Words & Photos by Rod Snyder
Grace Potter made her triumphant return to Philadelphia on Friday night for a packed house at The Fillmore. Just 12 shows into the “Daylight 2020 Tour” (in support of her 2019 release “Daylight”), she is showing that the few years she took off for personal reasons, and having her first child, have not slowed her down in any form.
She has an extremely solid touring band consisting of longtime Nocturnals guitarist Benny Yurco, Jordan West on drums, Philly local Elizabeth Hardy Jones and Kurtis Keber on bass. The show consisted of plenty of Nocturnals songs, (10 to be exact), but she played a nice selection of songs from her recent release, too.
The first thing that struck me was how incredible her voice still sounds, despite not really performing too much – she can still hit and sustain those high notes. Another thing was her energy – motherhood has not slowed her down – she was dancing and moving all over the stage during the set. She spoke with the crowd a lot, a few times asking what the band should play next. At one point, they broke into a snippet of Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man”.
After watching the show for a bit, I started to think about how solid the band was. Drummer Jordan West really kept an incredible beat. She supplied some very solid drumming this night. Benny Yurco brought his familiar tone and energy to the set, Kurtis Keber laid down some excellent bass and Elizabeth Hardy Jones delivered impressive backing keys and vocals. They did jam on some of the older numbers and it sounded like they’ve been on the road for months. I look forward to seeing them again when they have more miles under their belts.
The band is on tour, currently on the East Coast and will wrap up their tour at the end of March on the West Coast.
Setlist:
Daylight
Empty Heart
Turntable
Love Is Love
Back To Me
Big White Gate
Desire
Timekeeper
I’d Rather Go Blind
Something That I Want
Reposession
Shout It Out
Medicine
Nothing But The Water (I)
Nothing But The Water (II)
Encore:
Stars
The Lion The Beast The Beat
Paris (Ooh La La)
TheWaster.com | Philly
1.27.20
