Why Rockstar Chose Tom Petty's "Love Is a Long Road"
Rockstar does not pick trailer songs casually. Every needle drop in their major reveals tells you something about what the game is actually about. Tom Petty's "Love Is a Long Road" is no exception.
The song
"Love Is a Long Road" is from Tom Petty's 1989 album Full Moon Fever. It's an upbeat-sounding track with bitter lyrics — Petty's specialty. The song never charted as a single but is a deep-cut favorite among Petty's fanbase.
Petty himself was born in Gainesville, Florida. That's a deliberate choice for a game set in a fictionalized Florida.
The lyrics, decoded
The chorus repeats:
"Love is a long road / It's a long, long road, baby."
Verses describe a couple holding on through hardship, with lines about leaving home, broken promises, and pushing through together. Read in the context of Trailer 1 — Lucia in prison, Jason waiting outside, the two robbing convenience stores together — the connection is obvious. This is a relationship story before it's a crime story.
Compare to Rockstar's previous trailer-music choices:
- Stevie Wonder, "Skeletons" (RDR2 trailer 2) — paranoia, secrets, things buried.
- Phil Collins, "In the Air Tonight" (GTA V trailer 2) — tension, betrayal, reckoning.
- Sleepwalking by Chain Gang of 1974 (GTA V trailer 3) — going through the motions, waking up.
Each was thematically linked to the game's actual narrative tone. Tom Petty signals: this is a love story that goes wrong.
Will it be in the game?
Probably not. Rockstar has a long history of using needle-drop songs in trailers that don't appear on the in-game soundtrack. Reasons include:
- Licensing. Trailer rights and in-game rights are negotiated separately. Trailer use is often cheaper for a one-time placement.
- Soundtrack tone. GTA radio stations are curated by genre and era. A 1989 rock cut doesn't fit cleanly into a 2025-era radio system, though it could appear on a "classic rock" or oldies station.
- Surprise. Rockstar often saves song reveals for the in-game radio drop, where it has more cultural weight.
That said: V did include "Sleepwalking" in-game. RDR2 did not include "Skeletons." It varies. There's a real chance "Love Is a Long Road" appears on a Vice City rock station.
Streaming numbers
Within 24 hours of Trailer 1's release, "Love Is a Long Road" jumped from Full Moon Fever's deep cuts to one of the most-streamed Tom Petty tracks on Spotify. The song's daily play count reportedly increased over 70-fold in the days following the trailer drop, according to public Spotify charts and Billboard reporting. This is the cultural reach of GTA: Rockstar can resurrect a 1989 album track and put it back in the public conversation overnight.
What to listen for in Trailer 2
Rockstar's pattern is to escalate emotionally with each trailer's music. If Trailer 1 was bittersweet hope, Trailer 2 will likely be either heartbreak or defiance. Watch for a track that's either contemporary R&B/pop (matching Lucia's likely demographic) or something darker from the 1970s rock catalog.
Sources: Rockstar Games official Trailer 1 (December 2023), Tom Petty discography (Full Moon Fever, 1989), public Spotify and Billboard reporting on streaming spike.