Grace Potter's love affair with Colorado officially began on Feb. 11, 2011, when she sipped champagne to celebrate her band's first sold-out show headlining the Ogden Theatre in Denver.
It was only a few months later that the stunning singer-songwriter possessing a booming born-to-rock voice returned to Colorado with her Nocturnals, this time as a supporting act at one of the country's most picturesque settings. Ahead of that July 9, 2011, appearance (right) with the Avett Brothers at Red Rocks, Potter had more daring goals that she was willing to share with her interviewer.
"I've gotta long list of things to do, bucket list things," she told me over the phone from Las Vegas on another triple-digit afternoon in late June. "Play Saturday Night Live, make a movie. I want a lot of things, but one of my deepest wishes would be to headline -- and sell out -- Red Rocks."
After making her headlining debut in 2014 at the majestic 9,450-seat outdoor amphitheatre built 6,450 feet above sea level and coming
this close to seeing both dreams come true, Potter should be expected to go even higher this year.
The hardest-working frontwoman in rock 'n' roll is back, with an act that's bigger, better and bolder than ever.
Reviewing Potter for the first time after that Ogden show five years ago, I opened with a question that was partly rhetorical, partly rhythmic: "Can Grace Potter get any hotter?"
As if there was any doubt, the affirmative answer finally arrived in 2016. Touring as a solo act, she and an almost entirely new lineup of backing musicians crushed it during the second consecutive night of sold-out shows at the intimate but vibrant Belly Up in Aspen.
It was Feb. 6, on the eve of Colorado's unofficial sports holiday -- Super Bowl Sunday -- when nary a word about the Broncos was heard in this glitzy ski town venue less than 24 hours before Peyton Manning led his team on a joy ride into the sunset.
Potter took the stage shortly after 9:30 to chiming bells and a ticking clock, the packed house that included an elbow-to-elbow audience on the dance floor and comfortably seated couples closer to the bar. All were eager to soak up the electric atmosphere -- while paying $75-$165 a ticket.
Two songs in, she proclaimed what everyone else must have been thinking: "This is how a winter tour is supposed to be."
The temperature may have stayed in single digits throughout the night, but Potter's heat treatment throughout this 95-minute sonic blast was a mixture of cherished Nocturnal favorites (the opening "Medicine," "Ah Mary") with strokes of Midnight genius ("Empty Heart," "Biggest Fan") from her first solo album, out since August.
Fittingly in a space where framed photos of top-notch female performers grace the men's bathroom (and vice versa) and Aspen Mountain's World Cup ski runs are just a schuss away, Potter seemed like she was right at home. And in a way, she was, having previously taken this stage with the Nocturnals a number of times throughout her career.
On the morning of Feb. 5, before the first of two shows at the Belly Up, she posted on Instagram: "Woke up, looked out my bunk window and what do I see? Magic everywhere. I'm talking about a little town called ASPEN!!"
That afternoon, she wore minimal makeup and a NASA T-shirt while strumming an acoustic guitar during a Kitchen Concert for KSPN, the local radio station, an episode that put her on the front page of the next day's Aspen Daily News. (Below, see Potter perform "Empty Heart" in a video from that session.)
Her ongoing romance with the town is mutual, enhanced over Labor Day weekend in 2014. Despite playing in the rain at Jazz Aspen Snowmass in 2013, Potter and the Nocturnals returned the next year as an emergency replacement for opening night headliner Fun., which canceled because of a personal family issue.
So Aspen -- and the state's other hot touring stops -- seemingly can count on their saving Grace, rain, sleet or snow.
In our 2011 interview, Potter called Colorado "a huge gigantic version of Vermont," the state that includes the town of Waitsfield, where she was born and raised and where her parents Sparky and Peggy still reside. "As a ski bum and someone who came up in a ski bum family, I understand the essence of what Colorado is all about. Because everybody in Vermont ends up moving to Colorado."
Whether their stay is permanent or temporary, all those transplants don't necessarily ski, though. During that second Aspen show, Potter told the crowd she spent that morning in bed while some of her touring band members -- including Whigs bassist Tim Deaux -- hit the slopes.
Beauty sleep is certainly essential for anyone maintaining a healthy lifestyle, but particularly important for a musician who made a 3 1/2-hour bus trek from Boulder, where Potter began her three-night Colorado tryst before completing this leg of the strenuous tour the following week in the Pacific Northwest.
Conserving energy pays off on stage, though, where Potter is as adventurous as Olympic and World Cup champion Lindsey Vonn, whose Colorado connection goes back to her training days in Vail, another premier ski resort down Interstate-70 from Aspen. Not only do the lookalikes share competitive fire, goldie locks and winning smiles but also carefree spirits. Potter, at 32 a year older than Vonn, might be less athletically inclined these days, but it's easy to award a gold medal in apres-skiing to this life of the party.
Grace Potter performs on Feb. 6, 2016, at the Belly Up in Aspen
with guitarist Benny Yurco (left) and bassist Tim Deaux.
Milestone moments are worth celebrating, and Potter has had her fair share: the champagne toast at the Ogden in 2011; a barefooted victory lap around the grand Red Rocks stage in 2011, when her vigorous opening set not only chased away the raindrops but nearly upstaged the headlining Avetts; the marriage to Nocturnals co-founder and drummer Matt Burr in 2013; and the August 2015 solo album debut followed by the tour with her backing band the Magical Midnight Roadshow, which that night included Deaux, Nocturnal guitarist Benny Yurco, Ben Alleman (keyboards/guitar), Matt Musty (drums), Daiki Hirano (percussion) and Eliza Hardy Jones, a keyboardist/background vocalist who also doubled as the opening act.
No wonder another toast was in order as Potter lifted a glass of wine this time to honor the "amazing hosts" of Belly Up after rocking the house with "What We've Become," the last of surprisingly only four numbers from Midnight she performed before playing seven more songs, including a new original ("You Love Another") and a gospel-tinged cover of "I Shall be Released."
Perhaps it's time to address this Midnight madness. The shamefully underrated album released six months ago has been the subject of consternation and discussion in the media and online. Some would consider cover art listing Grace Potter without the Nocturnals after the group's four studio efforts as an act of betrayal, while others might think her transformation means: "Our rock goddess wants to become a pop princess."
Months before the album's birth, an alarmed fan started a thread on Potter's website's forum page titled "Please Give Me a Summary Of What's Been Going On Last Couple Years," asking a series of questions that included:
"Why has the band been dormant so long? Was it burnout? Did Grace have a baby?"
Even when rumors reach such a hysterical level, Potter must take great comfort in knowing folks still care to that degree. It's not like the Nocturnals are turning out the lights forever, either. Burr remains a formidable presence on Midnight, while Yurco and fellow GPNers Scott Tournet (guitars) and Michael Libramento (bass) make guest appearances.
Thankfully, neither they nor producer Eric Valentine talked Potter out of exploring new ground while trying to expand her audience. For a determined artist still willing to grow, her steadfastness should come as no surprise.
Just check out the collaborative net she cast in the past few years that includes projects and/or appearances with Kenny Chesney, the Flaming Lips, Rolling Stones, the Black Keys' Dan Auerbach, Daryl Hall and, most recently, Conan O'Brien while visiting the U.S. troops in Qatar.
In the announcement provided by her label, Hollywood Records, Potter said: "This album is about embracing life as it comes at you -- with all its unexpected twists and turns. I took a much more open approach to songwriting than I have in the past -- probably because it was unavoidable. I've experienced a huge amount of growth and change in the past two years -- both personal and professional, and it can be overwhelming for an artist to find ways to express that in a vacuum. ...
"Ultimately the process has fueled` me to share more, learn more, listen carefully, work harder, love harder... Our time on earth is far too short to be resistant to beautiful opportunities as they come our way, so when my inspiration took me somewhere new, I did what I always do: stripped buck-ass naked and ran straight into the fire."
While calling the result of her burning desire "nervy and refreshing," Time magazine connected Potter to Sheena Easton and Paramore without blinking. Wishy-washy Billboard tried wedging her into the female musical hierarchy somewhere between Bonnie Raitt and Britney Spears but summed up Midnight as a "beat-heavy hodgepodge."
Midnight shouldn't be a shock to the system for even longtime listeners who have enjoyed previous adventures in Graceland such as "Never Go Back" (co-written by Potter, Auerbach and three Nocturnals, it's one of the best cuts from 2012's The Lion The Beast The Beat) and "Paris (Ooh La La)," a 2010 electric guitar-driven rocker punctuated by squeals of delight from 2010's self-titled breakthrough album that might be Potter's heretofore best attempt to get the popular vote.
More Midnight pop-til-you-drop flashes emerge on "Hot to the Touch" and "Look What We've Become," but Potter shows off her versatility with touches of R&B ("Delirious" is a wail of a vocal exercise; "Your Girl" a groovy ode to '70s soul sisterhood) while still delivering knockout punches with the anthemic "Alive Tonight" and propulsive "Instigators."
Those powerful pipes are as flexible as the limber calisthenic positions she displays onstage, her timbre expressing toughness one minute, tenderness the next, creating sounds over the course of an album ranging from sweet to soulful, sensual to sentimental. Potter's not even afraid to let you see her sweat while head-banging or showing off other signature moves, shifting seamlessly from acoustic guitar to Gibson Flying V and Hammond B3.
Who among a new batch of pop stars such as Halsey, Tori Kelly, Zella Day and Tove Lo could be as Graceful? Undoubtedly someone will try to draw them into the conversation with Potter. While certainly entertaining and charismatic, they seem to lack her instrumental capabilities (electric guitar solos, anyone?) and workingman blues hues.
Vocally, Rhiannon Giddens, Alabama Shakes' Brittany Howard, Lake Street Dive's Rachael Price and Ireland's Imelda May are more worthy comparisons, with label mate ZZ Ward and the Larkin Poe sister act of Megan and Rebecca Lovell potentially closest to reaching Potter's status out of the next crop of well-rounded promising talents.
Until then, just be happy to be blessed with many more days of Grace.
Potter knows how to warm the cockles of your heart, whether she's leading a crowd singalong to "Stars," an unabashed piece of pop poetry, or stopping those wannabe crooners during the chorus to reference The Voice by saying, "If I had a big motherfucking red chair, I would totally spin around for you guys."
Then there was a mind-blowing trip to Heavy Metal Heaven during a nine-minute version of "Turntable," featuring guitar riffs straight out of Blue Oyster Cult, followed by an extended encore, beginning with Potter's Flying V shredding on "Nothing but the Water" and ending with her bass drum beating on "Paris (Ooh La La)."
Left with experiences worth cherishing forever, what's not to love, even if the clock eventually strikes midnight.
Tickets recently went on sale for Potter's next show at Red Rocks, her third straight year there as a headliner, this one on Aug. 19 with Lake Street Dive opening just like in 2014.
No matter who's checking off their bucket list, these are the best of times to watch a Midnight gambler win over more fans by turning a powerhouse of rock into a passion pit.
Colorado, prepare to get your heart on.
Concert photos by Michael Bialas. See more from Grace Potter's shows in Aspen, and with the Nocturnals in 2011 at Red Rocks and Denver's Ogden Theatre.