By Jim Rowland
Formerly of the band Grace Potter And The Nocturnals, American singer-songwriter Grace Potter (no relation to Harry) has collaborated with members of The Flaming Lips and Queens Of The Stone Age over the years. She runs the Grand Point North Festival in Burlington, and has done acting roles and sound track work (she was the voice of Carol in Disney’s ‘Prep & Landing: Naughty vs Nice’) and had a song featured in the Disney film ‘Tangled’. ‘Mother Road’ is her fifth solo album.
Produced by Eric Valentine (Queens of the Stone Age, Nickel Creek) and recorded at RCA’s famed Studio A in Nashville and Topangadise in Topanga CA, ‘Mother Road’ follows Potter’s 2019 acclaimed, double GRAMMY-nominated album, ‘Daylight’. The album was composed over a two-year span driving back and forth alone across America during the pandemic, on Route 66, otherwise known as ‘Mother Road’, hence the album’s title. And indeed the album has a definite Americana-soundtracked road trip, road movie vibe to it, with some self-reflective lyrics.
Sounding polished and accomplished whilst still managing to retain a raw edge, the album’s ten tracks boast a variety of different flavours all wrapped up within the Americana/country/rock bracket.
The title track opens the album with a soulful, uplifting slice of powerful country rock with a bit of a Stones vibe to it, the grooving ‘Good Times’ following similar lines and a hint of the Black Crowes, and the soulful rocking of ‘Ready Set Go’ shows off Potter’s abundant vocal talents with a few Joplin-esque screams. The album has a good shot of the blues in there too thanks to the gritty, atmospheric blues-rock of ‘All My Ghosts’ and the up-tempo raw and raunchy country blues of ‘Futureland’, whilst ‘Little Hitchhiker’ takes the foot off the gas for a delightful acoustic country ballad, and ‘Rose Colored Rearview’ injects some funk into the mix.
The big screen vibe is exemplified by the big and bold ‘Lady Vagabond’, a real highlight of the album, which has a western soundtrack vibe to it, with the album’s closer ‘Masterpiece’ having a more quirky and old fashioned theatrical flavour to it.
Slick, yet gritty and raw, ‘Mother Road’ is a very impressive album indeed, and highly recommended for those that like their rock with a large twist of Americana.
- ‘Mother Road’ is out now.
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