Just shading top spot, Home On Native Land is a joy-filled oddity. The Hidden Cameras is the nom
de guerre for Canadian maestro singer-songwriter Joel Gibb, and whatever
collection of friends and allies he can find at any given time to flesh out the
project at hand. On his seventh record
(my introduction to his work), the supporting cast has again been rotated, with
the album featuring contributions by, amongst others, Rufus Wainwright, Feist,
Pet Shop Boy’s Neil Tennant and Ron Sexsmith. It is a weird and magnificent ride. In some respects it shares strands of
DNA with my number 1 record from last year, Father John Misty’s I Love
You Honeybear: the lyrics are highly intelligent, original and visceral, and
the music is often simplistic but always soulful. But Home
On Native Land veers in so many directions that in truth it can’t meaningfully be compared to anything. Gibb has said that The Hidden Cameras make ‘gay
church folk music’, which is an accurate but under-inclusive description. There are definite gospel influences on this
album (at times it borders on the hymn-like), but classic country, folk, indie
and rock also all feature too.
Lyrically, there are two main points of
focus. The first of these is Canada and its
wildernesses. The beauty and isolation
of the Canadian outback is lovingly sketched and serenaded. Indeed, a couple of the tracks are reworked
Canadian folk songs, altered to evoke diversity and modernity: a sort of
revisionist history of the macho woodsman myth.
The second lyrical theme is homosexuality. This shouldn’t be in any way remarkable, but
sadly it is: it’s still rare for lyrics in mainstream music to feature gay love
songs in this way. The result is heart-warming
and yet never sickly, and deals with both the joy and pain of relationships in
a personal way. This is the sound of a
gay man weaving his sexuality into his songs naturally without it ever feeling
political or forced. More camp-fire than
camp, Home On Native Land is an album
that has something very real, and very beautiful at its core. This is what the world really sounds like in
2016: love not hate.
Overall, Home
On Native Land is a joy to listen to – intelligent, arresting but non-confrontational,
wildly varied musically and full of songs that are impossible to get out of your
head. For me, with this record, Joel
Gibb joins the other greats that have emerged from Canada over the last decade or
so: Arcade Fire et al. It is a wonderful
album. Time to investigate the back
catalogue.
sample track: Log Driver’s Waltz