Formed in 2003, trumpeter Frederik Köster's Quartett released two albums, Constantly Moving and Zeichen der Zeit (Signs of the Time), prior to this one, and have established themselves on the European gigging circuit with performances at the likes of the North Sea Jazz Festival. Broadly, you could describe what they do as jazz-rock fusion. Certainly guitarist Tobias Hoffmann sounds as though he's learned as much from alt.rockers such as Radiohead as he has from Pat Metheny, and those fat chords at the outset of ‘3x211’ – the first part of the four-part suite that makes up the main body of Momentaufnahme (Snapshot) – could even be said to derive their energy from heavy metal. There's a beguiling complexity about Hoffmann's battling style and the composition's grafting ascent, though, that draws on both Miles Davis (present in the 35-year-old Köster's blowing) and the musical theorising of Olivier Messiaen, and ultimately makes pigeonholing an awkward matter. If you like Christian Scott, you'll probably like Köster's quartett too: you'll certainly know where they're coming from. The ballad ‘Liebeslied’ builds in intensity and gives the leader – the recipient of various awards (New German Jazz, ECHO, WDR Jazz) – a chance to show his skills on flugelhorn.