There’s something completely refreshing and honest about Highway Companion. While the opening “Saving Grace” gets Petty’s solo album – his first without the Heartbreakers in quite some time, and only one of very few not to feature his band – off to a rollicking start, there’s an introspective nature at play here.

Why is that Tom Petty isn’t feted with the same regard as Neil Young, Bob Dylan or Bruce Springsteen? Tight and muscular, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers eschewed the excesses of 1970s arena rock for a leaner, meaner style, more rootsy and real, even when they added touches of psychedelia or new wave to their sound as time dragged on.

Highway Companion doesn’t bother with any pretence, and follows on from 1994’s Wildflowers by being a ‘solo’ record, looking inwards for inspiration rather than rocking out loud and proud. Even so, chugging opener “Saving Grace” has an insistent riff that’s instantly memorable, and that’s perhaps where the title is at its most accurate – this is the sort of album made for driving, fingers tapping on the steering wheel.

But, for all its undoubted hooks, it’s also intimate – there’s a bittersweet undertow to it, as Petty examines his own frailties on the likes of “Flirting With Time”, “Turn This Car Around”, and “Damaged By Love”. Produced by Jeff Lynne, who also helmed Petty’s 1989 solo debut Full Moon Fever, the pop base of that record is given over in favour of a grittier, more organic flavour. This is not an ‘easy’ album, with dark subject matter at its core, but it’s toe-tappingly good.