Die Hochstapler - Beauty Lies (2023)

The fourth and fifth album of Die Hochstapler (The Impostors) come as a package: recorded within their February 2022 residency at the now legendary Berlin venue Au Topsi Pohl, the band delivers the meal including the recipe. Beauty Lies is comprised of (almost) all the composed and collectively developed material that the quartet uses to cook up the two course menu on Within. While the latter documents the music as played live in front of an intimate enthusiastic audience, the first shows the same band in the same room in the afternoon, without audience and almost without any improvisation. Dryly cataloging their compositions, they unveil the ingredients of the night to come.

The quartet draws inspiration from the whole rich tradition of Jazz, Improvised Music and oral culture. Live in concert, their abandonment of notation and use of game structures, alphabets and morse code allow them to reach a high degree of complexity, jumping from one piece to another or keeping several going at the same time and composing in real time, all the while maintaining a joyful, playing cards like attitude.