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Bundled in with the four albums they released in the second half of the 1980s are five (count them) CDs of live tracks, remixes, and instrumental versions. They may have been pop, but they were smart muso pop.ĭigging into all ten CDs in this chunky compilation yields some gems.
![staring at the sun level 42 album staring at the sun level 42 album](https://www.level42.com/wp-content/uploads/51uAlS90QYL.jpg)
Your colleagues listened to Kylie Minogue, but you had aspirational goals, and Level 42 were perfect for you. When you got that promotion you’d been working for, along with the high-performance saloon car, the unstructured suit, and a reserved seat in the wine bar of your choice, came a Level 42 CD. For many people who lived through that bizarre decade, Level 42 were a symbol of opulence and “grown-up” tastefulness. It’s a great big lump of UK jazz-funk, powered by Mark King’s signature slap bass, and it serves as a time capsule of polished ’80s pop as well as a cultural trope. We get all their releases from the obligatory double live album A Physical Presence to their swansong for Polydor, Staring at the Sun on this ten-CD set. The Complete Polydor Years 1985-1989 finishes the job that The Complete Polydor Years 1980-1984 started earlier this year.
#STARING AT THE SUN LEVEL 42 ALBUM FULL#
That band was Level 42, and they were full of surprises. In the UK, fighting for airtime between MC Hammer, REO Speedwagon, and Wham! were a band who started as Mahavishnu Orchestra fanboys and ended up as an unlikely pop sensation. You may have put down your Rubik’s Cube long enough to turn on the radio. Album DescriptionThe 1980s were pretty weird, weren’t they? When you weren’t squirting gallons of hair spray onto your mullet and making sure your shoulder pads were large enough to land a helicopter on. See More Your browser does not support the audio element.
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Now out of print, Staring at the Sun is, by far, the least essential album in Level 42's catalog. It would take Level 42 several more years to release an album that would even come close to restoring the quality of its previous releases (Forever Now, which became the band's swan song).
![staring at the sun level 42 album staring at the sun level 42 album](http://cps-static.rovicorp.com/3/JPG_500/MI0000/747/MI0000747077.jpg)
It became a big hit in the U.K., charting at number two, but went nowhere in the States. It might be easy to excuse the band for losing enthusiasm after all, it lost two key members along the way, and perhaps Level 42 was pressured into repeating its newfound American success. Worst of all, Mark King who, over the course of the band's existence was becoming a more expressive and effective vocalist, sounds bored and uninspired, particularly on "Two Hearts Collide." And Mike Lindup's complementary falsetto background vocals are barely used this time around. The rock-ish "Heaven in my Hands" is catchy enough, and the Mike Lindup-penned ballad "Silence" is the album's best song.but the rest of this stuff! "Man" sounds like bad '70s art rock (complete with pretentious spoken word narration), "Two Hearts Collide" is flat and completely void of purpose, and "I Don't Know Why" boasts some of the most inane lyrics ever written for an album by a major band ("I don't know why.I love you like I do.but baby I love you.and always I'll be true".ugh.) (Murphy died in 1989.)Ĭonsidering the poor quality of the songs on Staring at the Sun, the sluggish performances are perfectly understandable. The usual awe-inspiring musicianship displayed on the band's previous releases is non-existent here. Veteran session musicians Alan Murphy (guitar) and Gary Husband (drums) joined Level 42 the year Staring at the Sun was released while their talent and capabilities are obvious, the lifeless performances on the album suggest a severe lack of chemistry and direction. Level 42 would never fully recover from the loss of the two key players their departure severely affected the band's sound. Founding members Phil and Boon Gould, the band's primary songwriters, left the group prior to the making of Staring at the Sun. Level 42's most visible members had always been bassist/vocalist Mark King and keyboardist/vocalist Mike Lindup. success was short-lived Staring at the Sun, released in 1988, tanked, for an obvious reason: the album just isn't good. success by 1986 with the albums World Machine and Running in the Family.
#STARING AT THE SUN LEVEL 42 ALBUM SERIES#
But Level 42 distinguished itself by combining R&B and jazz influences (Earth, Wind & Fire, Stanley Clarke, Average White Band) with a strong pop sensibility, churning out a series of successful albums and Top Ten singles. In the early 1980s, most newly successful British bands like Duran Duran and Depeche Mode were knee deep in the synth pop/new romantic/new wave/post-punk/whatever movement.
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Purchase and download this album in a wide variety of formats depending on your needs.