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| Pastemagazine |
 Once a rootsy, crunchy outfit with pronounced Muscle Shoals influences, Grace Potter & The Nocturnals broke out of Vermont through performances at blues fests, hippie jams and Bonnaroo, powered by a siren-voiced knockout who echoed Bonnie Raitt and could really throw down on the Hammond B3. So when word came in spring 2009 that the band was recording with T-Bone Burnett, Potter and The Nocturnals’ ascent into modern country-rock royalty seemed imminent.But something funny happened on the way to this slender fourth album: T-Bone was replaced by producer Mark Batson (Dr. Dre, Jay-Z, Dave Matthews Band), the band’s lineup was shuffled and their soulful, groove-based sound somehow became glammed-out pop-rock. While not quite an extreme makeover, the 13 tracks from Potter’s new-look Nocturnals are swathed in a pop-metallic sheen, methodical background vocals and lots of cooing where there used to be swanky soul. The record shifts to a later part of Potter’s beloved ’70s, and the commercial play could only feel more calculated if it featured a Drake cameo. Heavy on the breathing, lipstick and Betty Boop squeaks, opener “Paris (Ooh La La)” sets the LP’s tone as Potter howls over a synthetic groove; “Tiny Light,” one of six Potter/Batson co-writes, sounds pre-approved for a scene of great importance on Gossip Girl; and the piano-driven rave-up “Hot Summer Night” is laden with palpable effort and Potter’s clunky lines (“Even though it’s the middle of the winter and it’s really bad weather”)....full text |
| Contactmusic |
| Having recently reviewed the first single, 'Tiny Light', from Miss Potter and her band of insomniacs I am very pleasantly surprised by the album from which it was borne. Surprised mainly by their energy and sheer power as well as the obvious enthusiasm with which it was produced. I had questioned the choice of first single on the grounds of it being quite an ordinary track. Grace's voice shone but the single itself failed to ignite a spark. I stick by that. Whoever sanctioned the release of Tiny Light, and subsequent murder in terms of mastering, remixing, producing etc. needs a severe and prolonged thrashing. Having put Tiny Light out (!) as a single to showcase Grace Potter & The Nocturnals you would imagine that the band and management had agreed on a defining piece that would encapsulate their very essence to hopefully attract a larger audience. If you listen to the radio edit and the album version of this track they are miles apart. So you attract your listener on the grounds that he or she likes the lifeless, mellow, middle ground of the twitching corpse that had been left by Mark Batson (Co-composer!) and Andrew Scheps, for them to take a listen and find it's nothing like what they expected, so no extra sales. Meanwhile the folk itching for Robert Plant in female form to belt out some ostensibly very American tunes are left clueless as to their existence through the mediocrity of the single. Baffling is the only way to describe the processes that have lead to this series of events....full text |
| Thehurstreview |
| You gotta have respect for Grace Potter and the Nocturnals: In a move that has already become the stuff of lore, they recorded tracks for what they hoped to be their breakout album with legendary producer T-Bone Burnett– and then scrapped ‘em. Maybe Burnett’s analog-fetishizing, old-timey sound just didn’t square with the band’s muscular rock and roll vigor. Or maybe, as they’ve hinted at in interviews, the T-Bone sessions were a little too heavy on Grace, a little too light on the Nocturnals, resulting in songs that were shaping up to be, for all intents and purposes, a solo album. Whatever the reason, they did what most bands in their position– and young bands in particular– would have never had the stones to do, and they showed Burnett the back door. The thought of a Grace Potter solo album– perhaps produced by Burnett, or, even better, Joe Henry– isn’t a repulsive suggestion– she’s got the voice and more than enough charisma to pull off an entire album in the spotlight– but it just isn’t where she and her unit want to go right now. So they teamed up with Mark Batson, a guy who’s worked with folks like Jay-Z and Beyonce, Dave Matthews and Maroon 5, and made an album that’s perfectly suited to where they are right now– an album that sounds like the bid of a band that’s ready to break into the mainstream. It isn’t their first album, but it may as well be; it’s self-titled for a reason, because it feels for all the world like a proper introduction, the opening salvo of a band that makes no attempt to hide their desire to be the next big thing in rock and roll. Lusting after fame isn’t always a pretty thing for a rock band, but you have to hand it to them: On Grace Potter and the Nocturnals, they sound like they’s got both the confidence and the chops to pull it off. Batson’s work here is stellar: The album is sleek and polished, propulsive and hook-laden, streamlined enough to sound like the work of a band moving toward the mainstream but with the Nocturnal’s own personality and individual quirks very much in tact. It’s sterling in its professionalism but still vibrant, feeling like the work of a rock and roll band that’s coming into its own; the sound is modern, but rooted in flavors of classic rock that make it feel contemporary but timeless at the same time....full text |
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