JULY 6, 2012
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The Nocturnals’ frontwoman talks about finding her own place in music
BY SUE ZALOKAR
watching movies and cartoons as a little kid. My
parents just had videos and so I watched movies.
ast year, a fresh face hit the country music
There was a rule in our house that we couldn’t just
scene when Grace Potter recorded, and later
watch TV, we had to do something. So my sister
performed “You and Tequila” with Kenny
would paint, my brother would dabble in some kind
Chesney at the VH1 Divas Support the Troops of crayon situation and I would sit at the piano and
concert. It was a tipping point for Grace Potter and
play along to the movies. I realized very early on
the Nocturnals, a band that had its own successes,
that I had an ear for catching whatever was
but nothing like the tsunami of interest that
happening in the sonic landscape and recreating it
followed the show - fans crashed the band’s
in my own way.
website in its wake. For a few days last summer,
their self-titled album even nudged out The Beatles
S.Z.: You grew up in rural Vermont on, as I have
as the top selling artists on iTunes.
heard you call it, the Shire. Can you tell me a bit
Viewers who made it through online quickly
about Potterville?
learned that Potter is far from a country singer.
She and her band are mercurial performers, having
G.P.: My parents built it when they were crazy
made a name for themselves with raucous’ lively,
hippies dropping acid in the early '70s and they
were reading “Lord of the Rings.” My dad had this
rock ‘n’roll performances.
Last week, this dynamic frontwoman, multi
vision of building a house that kind of reflected a
lot of the storyline of the book. It’s part Shire, part
instrumentalist, songwriter and producer
celebrated her 30th birthday on stage surrounded
Rivendell. It’s a beautiful place and as it grew, as
the family grew and my parents businesses grew,
by her favorite people, a marching band, and a
they just kept building little buildings. They just
margarita in hand. This spring, the band released
sort of sprouted up like mushrooms. It turned into
its fourth album, “The Lion The Beast The Beat.”
a little bit of a compound. It also was a place that
She took time out from her tour, which includes a
the whole band moved back to and we all slept and
show July 19 at the Oregon Zoo to talk about her
ate and played music together for the first couple
music, sex appeal and the power of a good meal.
of years as we were coming up as a new rock ‘n’roll
Sue Zalokar: How did you and music find one
band.
another?
Grace Potter: I fell in love with music by
S.Z.: Tell me the creation story of the Nocturnals.
S T A F F W R IT E R
L
Inside
G.P.: I didn’t want to go to college, but my
grandmother made me. I took a gap year between
high school and college where I dabbled in music a
little bit and played some gigs. But it reached a
critical mass where my grandma just sort of put
her foot down. So I went to the same college that
my parents, my uncles,
my aunts all went to: St.
Lawrence University up
in Northern New York.
I realised very early ©a H a t 1
Within the first week of
had an ear lo r e a tch la f whatever
being there, of course, I
pulled out my piano and
was ha p p e a la f la the sarnie
started playing in the
landscape and recreating It In
local coffee house. There
was a place called the
f t t y OWB way®
Java Barn where all of the
music-oriented and arts-
oriented kids would hang
out. It was really just sort of an idyllic, utopian
society.
Matt Burr, who played in a bunch of different
bands on campus and was a senior in college, saw
me play. I was kind of wheeling out cover songs
and occasionally sliding in my own original music. I
had written this song called “Apologies” and he
came up to me and said, you need to be in a band.
See POTTER, page 5
, ;
City's alcohol
Designated
The gravity of
area goes fla t
drivers
abuse
with OLCC
A n evening on the
beat with Portland's
pick-up crew for
overfmbibers
The fin a l chapter in
our series on one
fa m ily’s journey
through domestic
violence
State agency rules
against city’s
planned ban
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