Comprehensive <a href="http://www.jambands.com/features/2011/08/04/grace-potter-s-golden-compass">interview over on Jambands</a>.

RR: Are you also doing the set design for the festival with your dad?

GP: I am, yeah, yeah. My dad’s a sign maker [Sparky Potter] and he’s collaborated with Russ Bennett for Phish concerts and Bonnaroo and lots of festivals. He’s already had experience in that world of working with the vendors and he understands how festivals are meant to be laid out. We came out to Red Rocks with my mom, and they came to see our shows when we played a couple nights at Red Rocks. We stayed at this hotel, and it completely inspired the entire festival experience. When you looked at the walls, there were all these beautiful pictures of classic American boardwalks. I hate to use the [Martin] Scorsese reference, but the show Boardwalk Empire has a set design that is so exceptional. It conjures the faded glory of the classic American boardwalk for me.

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RR: You’ve got some diverse and fascinating acts on the bill, as well, which you referenced earlier in our conversation—young and veteran acts. You just played at Red Rocks with the Avett Brothers, and I remember seeing them in a small bar where Jessica Lea Mayfield opened for them. Now, she is on your GPN festival bill. I love the fact that you’re the veteran moving someone else’s career forward now.

GP: Absolutely, and she deserves that spotlight. I think she’s really a talented person and somebody that the second I heard her voice—I think it was on a Black Keys album [“Thinks Ain’t Like They Used To Be” on Attack & Release ]—and that was the first time I had heard about her and I was like “FUCK!” (laughter)

There are a lot of those opportunities at a festival like this because it is intimate and our friends are attentive. I think they are really going to be sponges for it, no matter what. Like I said, my favorite thing is always to discover new bands. I might be going to see the main act, but I’m always pleasantly surprised by the opener, and that is what I end up taking away with me from a concert—“who was that band? That band was so good.” The same goes for a festival like Bonnaroo. My favorite thing to do is just wander around at Coachella or Bonnaroo and some of these festivals and wander into the smallest tent on

the site because you’re sure to find something really special in there. That’s basically what we’re trying to curate here, in a smaller and more definitive way, hoping that our friends are going to appreciate it. And I think they will.