Much has changed for Grace Potter since she and her band the Nocturnals signed with Hollywood Records after the 2007 sophomore release “This is Somewhere” had critics comparing her with everyone from Janis Joplin to Lucinda Williams.
If you go
Grace Potter and the Nocturnals with Elmwood and Justin Jones
When: 8 p.m. doors Saturday
Where: 9:30 Club, 815 V St. NW
Info: $20; 800-955-5566; 930.com
But one thing Potter has never changed is her belief in her sound and her band that has just deepened with each album including this soon-to-be-released self-titled album. “This record is the first time it’s really been us — the first time we’ve all found each other and ourselves,” Potter said. “Everybody was totally comfortable, everything was totally comfortable, everything we had was sitting right in front of us, and it just poured out of us.”
That’s saying something considering the Vermont-born band is now a five-piece with Nocturnal veterans Scott Tournet on lead guitar and Matt Burr on drums joined by bassist Catherine (Cat) Popper from Ryan Adams & the Cardinals and rhythm guitarist Benny Yurco of the GPN side project Blues & Lasers.
Much was made about what many perceived as a shift in producers for the album. Potter said there was no doubt that Mark Batson, who has produced albums for Dr. Dre, Jay-Z and the Dave Matthews Band, would be the producer for this June 8 release. The confusion, she said, came about because she had worked with T-Bone Burnett on some songs for a different project.
“I had been writing with Mark all along during the T-Bone project. I liked the idea of writing with someone who was not from my own world,” she said. “Very quickly, we developed this symbiotic thing. … We knew he’d be the producer.”
Of the 13 songs on the new album, six were co-written by Batson and Potter. What was interesting, said Potter, was that about the same time the band realized it wouldn’t fit in one format. Bringing Batson into the mix was the best way to naturally introduce a beat into the band’s songs.
“They all have that beat to them, a physicality and a mood,” she said. “You have to either want to dance to it or cry to it. But there’s also a feistiness to these songs that’s completely unapologetic.”
