Grace Potter, 26, hails from Vermont, and she's big on the jam-band scene, but her neoblues has subtlety and concision you don't often find with noodle-dancers. The Nocturnals' third disc tilts from Janis Joplin-esque bluster, to laid-back singer-songwriter soul that recalls a toughened-up Norah Jones, to Alanis-like blasts of epic recrimination. Potter's youthfulness can make for flower-soup lyrics but backlit by a no-nonsense band that massages Memphis grooves, light rock and pinot-noir reggae, it all bursts with promise.

“Is It True”

As the British Invasion reached its peak in 1964, Brenda Lee went from Nashville to London to record one of her hardest-rocking hits, her perky vocal backed by a stuttering, squalling guitar. That guitar was played by session musician Jimmy Page, yet to skyrocket to fame with first the Yardbirds and then Led Zeppelin. "She said to me, 'I've come here to make a record with the British sound,'" remembered producer Mickie Most. "She felt she wouldn't get the same sound in Nashville because they're only just catching up on the British beat group sound of about six months ago."