The world of the singer-songwriter and that of the alt-rock realm collide creatively on “Bad People,” the latest single from Edinburgh’s Hospital Corner. I say that because there is the same attention to the lyrical narrative and the sonic structure that you find in the former and the bigger, more anthemic sonics that power the latter, to be found at work too, the song moving from one to the other as it goes, becoming more anthemic and voluminous the closer it gets to the finishing line.
But as it leaves the more deft and delicate troubadouric lowlands and heads towards rock-infused crescendoes, it never truly throws one away for the other; instead, it uses the singer-songwriter sound as the perfect structure to hang all the more excessive sounds on, a way of corralling its various sonic charms and guiding them through more heightened and explosive sonic territory.
Charms such as the shimmering guitars and the beguiling picked, six-string rhythms, the steady, often unfussy but always on point beats, and the sort of lyrics that grow from the intimate to the end-of-set, festival-rousing crescendoes.
Based on the music of Christopher Finn, Hospital Corner is demonstrably able to juggle the cinematically graceful and the cavernous and imposing simultaneously and make a sound that brings out the best of both those worlds. But then, with a surname like Finn, it is no surprise that he knows his way around a song. (Neil or Craig, take your pick!)
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