The last time singer-songwriter Grace Potter was supposed to play San Diego (March 2020), live music was shut down by the pandemic and her show was cancelled.
Even so, she came to Del Mar anyway, with her husband/producer Eric Valentine and young son, and they camped in their car alongside the beach for a week. The very same car she drove cross-country (four times!) to craft her latest, and fifth solo album, Mother Road.
“Del Mar is one of my favorite places,” says Potter, who performs at The Sound on March 16. “I’m taken with the area, its culture and people,” she adds, sharing that she often spent Christmases with relatives living here.
Potter, who received two Grammy nominations for her last album, 2019’s Daylight, is excited to share new songs from Mother Road, at times a raw memoir that addresses emotional themes such as regret, depression, grief, and loss. For example, on the cathartic title track, which Potter says is a road map for what is to follow, she sings: And I don’t really know if the day will ever come/When I’ll find that peace within/But as I roll down this rugged highway/I’m closer than I’ve ever been.
The Vermont-born musician, who now lives in LA’s Topanga Canyon, started her journey on “the mother of all roads” — a reference to Route 66 from John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath — in summer 2021. Following the historic highway across the country, Potter imagined her songs like a mirage on the horizon, and then flew to Nashville for recording sessions with Valentine and her crackerjack band, which includes renowned keyboardist Benmont Tench (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers), guitarist Nick Bockrath (Cage the Elephant), bassist Tim Deaux (Kings of Leon), pedal-steel guitarist Dan Kalisher (Fitz And The Tantrums), and longtime drummer Matt Musty.
Fueled by Potter’s trademark raspy vocals, Mother Road has the swagger of Mick Jagger (“Ready Set Go”) and urgency of Sheryl Crow (the plucky “Good Time”). An intoxicating elixir of roadhouse rock, honky tonk country, and barroom blues, the album transports you to soundscapes as evocative as the dust bowl towns Potter drove through, from ethereal (“All My Ghosts,” which is infused with haunting pedal steel guitar, organ and tympani) to cinematic (“Lady Vagabond” immediately conjures up Ennio Morricone’s score to the 1966 spaghetti western The Good, the Bad and the Ugly).
But Potter says the album’s sound is less intentional and more inspirational. “I think about what I like, and I interpret it,” she states. “Chasing a sound doesn’t lead to something original.”
In addition to her own headlining tour, Potter will be performing with many illustrious friends for all-star gigs in the coming months. In May and June, she’ll join Chris Stapleton for some dates on his All-American Road Show, including two nights at Hollywood Bowl.
Even sooner, on April 18, she’ll be sharing the stage with Jackson Browne, Norah Jones, Taj Mahal, and others for Mavis Staples’ 85th birthday celebration. Potter, who also participated in the legendary gospel and R&B singer’s 75th and 80th birthday bashes, refers to Staples as “the godmother of music” and a massive inspiration. “One of my first vinyls was (The Staple Singers’ 1959 song) ‘On My Way to Heaven.’ When I heard that, I said, ‘Where is this church in Vermont? This is what my soul needs!’”
But Potter’s focus this year — and for the foreseeable future — is Mother Road, and what it represents. “It’s my whole life now, and where things are going. It’s who I have accepted myself to be — the good, the bad, and the ugly to use your reference,” she chuckles. “It’s the most pure and defining version of me.”
Tickets for Potter’s show at The Sound can be purchased here. Baltimore country singer and X sensation Brittney Spencer opens the show at 8 p.m.
Donovan Roche, a San Diego-based writer/editor, has covered the music, entertainment and arts scene for more than 30 years. Send your story ideas to droche17@cox.net.