The Hidden Cameras - 'Mississauga Goddam' (Rough Trade)
4/5
By: Toby L
Tales of sardonic sodomy. A song called 'I Want Another Enema'.
How Joel Gibb melds the above with such sublime, intense melody and still somehow retains a refined sense of artistic validity is the man's greatest asset.
'Mississauga Goddam' is his Hidden Cameras' second album proper, following the sorta-mini 'Ecce Homo' LP, a 'CBC Sessions' EP, and the chillingly perfect, underground exertion of 2003, 'The Smell Of Our Own'. It's eleven further songs of oft woefully poignant, brittle warmth and dexterity, and yet more consciously cheeky socio-political commentary of his still-quite rampant sexuality.
Yet, for all the nagging, shuffling church-like waltzes - 'Doot Doot Plot', 'Fear Is On' - you get the real gold: stark, unnervingly beautiful pieces like 'Builds The Bone' or 'We Oh We', just Gibb's subtle vocal quiver, some mean string-arrangements, and his abrupt, distinctly scraped acoustic. It's a minute, endearing orchestration that only the most morbid of hearts could protest to.
Elsewhere, there's a whole series of joyously playful alt-hymns - bouncing, innocent(-seeming) odes - 'I Believe In The Good Of Life', 'In The Union Of Wine', 'Music Is My Boyfriend' ('I found music... he found me... I wash his dirty underwear...') - and a quite epic, strangely moving, title-track closer.
Gibb's done it again. Another collection of dustily sleazy and harmoniously intriguing work all in the same sitting. He remains our most esteemed of guilty pleasures.
Artists in this article: The Hidden Cameras
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