Thursday, September 3, 2020

Grace Potter - Twilight Hour, Volume 3 - Home Concert, Topanga, CA, 5-18-2020

I've posted two home concerts from Grace Potter, so far. If you haven't heard them yet, you've been missing out, and this is a good opportunity to give her a try. She has a remarkable voice, is a talented songwriter, and is good on the keyboards and guitar to boot.

She did a home concert a week for several months. That's come to an end recently, because she's resumed doing live concerts. (In order for people to watch them while social distancing for the coronavius, they're being held at drive-in movie theaters, and people stay in their own cars!) The last album I posted here compiled two home concerts together, but this is just one concert that lasted 50 minutes.

This is roughly an even mix of covers and originals. The covers are "Dead Flowers" (the Rolling Stones), "Someday We'll Be Together" (the Supremes), "No Expectations" (the Rolling Stones), "Son of a Preacher Man" (Dusty Springfield), "I'll Take You There" (the Staple Singers), and "Cortez the Killer" (Neil Young). "Someday We'll Be Together" is actually a duet with Michael McDonald, former lead vocalist of the Doobie Brothers. Due to the virus, McDonald's vocals were done remotely and added to Potter's recording.

Don't be put off by all the originals. They're pretty good. Her albums have often had production issues, in my opinion, but the songs shine better in this live format. Most of the songs here are done with a band, but a very minimalist one, usually just Potter on guitar or keyboards, plus a drummer and lead guitarist. 

Often during these shows, Potter is winging it. I haven't included her failed experiments, where she starts a song and gives up on it after only singing a verse or so. (I also didn't include any of the extensive talking between songs.) But I did include one very rough take, "Son of a Preacher Man." She stops it before finishing, admitting that she'd never played it before. But I thought it was cooking before the end, so I kept it. By contrast, "Cortez the Killer" is a song she's done a lot in concert, and it's a definite highlight.

By the way, one of her originals, "Please," has a very strange ending. She'd done a duet with Michael McDonald the song before that, and she still had McDonald's gruff singing style on her mind. She jokingly ended the song singing a parody of his style. I thought it was fun, so I kept it in.

01 Tiny Light (Grace Potter)
02 Eachother (Grace Potter)
03 Dead Flowers (Grace Potter)
04 Someday We'll Be Together (Grace Potter with Michael McDonald)
05 Please (Grace Potter)
06 Daylight (Grace Potter)
07 2.22 (Grace Potter)
09 No Expectations (Grace Potter)
10 Son of a Preacher Man (Grace Potter)
11 I'll Take You There (Grace Potter)
12 Shout It Out (Grace Potter)
13 Cortez the Killer (Grace Potter)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15835981/GraceP_2020_TwilghtHourVolme3HmeConcrtTopangaCA__5-18-2020_atse.zip.html

The cover art photo comes from her Instagram account, and was taken during one of her home concerts.

3 comments:

  1. Thank you, Paul. This will be my first GP download from you and I am looking forward to it.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks so much. Another awesome post.

    ReplyDelete