LEVEL 42
(UK, sixteen Top 40 hits, nine Top 40 albums)

SCRUBBED-CLEAN, SWEATING Essex four-piece whose enormous success and popularity concealed a deep artistic unhappiness on the part of half their personnel. Back in '81, a quartet of highly-respected Britfunksters at the top of their game decided to go pop and, with principles duly abandoned, made a top-drawer fist of it. After a slow start (of six releases from '80 to '82, only "Love Games" got there, peaking at No.38), they filled the airwaves consistently with lovable pop songs. With the soft-top sports car and white towel sock brigade firmly in the past, these four consummate musicians carved out a career which never quite left the B-list but still gained them serious respect from everyone but themselves and their ilk. Diminutive, blond vocalist Mark King, whose voice managed somehow to combine monotony with character (rare, to say the least) earned an extra reputation as, quite simply, the best bass guitarist in the world.  

FALSETTO

That may well be untrue, but his thwackety-thwack thumbs became almost a gimmick for Level 42 once they scored their first noticeable hit with "The Chinese Way" (“words softly spoken in Cantonese”) in '83, which got to No.24, before scraping into the Top 10 in the summer of the same year with the marching "The Sun Goes Down (Livin' It Up)" ("though I live on the edge, time is on my side, all the doors to my life are open wide"). Their third proper hit came in '84, the riproaring "Hot Water" ("here it comes again, chugging like a train") which radio listeners later part heard each week after DJ Bruno Brookes bastardised the grenade-like intro for his chart rundown music bed. From '85 onwards, King was always backed up larynctically by keyboard player Mike Lindup, whose falsetto bridgework between King's more earthy verse and chorus delivery also provided a trademark as they plundered into the upper echelons time and again. The outstanding "Something About You" ("oh, drawn into the streams of undefined illusion, those diamond dreams, they can't disguise the truth") got to No.6, accompanied by well-acted black and white video; the pleasant, slower "Leaving Me Now" ("and I suppose you're leaving me now, I was so sure, now I'm so full of doubt") reached No.15. In '86, they scored their biggest hit with "Lessons In Love" ("all the dreams that we were building, we never fulfilled them") which peaked at No.3 and sold more singles in Europe than any other that year, and in '87, they added to a plum slot as Madonna's support act in the States by putting three consecutive singles into the Top 10 - to wit, the bizarre King-clan childhood recall song "Running In The Family" ("on the back seat of the car with Joseph and Emily") which hit No.6; the funky "To Be With You Again" ("can you feel me reaching out to you?") and the tear-jerking "It's Over" ("and I won't take no souvenirs, no perfume, picture, promises, because it's over"), both of which found No.10. Then it started to go belly up.

PRINCIPLES

The other half of the tight quartet, brothers Boon and Phil Gould - guitar and drums - walked out, claiming afterwards that they had lived a lie over the last seven years by performing material which went against their musical principles. King and Lindup soldiered on into '88, where "Heaven In My Hands" ("I'm drowning on dry land") became their last recognisable hit, getting to No.12, as new guitarist Alan Murphy settled in. The star was waning, though their three remaining singles of the decade still made the Top 40, and they weren't quitters, tirelessly continuing to bash out stuff from the production line with reasonable success until tragedy struck in '91 when Murphy died of an AIDS-related illness. You had to hand it to King and Lindup - they battled on as a twosome with hangers-on doing the sticks and solos and were still making records and sometimes finding the 30-40 zone until '94, when they finally called it a day. Hindsight hints at a slight naffness about them when analysing their '85-'87 heyday, but we don't buy that - they made chirpy and safe music and had not a hint of scandal, controversy or ego about them, but they also made their money, pleased a nation, and had a bassist so damned talented that his hands were insured for a cool million by his record company. That's good going. We salute them.

Biggest Hit: "Lessons In Love", No.3, 1986
Defining Moment: Thunderthumbs.

Matt