At the beginning of their career,
Level 42 was squarely a jazz-funk fusion band, contemporaries of fellow Brit funk groups like Atmosfear, Light of the World, Incognito, and Beggar & Co. By the end of the '80s, however, the band -- whose music was instantly recognizable from
Mark King's thumb-slap bass technique and associate member Wally Badarou's synthesizer flourishes -- had crossed over to the point where they were often classified as sophisti-pop and dance-rock, equally likely to be placed in the context of Sade and the Style Council as any group that made polished, upbeat, danceable pop/rock. The band's commercial peak came with 1985's
World Machine, but they continued to record and tour sporadically throughout the '90s and 2000s.
Featuring
Mark King (bass, vocals),
Phil Gould (drums),
Boon Gould (guitar), and
Mike Lindup (keyboards), the band formed in 1979. Before they released their first single, "Love Meeting Love," the band was pushed to add vocals to their music in order to give it a more commercial sound; they complied, with
King becoming the lead singer. Released in 1981, their self-titled debut album was a slick soul-R&B collection that charted in the U.K. Top 20, resulting in the release of
The Early Tapes.
Level 42 had several minor hit singles before 1984's "The Sun Goes Down (Living It Up)" hit the British Top Ten. Released in late 1985,
World Machine broke the band worldwide; "Lessons in Love" hit number one in Britain and "Something About You" hit number seven in America. Their next two records,
Running in the Family (1987) and
Staring at the Sun (1988), were a big success in the U.K., yet only made some headway in the U.S. Both of the Gould brothers left the band in late 1987; they were replaced by guitarist
Alan Murphy and drummer
Gary Husband.
Murphy died of AIDS-related diseases in 1989; he was replaced by the renowned fusion guitarist
Alan Holdsworth for 1991's
Guaranteed. The band followed
Guaranteed in 1995 with
Forever Now.
Throughout the remainder of the ‘90s and the 2000s, the band’s lineup fluctuated, with
King the lone constant and his brother, guitarist Nathan King, on-board since 2001.
Level 42 released a studio album, Retroglide, in 2006. Four years later, the band celebrated its 30th anniversary with a special tour, as well as a box set, Living It Up, which included a disc of fresh acoustic versions recorded by
Mark King and Lindup.
–
Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rovi