Refugee And You Got Lucky Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers

Refugee Album: Damn the Torpedoes (1980)
You Got Lucky Album: Long After Dark (1982)
by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

"Refugee" is a song recorded by American rock band Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, was released in January 1980 as the second single from their album Damn the Torpedoes, and peaking at No. 15 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart.

In a November 2003 interview with, Campbell described the recording sessions for "Refugee":

That was a hard record to make. It was a 4-track that I made at my house. He (Tom Petty) wrote over the music as it was, no changes, but it took us forever to actually cut the track. We just had a hard time getting the feel right. We must have recorded that 100 times. I remember being so frustrated with it one day that - I think this is the only time I ever did this - I just left the studio and went out of town for two days. I just couldn't take the pressure anymore, but then I came back and when we regrouped we were actually able to get it down on tape.

Billboard described "Refugee" as being "Petty at his best," specifically praising the "gutsy rock vocal and searing guitar lines." Cash Box said it has "growing interplay between guitar and organ, coupled with Petty’s forceful vocals." Record World called it a "perfect union of power and passion."

Tom Petty said of this song: "This was a reaction to the pressures of the music business. I wound up in a huge row with the record company when ABC Records tried to sell our contract to MCA Records without us knowing about it, despite a clause in our contract that said they didn't have the right to do that. I was so angry with the whole system that I think that had a lot to do with the tone of the Damn the Torpedoes album. I was in this defiant mood. I wasn't so conscious of it then, but I can look back and see what was happening. I find that's true a lot. It takes some time usually before you fully understand what's going on in a song - or maybe what led up to it."

Mike Campbell said: "When we were at the studio mixing it, I remember this one girl who was working in reception, she came in and heard the mix and she said, 'That's a hit, that's a hit,' and we looked at each other and said, 'Maybe it is.' You don't always know. Sometimes you think certain things are surefire and people just don't latch on to them and other things they do. You know when it's good or not, but you don't always know if it's a hit. A hit record a lot of times is more than just the song, it's the timing, the climate you put it out in, what people are listening to and what they're expecting to hear and if it touches a nerve at a certain time."

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers performed Refugee in 1979 on their first Saturday Night Live appearance, where they also played "Don't Do Me Like That."

The band shot a music video for this song because they didn't want to appear on The Merv Griffin Show in person. It did the trick, and the video aired on the show, allowing Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers to promote the song without showing up. This was the only place they thought the video would air, but when MTV launched in 1981, it got lots of play on the network, which craved rock videos from American artists. The band became one of the most popular acts on MTV

During a Twitter Q&A in December 2011, Petty disclosed that Melissa Etheridge doing "Refugee" was the best cover of the song he ever heard. Etheridge's version was recorded for her 2005 compilation album, Greatest Hits: The Road Less Traveled.

"You Got Lucky" is the first single from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' album Long After Dark. The song peaked at #20 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #1 on the Billboard Top Tracks chart, where it stayed for three weeks at the end of 1982. Somewhat unusually for a Petty song, guitars give up the spotlight to allow synths to carry the song's main structure.

Petty felt the video was "a real groundbreaker," and stated that he and the band wrote the treatment themselves, borrowing heavily from the post-apocalyptic look of Mad Max 2, released in 1981.

The video begins with Tom Petty and Mike Campbell happening upon a black tent in front of the Vasquez Rocks after riding in a hovercar (from the television series Logan's Run). They find a radio/cassette player wrapped in bubble wrap and play the tape, which begins the music of "You Got Lucky." The other band members, Howie Epstein, Benmont Tench and Stan Lynch, arrive in a sidecar racing motorcycle.