On Nov. 2, 1982, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers’ Long After Dark was released, and it featured a major change in the band’s lineup.
The Gainesville, Florida-based band, formed in 1976, had featured Petty, guitarist Mike Campbell, keyboardist Benmont Tench, drummer Stan Lynch and bassist Ron Blair from the start. But Long After Dark became the first of the Heartbreakers’ albums to feature Howie Epstein on bass. It also marked Blair’s final song with the band—for a couple of decades, that is.
The final song was “Between Two Worlds.” Written by Petty and Campbell, the track was one of the only “sure” things in place during recording sessions for Long After Dark.
“It was the only tune at the time we were sure was on the album because there were so many songs up in the air,” Petty once said.
“Between Two Worlds” has a sound that Campbell once described as “jammy Stonesy.”
“It’s a sneaky kind of sexy groove that one,” Campbell told Life of The Record. “The words are really good on that one. Yeah, ‘A woman’s body is only flesh and bone, how come I can’t let go, I’m between two worlds,’ you know, that was kind of where we were at the time, I guess, you know, it says a lot.“
The song about being unable to let go came just as Blair was about to leave the band.
“Long After Dark, I remember that Ron Blair did his last track with us, ‘Between Two Worlds,’ which was one of my favorite things we ever did,” Tench recalled to Ultimate Classic Rock. “Howie Epstein [joined the Heartbreakers], so I remember having Howie there. I loved Howie from the first second….I loved Ron too.”
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Blair’s decision to leave the Heartbreakers came amid a “grueling” period following the massive success of the albums Damn the Torpedoes and Hard Promises.
“There were three hellish years where we couldn’t get a f—ing break, and about 200 awful-sounding gigs in a row,” he told Rolling Stone in an interview. “It was rough. There was something riding on every gig. There would be some small-town radio-station programmer there, and after the gig, you’d meet some record-company guy who supposedly controlled the money. Then, six months later, you’d meet someone else that really controlled the money. Everything was just life or death, and it took its toll on me.
“It was sort of mutual,” he added of the decision for him to leave the band. “A conversation took place one day, and it was pleasant. It was, ‘We’re going to part ways.’ I felt pretty relieved.”
While he had “zero” regrets about leaving the Heartbreakers at that time, Blair returned 20 years later as a replacement for his replacement, one year before Epstein’s death at 47.
Blair reunited with the Heartbreakers for their 2002 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame performance, and then stayed on, forever known as the legendary band’s first and third bassist.
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