A band that seeks to break new ground and evolve deserves a respectful nod of recognition. It can be so easy to sink into the comforting embrace of genre labels and allow the algorithm to distribute your music to sympathetic ears that it’s refreshing to be unable to put a band in a box. On Only You Left, the fifth album from Manchester trio The Orielles, the band think outside the box, redesign the box and put themselves back in it again with mixed results.
Recorded between Hamburg and the Greek island of Hydra, the record reflects the geographic incongruence. At least, that is according to vocalist Esmé Dee Hand-Halford, who describes the difference between ‘metal’ and ‘wood’ sounds on the album, reflected by the industrial Hamburg and the laid-back lifestyle of Greece. Alongside drummer Sidonie “Sid” B. Hand-Halford and guitarist Henry Carlyle Wade, the band have long had a talent for weaving musical textures. Sometimes that instinct results in a hypnotic collage, as on their Disco Volador album with its impeccable blend of jazz percussion and familiar indie shine. At other points here, alongside some outstanding instrumentation, it feels like a puzzle assembling itself without quite putting the pieces in the right place.
Opening track Three Halves begins in fragments: breathy, skeletal and uncertain before suddenly knitting its pieces together. It’s a track that doesn’t reveal too much about what’s to come, although it suggests atmosphere might take priority over catchy beats this time around.
Shadow of You Appears leans into cinematic tension, its scratchy strings creating a nervy build that feels perpetually on the edge of release. Yet the song also highlights one of the album’s recurring quirks. The Orielles do not quite possess the scrappy, lo-fi DIY energy of a band just beginning- they are long since past that point. However, they also haven’t settled into the confident sharpness of a group five records deep. The result can feel oddly suspended; an experiment that hasn’t fully decided what it wants to become.
If the album occasionally drifts, it is not fixed permanently in a genre limbo. Tears Are lifts the listener with a thick, sludgy opening riff that briefly suggests an unlikely collision between classic grunge and something approaching psychedelic dream pop. For a moment, it even edges into territory reminiscent of Korn (yes, Korn) with its deliberate darkness, before abruptly dissolving into delicate finger-picked guitar and hushed vocals.
Elsewhere, the band’s sense of texture remains its greatest strength. Embers pulses with technological nous and inventive percussion patterns, evoking the eerie digital unease of Kid A-era Radiohead– particularly the off-kilter rhythms of Everything In Its Right Place or Idioteque. It’s one of the album’s more absorbing moments, suggesting a direction where the trio’s construction of atmosphere and considered experimentation might fully align.
Those tendencies continue on Tiny Beads Reflecting Light, a track that sits somewhere between bedroom psychedelia and the surreal introspection of Skins’ Cassie staring out of a bus window. It’s here that the band’s peculiar gift becomes clearest: the ability to interweave fragments, moods and half-ideas into something that scratches the brain in just the right way.
Still, Only You Left occasionally mistakes mood for direction. The Woodland Has Returned carries a faint whiff of zeitgeisty grunge and soft psychedelia, unfolding like a piece of gentle, cinematic rock that never quite sharpens into focus. It’s peaceful without being slow, atmospheric without being entirely memorable.
Not that the trio lack musicianship. All In Metal slips into a brief jazz-tinged breakdown that serves as a small reminder that The Orielles are technically formidable players who can pivot styles almost at will. The eerie You Are Eating A Part Of Yourself heads somewhere darker altogether, slowly building a sense of dread that feels like farming doom on a road leading nowhere in particular.
By the time the album reaches To Undo The World Itself, things soften again. The track glows gently, like the deepest orange sunset lingering just before the light disappears. It’s a genuinely pretty moment, and perhaps the closest the album comes to emotional clarity.
In truth, Only You Left is unlikely to convert sceptics, but it may fascinate those who enjoy watching a band push themselves into uncertain territory. It’s a record filled with ideas. Sometimes those ideas are too embellished, and sometimes they are only half-formed. This album is rarely dull as it gives these fantastic musicians the space to generate or reflect mood as well as jam.
If nothing else, it reinforces that The Orielles remain a band more interested in exploration than refinement. With the album arriving on 13 March 2026, they’re also taking it on the road with a string of intimate UK appearances, including in-store shows at Piccadilly Records in Manchester, Jumbo Records in Leeds, Bear Tree Records in Sheffield and The Jacaranda in Liverpool, alongside gigs earlier this year in venues such as Norwich Arts Centre and Preston’s The Ferret. You can also catch them playing in the ICA in London on June 19th.
And perhaps that’s where these songs will ultimately make the most sense: slightly messy, slightly unpredictable, but alive in the room.
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