Hidden Cameras Play Football Match, Partake in Opera

Photo by Guntar Kravis

Taking a break from their usual voyeuristic activities, Canadian pop provocateurs the Hidden Cameras will soon shift their focus to a couple unusual-- even by their standards-- undertakings.

First up, on August 15, the band will perform at a football match in Munich, Germany. Apparently some people call this sport involving feet and balls "soccer." Anyhow, the special gig comes at the request of ace footballer Mehmet Scholl, whose FC Bayern München squad will take on the dastardly kickmen of FC Barcelona at Allianz Arena. Should be a match to remember, as the Cameras promise "11 musicians, several go-go dancers, and choir," according to a press release. Hopefully we'll get a wardrobe malfunction or two as well.

Champions of both sport and art, the Hidden Cameras will then lend several among their ranks to acclaimed rock opera The Rat King, which makes its U.S. premiere during the New York International Fringe Festival, going down you-know-where from August 20-25. Camera Maggie MacDonald created the piece, "a post-apocalyptic rock opera set in the not so distant future where the world is devastated by the effects of environmental degradation and global warming, rats threaten to overthrow the earth, and mankind is verging on extinction." Sounds lovely.

All performances of The Rat King take place at the Lucille Lortel Theatre.

Finally, the Hidden Cameras' Joel Gibb contributed to the forthcoming Jens Lekman-curated Arthur Russell tribute EP. Along with Lekman and Electrelane's Verity Susman, Gibb will perform at the Kulturhuset in Stockholm on August 20.