Oakland’s Whiskerman have been rolling around the Bay Area for long enough to pick up a little bit of everything that’s happening in that scene: ecstatic psychedelia, sturdily constructed pop-rock, pick-and-grin folk. On their new album, the forthcoming Champions, the group present it all as a single picture rather than a series of genre fragments, and we’re pleased to be premiering the lead single, “Jackie & Delilah.”
As that latter name might have led you to believe, there’s certainly a touch of The Grateful Dead in the song’s easy-morning groove, but the real calling card here seems to come from further east. Over soaring strings and a quiet-stab guitar line, singer Graham Patzner sounds a bit like Gene Ween at his most earnest, and the rounded piano lines that bolster the verses recall Matthew E. White and the big-room production of erstwhile Bay Area neighbors Girls on their swan song, Father, Son, Holy Ghost.
You can give “Jackie & Delilah” a listen below, then check out the album’s art and track list.
Champions track list
14. Wonder
