race Potter beams, “Oh yeah, I’m a Phish fan, I’ve been to like, 45 Phish shows!”

Waitsfield rocker Potter of Grace Potter and the Nocturnals was just a newborn when Phish was playing its earliest shows in Burlington in the 1980s. That group of four friends could have hardly imagined then how their jam rock would earn them a huge cult following, or, that they’d end up inspiring future musicians, like Potter.

The singer recalls, “I used to go with my parents as a kid, and when I got old enough to go by myself, my parents still came, but I was part of what they called ‘the Phish art crew.’ We would distribute paint and strange things to paint on. And Phish fans would come paint and I was one of the ‘comandeerers’ of paint!”

She’s now herself one of rock’s young stars, one of several in the music industry predicting 2009 could be the year of Phish.

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Grace Potter says, “I have become friendly with some of the guys, and if I could pay them a visit it would be a great reunion, not just for them, but for me too, to be able to be a Phish fan again!”