A few weeks ago I received an email from a guy who is in the management team for Grace Potter and the Nocturnals. Grace Potter is a Vermont-based blues-rock singer who is getting some national exposure of late and I guess the email to me was part of an effort to get some netroots buzz going. He offered to send me a disk and I said I'd write about it if he did. The disk arrived yesterday.
I listened to the album all the way through, which is saying something as I have a low tolerance for music while I'm at the computer -- particularly music with lyrics. She has definitely got some chops. She fairly well nails that Bonnie Raitt blues/gospel/rock thing, though my first impression is that she doesn't take it anywhere we haven't been before. That's not a deal-breaking criticism, it just means that Potter, like most of the other professional musicians that have ever lived, has not yet transcended her genre. She's only 22 -- give her a few years.
I warned the guy (sorry I'm not calling him by his name -- the email is on another machine) that I'm not a music blogger and that I wouldn't necessarily write a glowing review, but I admit the disk was very good, given its genre. I expect Potter's star will continue to rise and with any luck, I'll get to see her perform at SXSW in March (if the timing is right). Her live show is apparently what really sells the act, not unlike a certain other Vermont band.