ARTIST: The Orchid Highway
TITLE: The Orchid Highway
LABEL: Self-released
GENRE: Rock
TIME: 37:09 min
SIZE: 53,7 MB
RIP DATE: Aug-25-2007
RELEASE DATE: Apr-10-2007
WEBSITE: n/a
Track List:
01. Sofa Surfer Girl 04:53
02. Medicine Tree 02:38
03. Let's Stay In Instead 03:05
04. Next World 02:41
05. Ballad On Plain E 04:06
06. Opiate 05:11
07. Pop Tart Girl 02:52
08. Tea With Shandra 04:38
09. Time For A Change 04:09
10. Legion Hall 02:56
Release Notes:
The Orchid Highway is one of Vancouver's
longest-running bands, and their dogged die-hard
attitude is more than justified by the quality of
the music they write. Trousers-deep in a rapturously
ongoing obsession with mid-60s Britpop and
psychedelia, the ten songs on their self-titled
debut (stunningly recorded in lush psycho-stereo by
engineering wizard Steven Drake at Greenhouse
Studios) contain imaginatively melodic arrangements
that would knock Brian Wilson out of his housecoat
and on his fat ass in his piano-equipped sandbox
(and ressurect poor old Syd Barrett from the
acid-casualty dead while they were at it). Songs
like "Sofa Surfer Girl" (one of OH's live favorites;
haven't we all met a sofa-surfer girl at one time or
another?) are fine examples of the clever
tongue-in-cheek lyrics of the Macdonald brothers
Rory (bass, vocals) and Jamie (guitar, vocals),
fleshed out by the powerfully superb instrumental
hammerings and fully-fleshed vocals harmonies of
their fraternal wingman Derek Macdonald (keyboards),
drummer Adrian Buckley, and the guitar fracas of
John Woods (whose vacancy on the Highway has been
taken by the equally-talented Scott Perry, who it
must be noted is a strong addition rather than a
convenient replacement). The Orchid Highway finally
have a strong record to be forever proud of. Now all
they need is to parachute this record by the
thousandfold into the hearts and minds and ears and
stereos of the nation's vast power-pop audience.
Vancouver needs a Sloan of its West Coast own, and
with this record, we now have one.