Grace Potter

Way back in 2008—before the Grammy nominations, the steady stream of sold-out tours and critically acclaimed records, the co-signs from rock royalty like the Rolling Stones, Robert Plant, Bonnie Raitt, Iggy Pop, and many more—Grace Potter holed up in an L.A. studio with the legendary T Bone Burnett and cut an album unlike any other in her wildly expansive body of work. Made with a crew of musical luminaries, the Burnett-produced LP captured Potter at a moment of profound metamorphosis, then wound up shelved. After joining forces with her former label Hollywood Records to unearth those recordings from deep in the vaults, Potter at long last presents the official release of Medicine: a powerhouse album that’s equal parts archival gem and thrilling new addition to her extraordinary catalog.

“I remember being in the studio with T Bone and feeling like this was everything I’d been waiting for, and I couldn’t go wrong—it never occurred to me that the album might not get released,” says Potter. “But even though I felt a great urgency to put the record out back then, I’m at peace with the fact that it’s taken this long. I’m at a point where I have a much stronger understanding of what I have to offer the world, and this offering feels like it’s right on time.”

Arriving on the heels of her fifth solo album Mother Road—a 2023 LP that marked her most fiercely visionary work to date—Medicine came to life soon after the release of This Is Somewhere, the 2007 sophomore effort from her former band Grace Potter and the Nocturnals. After stumbling upon a video of Potter delivering an a cappella rendition of the title track from the band’s 2005 debut Nothing but the Water, Burnett didn’t hesitate when approached about working with Potter. They arranged a meeting at the Hotel Bel-Air—an occasion so consequential she recalls every moment in ultra-vivid detail. (“I remember wearing a Missoni dress I’d bought vintage, which was unraveling at the seams,” says Potter. “I arrived way too early, so I listened to Linda Ronstadt’s ‘Blue Bayou’ on repeat in the car. Then, I finally sat down with T-Bone and Bob Cavallo, head of Hollywood Records at the time. I ordered corned-beef hash and sat dead-still trying to keep my dress from falling apart as we talked about the project and everything we could create together.”) Fresh off his widely celebrated turn as producer on Robert Plant and Alison Krauss’ Raising Sand—a 2007 album whose five Grammy wins added to a legacy that also included producing O Brother, Where Art Thou?—Burnett approached the project with a definitive plan for what would become Medicine. “T Bone’s idea was that my voice and the rhythm would carry the record,” she says. “He told me my voice was a force of nature, that it needed to be compelled forward by something with a superhuman momentum—which was not at all what I’d expected, and so much more enticing and exciting as a new access point for my musicality.”

Recorded at The Village Studios, Medicine. strays far from the high-spirited roots-rock of Potter’s earliest work, bringing a shadowy intensity to her soul-baring songs of lust and longing and self-salvation. To carve out the sonic landscape envisioned for the album, Burnett enlisted his longtime collaborators Jim Keltner, bassist Dennis Crouch, guitarist Marc Ribot, and keyboardist Keefus Ciancia. “It was like being in a masterclass every day,” says Potter. “I was so game for whatever T Bone wanted to try, whether it was making space for my voice to really ring out or letting the music swallow me whole so I could drown a little bit and then come back to the surface.” For Potter, that process unlocked aspects of her vocal artistry previously unknown to her. “At the time I was in a rock band where screaming over the loudest guitar onstage was my main job,” she says. “But this album often required real restraint and nuance, and it taught me so much about how to play with those moments of tension and release.”