Gig: The Hidden Cameras

The Hidden Cameras

Lower Ossington Theatre (SummerWorks Festival). Friday, August 6, 2010.

For the third year of musical programming at the SummerWorks Festival, there were a few changes afoot. Most notably, the action was shifted from The Theatre Centre (underneath The Great Hall), a spot that was not especially well-loved as a music venue, where slow turnovers from plays running there seemed to lead to perpetually late-starting shows. This year, things were shifted to The Lower Ossington Theatre, which was unknown to me, but turned out to be a generally sympathetic space. Several rows of tiered seating allowed space for those inclined to sit, and the floor in front of a good-sized stage could be set up with chairs, or not, depending on the vibe of each show. The facility also had more room for some other ancillary events, including some installation-y stuff in a room dubbed "the Playground" as well as cabaret-styled shows with a host of musical guests in the lower "Performance Bar". Also notably, the Music Coordinator for this year's series was Kevin Parnell — known for his work with Wavelength — who curated a very strong lineup of local talent. There were no shows in the music series that I was totally uninterested in, though with one thing or another, there were a couple I couldn't make it to.¹

Leading the whole thing off was an extra-special event, featuring a melding of music and dance and theatricality from a name that could easily sell out a much larger space. When word went out that The Hidden Cameras were undertaking a "dramatic retelling" of last year's Origin: Orphan it seemed to make sense. The band has had a longstanding interest in finding different ways to perform, and in mixing it up with different artforms, including dance. The word also came with the proviso that this was more of a "workshop" kind of performance, more presenting a sketch of where leader Joel Gibb wanted to take this than any kind of finished product.

Even still, it was the Hidden Cameras, and more than enough of an event to merit a two-night run to lead off the music series. I was there with A. for the second runthrough, and one piece of advice that had trickled down from those who had been there the night before was to arrive early to get a seat. As things turned out, we ended up not getting down there as punctually as I was hoping for, and indeed all the the seats were taken as we entered the theatre. We did manage to grab spots on the first step up of the risers, so there was a little bit of legroom — more than those who arrived after us who were relegated to some tightly-packed zones on the floor in front of the stage.

The space on the floor was mostly being held open — before the show for a booth selling beer, and then as as the main spot for the dancers. The stage was filled with the band — eight in all on this night, including viola player Lief Mosbaugh, who had been missed in the band's last few local shows. It quickly became apparent that this wasn't going to be just a song-by-song run-through (like the album's release party) with some interpretive dancing, but a purposeful dramatic arc. As the band started the slow, stately march of the title track, the dancers emerged in front of them, with Gibb amongst their number, singing from the floor. Their urchin costumes and ragamuffin makeup would indicate that these were the Orphans, and the songs of the first set basically served as an account of the various travails they had to deal with, mostly at the hands of a malicious Authority Figure, portrayed by Keith Cole.

Although the narrative thrust of the story was pretty vague at times, there was enough going on that it didn't seem like too big a deal. The band — quite unusually for a Hidden Cameras show — were mostly seated and not drawing attention to themselves, but the screen behind them featured a series of visuals acting as a backdrop to the dancers. The "story" increasingly came to revolve around the youngest of the group, a kid who appeared to be Gibb's alter ego — or at least that's what I one would guess when dancing goblins² raised up and devoured The Kid at the end of "He Falls to Me", only for Joel to emerge as the band struck up "In the NA". The first half, with all Heavy Themes and Confusing Elements ran a half hour, before a theatre-style intermission.³

The end of the break was signified by Keith Cole, wandering around ringing a bell with gusto to call people back into the theatre space for the second half. This part began with the slow, stately build of "Ratify the New", which here was an anthem to painful catharsis — there was a lot of anguished screaming from the orphans. One main theme that seemed easy to draw out from all of this was the idea that all the trauma a person goes through is the stuff from which Self is built — and eventually, even if there's no higher transcendence, there's still Art.

During "Do I Belong?", the band beckoned Gibb up to the stage, who shyly accepted and then, gaining confidence, called up the rest of the Orphans, who became singers. The outcasts have formed a band! At song's end, Gibb addressed the audience for the first time — but in character, saying, "this is our first show – we've never played before. It's so good to be in a band. We're going to make a CD soon and we hope you guys come and see us again." And they performed a song that sounded something very much something by the nascent Hidden Cameras.⁴ You could use this to "read" the whole story as being autobiographical in a sense, but I don't know how far you'd want to push it. Anyways, there was a sense of joyous overcoming and of everything being all right — a grown-up equilibrium of getting over all the childhood traumas and building something of yourself out of it.

But that left a loose end — Keith Cole, the old Authority Figure, who dashed out at the end, distraught, screaming "no more!", driven to the end of his own tether. And then, to the gentle sashay of "Colour of a Man" — a beautiful version of the song, thanks to those strings — we learned that the victimizer was driven to hate by his own demons, which he overcame through his transformation into a "bee-yoo-tee-ful lay-dee", in one of the more whimsical and visually pleasing sequences, where the ex-Orphans helped him in an Instant Makeover. The lesson being, I guess, that the people who victimized us need to be healed, too.

And things after that were far jauntier on the whole, with the next songs being more about celebrating and finding love. The night's most notable musical re-version was an upbeat reprise of "Origin:Orphan", with a rolling disco-fied bassline and pulsing trumpet stabs, signifying how much had changed since the dour opening.

And then "Silence Can Be a Headline", the gorgeous dénouement. As the song started, the Orphans came and sat amongst the crowd. As the slow-dance majesty of the song unfurled, they chose partners from the audience and pulled them up to dance. A few couples in the crowd took the initiative to join in as a giant disco ball appeared on the screen. This was a sweet and satisfying wall-breaking ending. As the song faded and the band left the stage, the crowd called for an encore, but had to be satisfied with a curtain call.

It was good stuff, though certainly not a runaway success. That this started from the album's songs was the show's blessing and curse — rough in that it sometimes seemed that the narrative was roughly sketched in on a napkin to string together what was there in the songs. On the other hand, I'd rather have a weak narrative and good songs than the reverse at something like this, as there was always the strong music and performance to fall back on when the other elements seemed a little dodgy. And the fact the band are pushing themselves in doing something like this is surely to be appreciated. An interesting one-off and a good start to the Music Series.

You can check out a couple tracks from this show here and here.

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¹ There was also a series of "Musical Works" alternating with the more regular gigs, featuring a glimpse at the musical side of some in-development theatre projects. A bit outside my sweet spot, but an admirable idea.

² Or, um, "presumed dancing goblins"? In the fever-dream rush of allegorical imagery, my grasp of what-was-what can be read as being tentative at best.

³ The whole night proceeded in a way that surfed back and forth between "concert" and "theatrical event" — people sat and listened attentively like a theatre show, but clapped after each song, concert-style. Interestingly, without anyone making a big deal of it, the "how to behave" element just sort of intuitively took care of itself.

⁴ This song rang familiar, but I couldn't place it. I'm not sure if it was one of those very old early/unrecorded tracks from the band's repertoire, or a new one made to evoke that. Does anyone have a more firm opinion of this one?