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Laikinoji sostine

«As it was hoped swiss group "The clients Funk Society" became one of the biggest festival surprises. Its concerts in the festival and night Jam Sessions even excelled the titled festival stars.»

Laikinoji sostine, 30.04.1999

Music For Your Ears And Your Belly

You always got to be careful if an event agency is anouncing a band as“ unbelievable“. Automatically you hear the PR – bell ringing. Mr Matthias Bürgin anounced The Clients Funk Society simply as „The Best Funk Band of Switzerland“ in the media. He wasn’t wrong!

After a few minutes of the crowd’s shyness the band spread an enthusiastic atmosphere and broke all distance instantly. What a groove, what a musicality and what a performance! „Too much of a compliment“ I hear some of you „prove it, dude!“ okay.

Five men on stage, let’s say „in mint condition“ with a front saxophone player who looks just like Thomas D, of the „FantastischenVier“ except he’s bald headed. He’s glimpsing at the crowd through his Space shades and invites the audience to get the groove on, before he blows his horn like there was no tomorrow, untill his goatie starts dancing to his own play.

A Fiery Performance

No doubt would cross our mind, if he, Dave Feusi, mentioned having supported acts like James Brown or Maceo Parker. His „JB horn“ like feeling for rhythm and melody is combined with a clear understanding for intonation, improvisation and hot performance. His musician collegues support him by pulsing the beat, which reminds me of prince’s „sexy motherfucker“.

lowing Beats

This kind of Funk Music is perfect to dance to. It is erotic food for our ears, frees our mind with energy, what can easily lead into a physical state of dehydration. People move & groove, twitch and let themselves go to the rhythm of the drums. Christian Niederer, the drummer, is motivating the crowd by syncopating and bouncing hard without loosing the focus of it all:

The Funky Beat

Also the bassist, Thomas Reinecke, is following the same rule of interplay, although his fingers dance over the board of his bass with a brilliant virtuosity. This duo is seriously matching and reminds me of David Garibaldi and Rocco Prestia, the two famous teamplayers of Funk (Tower of Power). You wouldn’t believe that Reinecke from „Grand Mother’s Funck“ was hired for this one gig only. The original Bass player wasn’t able to play the concert because he was on tour in Indonesia!

Bass and drums are supported by the other half of the rhythm section, Marco Figini (guitar) and Peter Wagner (keys) who both write the tunes – compositions with a perfect structure: unison parts for the ears, fat and compact melody parts for the belly. The Unity eloborates by the additional bridges and solo parts. Without covering any artist they tribute songs to Herbie Hancock, Eddie Harris and Wild Cherry (Play That Funky Music).

Mellow Effects

All different influences of Funk are part of their musical repertoire : Jazz, Fusion and Rock. In this context the band uses only a few submissive effects in a very tasty way, like Feusi, when he puts his sax sound through a surprising Talkbox kind of effect.

The difference between The Clients Funk Society and most other Bands is their extraordinary balance of each musicians virtuosity and the collective understanding for this music. (Too) many bands of this style lack in technique, feeling or songwriting – not this band!Critics and the crowd would vote the same at the end of this night.

Basler Newspaper 17.03.2003 Marc Krebs