The Hidden Cameras

Formed in Toronto in 2001 around singer-songwriter Joel Gibb, The Hidden Cameras operates as a collective with a rotating lineup and has included musicians such as Laura Barrett, Maggie MacDonald and Michael Peter Olsen over the years. The project sits between indie pop, indie rock, baroque pop and choral folk, with a pronounced queer aesthetic that Gibb once summarized as “gay church folk.” From the start the band performed in varied settings — galleries, churches, parks and other unconventional venues — developing a spacious live approach often augmented by choirs and strings. After Ecce Homo (2001) came The Smell of Our Own (2003), Mississauga Goddam (2004), Awoo (2006) and Origin:Orphan (2009), where the pop songwriting opened up to denser arrangements and darker moods. Age was released in 2014, followed by Home on Native Land in 2016, recorded over a long period with guests including Feist, Rufus Wainwright and Neil Tennant. The Hidden Cameras continued with Bronto in 2025, maintaining a continuity in which melodies, vocal harmonies and the tension between poplight and sharper themes remain central.