Beauty Pill: NPR Music Tiny Desk Concert

October 23, 2015 by LARS GOTRICH • Beauty Pill’s music is an invitation. In it, life whirs with plunderphonic glee and riffs are funky from the inside out, with rhythms that are equal parts hip-hop and go-go. Conceived, recorded and meticulously tinkered with over the course of eight years, Beauty Pill Describes Things As They Are was partly made in front of an audience after member Chad Clark recovered from a viral infection in his heart that nearly killed him. It’s one of the year’s most stunning records, as well as an argument for letting art rest, live and breathe before it’s ready to be known by a listener. With such a deeply textured group of songs, it was hard to predict how the D.C. band would translate in the NPR Music office. But Beauty Pill didn’t strip down, nor did it remove anything vital; the band thought about and adapted to the space, even if Clark was a little late arriving due to a lost dog on a highway. Jean Cook’s Monome (for lack of a better descriptor, a sampler sequencer) plays a majo