{"id":12883,"date":"2025-04-22T12:30:00","date_gmt":"2025-04-22T17:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/?p=12883"},"modified":"2026-05-07T19:24:19","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T00:24:19","slug":"album-review-orelands-secrets-and-select-missions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/2025\/04\/22\/album-review-orelands-secrets-and-select-missions\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review :: Orelands :: Secrets and Select Missions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"700\" height=\"700\" src=\"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Orelands.jpg\" alt=\"album cover starry sky with clouds neon sign that says Orelands on the horizon. \" class=\"wp-image-12884\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Orelands.jpg 700w, https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Orelands-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Orelands-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Orelands-100x100.jpg 100w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>by Mykhailo Vil\u2019yamson<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Even though one might see the We, Here and Now! record label and mistakenly assume that Orelands must be made up of Shakespearean bards from the Stratford Festival in Ontario, the band itself emerged from the hard rock, zinc-laden mining town of Flin Flon. Though only one member of this three-piece actually lives there \u2013 i.e., the drummer, Dean Martin \u2013 both Jay Hovland (songwriter, guitarist, vocalist) and Scott Ellenberger (bassist) also have roots in Flintabbatey Flonatin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p>Their late December 2024 release <em>Secrets and Select Missions<\/em> could be best described as Dreamo Psych Rock, with its highly textured, multi-layered, repeating patterns of instrumentation, as well as the consistently unpredictable manifoldly-voiced poetic turns of phrase. The lyrics are cryptic yet familiar, necessitating re-listening in order to muse about what\u2019s being said. Each song is relatively slow, steady and pensive; at times folk rock-ish, and other times spacey. From the shortest song (\u201cAll Seasons\u201d at 2:26) to the longest one (\u201cMeans\/End\u201d at 5:19), the album feels like a record spinning: there\u2019s a cyclical rhythm to things. And speaking of physical copies, it\u2019s currently available on cassette (unless the short run of 30 is gone by the time these words are being read).&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Amusing aside: on the label\u2019s Bandcamp site, the digital album \u2013 presumably to encourage purchases of tapes, or to have a laugh (or both) \u2013 is listed as $999 CAD! But not to worry: the reader will be able to get these nine songs for a mere nine dollars directly from Orelands\u2019 own Bandcamp page (and likely from We, Here and Now! once the limited edition \u201cUnder a Prairie Sky\u201d cassettes are sold out).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While \u201cMeans\/End\u201d reminds me to a certain extent of the Danish band Mew and \u201cCountdown\u201d is slightly reminiscent of Beck\u2019s more indie folk songs, most of their sound is uniquely theirs and hard to describe by comparison. My suggestion: if you need a break sometime this week to zone out \u2014 as I\u2019m sure you do \u2014 grab your noise-cancelling headphones, pour yourself a drink, find a comfortable chair, and settle in as Orelands transports you somewhere else for half an hour (or longer, if\/when you choose to play it through start-to-finish for a second or third time).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Mykhailo Vil\u2019yamson Even though one might see the We, Here and Now! record label and mistakenly assume that Orelands must be made up of Shakespearean bards from the Stratford Festival in Ontario, the band itself emerged from the hard rock, zinc-laden mining town of Flin Flon. Though only one member of this three-piece actually [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12884,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[1420,1732,1729,1731,1730],"class_list":["post-12883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reviews","tag-album-review","tag-flin-flon","tag-orelands","tag-secret-missions","tag-secrets-and-select-missions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12883"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12883\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12885,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12883\/revisions\/12885"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}