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Cover of You’re Gonna Get It! by Tom Petty — Cover: You’re Gonna Get It!

Song · Tom Petty

“I Need to Know” by Tom Petty

From the album You’re Gonna Get It! (1978)

“I Need to Know” by Tom Petty appears on 18 radio countdowns from 8 stations between 1978 and 2026. It was first released in 1978 on the album You’re Gonna Get It!. Its best result is #9 on the KISW Top 25 Rock Songs from 1978. In the combined RockLists rankings it is #4,447 indie & aaa song of all time.

18countdowns

8stations

#9best position

0#1 finishes

1top 10 finishes

1978–2026years charted

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Video from YouTube (Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers - Topic). Pressing play loads YouTube's player. Watch on YouTube

"I Need to Know" kicked the door open for You're Gonna Get It!, the second album from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers: it went out in 1978 as the record's first single and peaked at 41 on the Billboard Hot 100. Petty wrote it alone and produced it with Denny Cordell and Noah Shark, who engineered alongside Max Reese, and Ron Blair's bass keeps the whole thing lunging forward.

It was no stranger to anybody who'd caught the band live. A June 1977 appearance on Germany's Rockpalast shows them already tearing into it, along with "Listen to Her Heart", the single that came next. The trade papers got the point right away: Cash Box heard hard-driving rock 'n' roll with a hook that circles back until it hypnotizes, and Record World called it an energetic rocker.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.

RockLists rankings

Indie & Adult Alternative

#4,447 of all time

Classic Rock

#842 of all time

Hard Rock & Metal

All Rock Formats

Year-end countdowns

Year	#	Station	Countdown	of
1978	9	KISW Seattle-Tacoma, WA	KISW Top 25 Rock Songs from 1978	25

All-time and decade countdowns

Year	#	Station	Countdown	of
1996	540	KISW	KISW Top 1000 of All Time (1996)	1000
1998	536	KISW	KISW Top 1000 of All Time (1998)	1000
1999	611	KISW	KISW Top 1000 of All Time (1999)	998
2001	810	WFPK	WFPK 2001 Greatest Songs of All Time	2000
2011	392	100.7 WZLX	100.7 WZLX Top 1100 Countdown (2011)	1100
2011	338	97.9 The Loop	The Loop Rock N Roll 500 (2011)	500
2012	376	Big 100	BIG 500 Memorial Day Countdown (2012)	500
2012	395	100.7 WZLX	100.7 WZLX Top 1200 Countdown (2012)	1200
2013	180	100.7 WZLX	100.7 WZLX Grand Jam 1000 (2013)	1000
2013	296	100.7 WZLX	100.7 WZLX Firecracker 500 (2013)	500
2014	27	100.7 WZLX	100.7 WZLX Firecracker 400 (2014)	400
2015	179	100.7 WZLX	100.7 WZLX Top 1007 Classic Rock Countdown (2015)	1007
2015	119	100.7 WZLX	100.7 WZLX Firecracker 500 (2015)	499
2016	334	100.7 WZLX	100.7 WZLX Top 1007 Countdown for 2016	1007
2021	229	WCSX	WCSX Rock & Roll 500 (2021)	499
2023	150	97.1 The Drive	97.1 The Drive Memorial Day Weekend Rock N Roll 500 (2023)	500
2026	147	KSHE 95	KSHE 95 U-Man 500 (2026)	499

Also listed as: I Need To Know.

Charting alongside it in 1978

Best songs of 1978 →

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