DIE HEITERKEIT - "SCHWARZE MAGIE" Tour 2025
From those up there, nothing more is to be expected, that's clear. The gods are sick and powerless, the spirits too porous for haunting. And so it is once again up to Die Heiterkeit to guide us with their inherently tender strictness along the path that now leads us out of this mess. Or, even better, into a new, in truth, ancient world of magical thinking. After the light glam pop of "Was Passiert Ist", Die Heiterkeit now radiates powerfully-mystically in a forge between pop and folk and goes, with a naturally grand gesture, straight to the elemental. “Sometimes only black magic helps,” sings Stella Sommer and takes us, safely wrapped in warm sonic hoods, to the Teufelsberg and between the lines of great songwriting artistry.
Anyone still pointing, in the 15th year of Heiterkeit and with their now 9th album (so far: 4x Die Heiterkeit, 3x Stella Sommer, 1x Die Mausis), with sheer astonishment at Sommer's dark voice and again only rummaging out the long-exhausted, cheap comparisons, misses the spectacular uniqueness in this music that no one in this country seems to master without effort and most importantly fearlessly like Stella Sommer. And one misses what a great songwriter and musician one is dealing with. Like the predecessor "Was Passiert Ist", "Schwarze Magie" was also created in close collaboration between Sommer and producer Moses Schneider.
This album sounds both new and familiar, heavy and light. Like a collection of the greatest pop songs from the golden age before this music sounded hollow and faded. Nothing here suggests German indie music. The Great American Songbook served as inspiration for Sommer (after all, Frank Sinatra sang about "Witchcraft"), a quote from an Elvis speech easily becomes the impulse for a song about the dangers of successful manifestation (“Alles, was ich je geträumt hab”).
"Schwarze Magie" possesses a depth and ancient wisdom that is hard to find in this country. Like heavy velvet curtains, this album lays itself with profundity and captivating gravitas over our so-called reality, and again and again, the unique Heiterkeit spirit flashes through. Stella Sommer is the woman who carries not only the lightning but also the wit in her pocket.
And a sense of which interpretation of the originally Persian hope mantra “This too shall pass” we currently need: “This too shall pass,” sings Stella Sommer: “The mouth is a wound that laughs / you will get through this too.”
In “Teufelsberg” it says: “Sometimes you only realize you were lonely when you're no longer so.” And how much Die Heiterkeit has been missed is something you will definitely hear when they return with this masterpiece after six years.
Doors: 7 PM / Standing Room
Hallo, ich bin Maya.
