Super review by Cal Gibson, of The Secret Soul Society and Scruffy Soul Recordings.

Another joyful excavation from the Be With crew, this time around digging out Klaus Weiss’ seminal 1979 library banger, Sound Inventions, licensed from the German imprint, Selected Sound. Twenty-two small but perfectly formed funk nuggets are offered up by Klaus and his chums, each one clocking in at a couple of minutes, all of them liberally sprinkled with extra large helpings of boompty-boomp goodness. It’s a cornucopia of musical madness, a syncopated stroll through the minds of master musicians – a true delight. Drumcrazy, for example, rides a freaking fantastic synth bass line, the beats acrobatically vaulting all over the show – two and a half minutes of non-stop erotic cabaret for sure. Klaus making sure that the dancefloor is fired up and ready to roll.

The title cut is totally batshit crazy synth madness: arpeggiators set to ‘frankly ridiculous’ – this is cocktail hour shizzle gone completely schizoid, the sound of synthesizers running amok, scaring the children and adults alike. Not for the faint of heart.

Air Space is all low squelches and suspenseful builds: the sound of the future re-interred from the past, looking back in order to head forward. Destination: spaceflight. Look ma, no hands…

Those synth bass lines are back in force for Funky Art – phat, phunky and surrounded by chattering percussion and wicky wack guitar shapes: another two minutes of wonderment from the session guys, whipping up a studio storm.

A Few Cuts is even shorter – a minute and a half of butt-shaking groove, a distillation of pure funk. Tricky if you’re programming a set, perhaps, but get a couple of copies and you’re laughing. Indeed, to carp at the miniature nature of library tracks such as these would be to go against the very soul of the genre: these are little morsels of musicianship, dropped on the fly by players who can turn their hand to anything that’s asked of them. Midget musical gems, floating fancy free and full of life and joyfulness. Brilliant stuff all round. There’s a couple of equally cool Sammy Burdson albums coming too: Be With are once again (re)making the library the funkiest room in the house, no doubt.

Klaus Weiss Rhythm & Sounds` Sound Inventions can be ordered directly from Be With Records.