will be a bit shorter! (per Spotify)

The film will only clock in at 11 minutes, but Paste Magazine promises that the surviving members of The Heartbreakers will provide a lot of insight into the Fillmore experience!

In the trailer, Tench reflects on the importance of playing the Fillmore: "The Fillmore, to me, it's an event, it's a place in time." Ferrone adds, "It's one of those venues that's had so much, so much music inside of it." Thurston rounds out the band's excitement; "You get a little tingly about it!"

The outlet, along with Tom Petty and The Heartbrakers' official Instagram, revealed a minute-long trailer for the documentary on Thursday; no official release date has been revealed as of yet.

Petty passed away two decades after the band's Fillmore residency, in October of 2017. The 66-year-old passed away of an accidental drug overdose.