The Orchid Highway

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.
-Ferdy Belland
NERVE MAGAZINE