For this week’s reviews, the HOT-4-U camp would like to dedicate this installment to our homey who’ll soon be gettin’ married, Mr. Ken ‘Botak’ Tan. We do hope the vibe and music here will continue to inspire his life between the sheets and hopefully help spring out some junior botaks in the near future. With that said, we tilt our Kangols to our bruddah-in-arms, wishing him everlasting love and funk eternal. Yammmmmmmmmmm Seng!
Artiste: Level 42
Album: Level 42
Spotlight Track: Love Games
Label: Polydor Records
Mark King: Bass, Vocals, Percussion
Mike Lindup: Minimoog, Acoustic & Electric Pianos, Vocals, Percussion
Philip Gould: Drums, Glockenspiel, Timbales, Backing Vocals, Percussion
Boon Gould: Guitars
Wally Badarou: Prophet 5, Korg Polyphonic, Minimoog, Vocalising
Guest Musicians:
Leroy Williams: Congas, Bongos, Percussion
Gary Barnacle: Electric Sax
Dave Chambers: Tenor Sax
Albeit bullshit weather and even shittier whiteboy food, it’s comforting to know that England can at least boast housing one of the best 80s pop bands ever to have existed… yes yes y’all.. it’s Level 42! With high calibre musicianship – not only from Mark ‘Thunderthumbs’ King – courtesy of Mike Lindup (keyboards), Boon Gould (guitars) and Phil Gould (skins), the band have sold more than 30 million albums worldwide! Phewwwwweeeeeeee!!
Hailing from The Isle of Wight, Level 42 was formed in 1980 as a jazz-funk fusion band. Now, just after recording their very first single “Love Meeting Love”, Wally Badarou – a renowed synthesiser / instrumental keyboardist – joined the band and became Level 42’s longtime co-producer. Although Wally only ever played in the studio with Level 42, he was known as the band’s unofficial “5th member”. Personally I believe Wally was instrumental for infusing the right belachan funk into the Level 42 sound and his production ideas were definately critical in contributing toward the success of their best selling LPs.
With the brillance of Wally Badarou in place, Level 42 was on course for snazz-jazz heaven and our spotlight track for today – which was their first Polydor single – ‘Love Games’, really slams the funk in the listeners’ face and was a small prelude to the quality offerings this band was capable of.
There’s so many things to check out in this song, I really don’t know where to begin, but take a careful listen to Mark King’s percussive slap bass technique here which really drives the groove home. The vibe is so steam, you cannot help but cram your face everytime the b-line twangs or when Mike Lindup scats in his flying falsetto style. Hands down BAD ASS!!
This album as well, although meant to be more a jazzfunk installment than a pop record, is totally super tiok with other rocksteady tracks like Starchild (heavily sampled by Kenny Dope and many others), 43, Why Are You Leaving and Dune Tune. Highly recommended record if you’re feeling up for a funky jazz fusion afternoon ; )
To end off, I’ld like to point you to some YouTube gems I’ve discovered on Level 42. Take some time to peep these performances if you can.. u won’t regret!
1) Love Games – Live 1981 performance @ Top Of The Pops >> FUNK COCK STAND!!
2) Something About You – Live 1987 performance @ Wembley Stadium >> bloody matured lyrics and the band’s vibe here is spot on.. goosebumps galore!
3) Starchild Part 1 & Starchild Part 2 – Live 1983 performance >> to call this clip a rarity is an understatement.. BEYOND SPEECHLESS…
So there you go folks. Not only are you gettin’ the low down on my favourite 80s pop band but you also get to see them in their funky drainpipe jeans.. bestest!
“Fragile but free…” Phoooooooo, mad lyrics….
Tangkap This!!!
-Crispian
