aaamusic | On 12, Feb 2012

London, 8th February

Although Creatures Of An Hour, the first album released by the London-based band Still Corners, was celebrated by the international music press as one the best of 2011, seems like this four-piece still hasn’t received the deserves attention.

 

Cargo seems the perfect location for their gig, with its ambience and atmosphere. After the enjoyable performances of supporting bands My Sad Captains and Hooded Fang, Tessa gets the stage and a cascade of sound breaks in.

 

Categorising Still Corners as a dream-pop act is limiting, at least. The creature created by Greg Hughes is eclectic, evocative, and sensual.

 

Endless Summer, the song that made Still Corners famous in the alternative sphere, live-on-stage is softer and even more ethereal. If you think Still Corners are playing their cards in the first round, with Cookoo following just straight after, well, you couldn’t be more wrong.

 

In fact, the real nature of Still Corners seems to surface with the least known tracks. Circulars is a nightmare that draws upon the explorations of prog-legend Goblin, while Into The Trees hypnotises as Death in Vegas before exploding in a Kraut fugue.

 

Ghosts from 1970s Germany drift through Submarine, an unstoppable psychedelic anthem that represents the apex of the night. It’s not over though. With Velveteen Hughes pays a visit to the streets of Nouvelle Vague’s Paris, until the most hidden alleys as painted by Air and Poni Hoax.

 

The thin line between spookiness and trip-hop is trespassed when, with I Wrote In Blood, Portishead meet Boards of Canada in a tender suicide lullaby. “Took a little pill to see your face, found the sleep in your embrace”, Tessa whispers, while we realise it will be so hard to set ourselves free from this gentle and inexorable cobweb.

 

Lorenzo Coretti