Oreo is Greek for MOUNTAIN, huh? Ok, I got that from the crosses, but then thought there must be a hidden pun for 12D being MOLESKIN. MALESKAN is a word you’ll find only in crossword blogs, and a NATICK, to boot! :)
Yeah, it's very much an "inside baseball" theme - crosswords about crosswords. If you're interested in how the clueing for OREO changed over time, xwordinfo's a great resource - https://www.xwordinfo.com/Finder?word=OREO. Scroll down to the Pre-Shortz puzzles and things really start to change. Honestly pick any common word and it's fascinating to see the trends in clueing over time.
Running the gamut from right-wing talk radio to left-of-the-dial college stations to Active Rock (the industry term for "you've heard this Nickelback song ten times, you'll hear it ten more times, and you'll like it")
9D
"Have one ____" (2010 Joanna Newsom triple-LP that's the antithesis of Nickelback)
10D
It was frequently clued as "Monkshood" in pre-Shortz puzzles (If you don't want to Google the answer, solve the clue "Soul legend Redding" and replace the first letter with an "A")