Back in 2016, Karl Blau made the rare double appearance on both our year end lists, Best Cover Songs for “That’s How I Got To Memphis” and Best Cover Albums for Introducing Karl Blau. Now he’s back, with a new cover and a new band. Blau has teamed up with Heyward Howkins and Chet Delcampo, both from the band Later Fortune, for a new project called Opal Eskar. On their self-titled debut EP, this Philadelphia supergroup is also joined by two more local heroes, Charlie Hall and Robbie Bennett, both of The War on Drugs.
Five of the six EP tracks are original, but the sixth is a Beach Boys cover. And this band of music nerds digs deep, eschewing all the obvious greatest hits for the Wilson/Love Sunflower tune “All I Wanna Do,” bringing a dose of dreamy horn-flecked psychedelia.
“This is one of my fave under the radar Beach Boys songs and it doesn’t seem to get too much attention cover-wise,” Delcampo says. “I played it, along with a few other cover contenders, in the studio for Heyward and Karl, and Karl felt the most connection to this one. When we played it back for Robbie (Bennett of The War on Drugs who plays mellotron on the track) after the basic track was in place, he said it was one of his favorites too!”
Check it out exclusively below, and pre-order the EP (out tomorrow) at Bandcamp.
