From: Level42-request @ worldmachine.com (Level42 Digest) Subject: Level42 Digest V98 #116 _ ____ _ ____ _ _ ___ // //__ // / //__ // /__// __// //__ //__ \\_/ //__ //__ // /__ D I G E S T Level42 Digest Volume 98 : Issue 116 560 subscribers Today's topics: Post-WM in Canada MScore0696 New Drummers Brad Dietz Mugging Mark/DVD-42 DonZipf Gary Husband Video, Other Drummers Joey Vela L42 in USA Followup Dave Mock Level 42 in U.S Brian Runkle SATS US tour Mike p3099 songs jeff mahoney ------------------------------ Subject: Post-WM in Canada From: MScore0696 Date: Sat, 2 May 1998 12:04:16 EDT Fans: Some interesting postings regarding the downfall of L42 in North America has prompted me to put in my two cents. Here in Canada, RITF was very successful. The two singles and videos released here were LIL and RITF. If I remember correctly, the album was number 1 for at least a couple weeks on Toronto's CHUM-FM Top 30 chart. As we all know, things went downhill from there. The only single released from SATS was Two Hearts Collide. The album faded out quickly. When Levelbest was released I remember the CD and video being plentifully available in stores. TCOY was a short lived single on radio. The release of Guaranteed received no hype and was basicly invisible to the record buying public. I stumbled across it shortly after it was released. Of course no singles were released. I do remember hearing the title track played on radio once. And then the single largest travesty in music history was the fact that Forever Now was NEVER released in North America. This is almost unbelievable. FN could have been the "resurgence" of L42 in N.A. if released and promoted well. What a shame. I'll bet if they released it over here today, it would be popular on dance and pop radio stations. Anyhow, 'nuff said. Bonneville Mark "Your folks have waited up for you, now they've locked the door and turned out the lights." ------------------------------ Subject: New Drummers From: Brad Dietz Date: Sat, 02 May 1998 14:25:58 -0400 I have always wondered who would also sound good on the Level 42 gig. My votes would also go to- not in any particular order: Mark Cloned like that sheep, and his double on the drums... ;) Jeep MacNichol (The Samples) Phil Collins- maybe Manu Katche (Julia Fordham, etc..) John "Jr" Robinson (Lisa Loeb, etc...) John Molo (Bruce Hornsby)- probably the best choice (IMHO) with his workings with such a keyboard and drum machine oriented artist- plus he's damn good. Steve Smith (Steps Ahead, Journey) Jeff Porcaro (Toto, Michael Jackson, etc...) Peter Erskine (Weather Report, etc...) David Garibaldi (Tower of Power) Stuart Copeland (Police, Animal Logic) Vinne Coliuta (Sting, Frank Zappa, etc...) Animal (The Muppets) :) Myself... I wish... Neil Peart would be interesting since like Phil, also writes lyrics. -Brad ------------------------------ Subject: Mugging Mark/DVD-42 From: DonZipf Date: Sat, 2 May 1998 14:48:55 EDT > As far as the Mark King segment goes, I thought that the producers of > the video gave _way_ more face time to Mark than to any of the other > musicians. Of course, Mark WAS standing directly behind Gary, while all the other musicians featured stand off to the sides, as is normal. I think Mark is just compelled to take center stage any way he can! * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * > If there any fans who have adopted the DVD format already, I currently > heading up an effort to encode L42 assets to disc. Go for it, Maurice!!! There are at least a couple of us DVD fanatics on here. I currently have 41 DVD titles (wonder what lucky title will be the magic number) and a Sony DVP-S3000 player. My dream is to have Level 42 on DVD. Judging by the membership of this Digest, the release of such a disc would sell a few hundred more players! Z. ------------------------------ Subject: Gary Husband Video, Other Drummers From: "Joey Vela" Date: Sat, 02 May 1998 12:09:38 PDT Will, I agree with you about how Tony Thompson would have been a great Level 42 drummer. He was a classic "slam" funk drummer, nothing fancy, just the power of The One, where all things begin and end according to the Godfather of Funk, James Brown. How about these cats? Jerome "Big Foot" Brailey: He was perhaps my favorite P-Funk drummer of them all, very similar to Tony Thompson. Just listen to "Flashlight" and "Give Up the Funk". Imagine "The Sun Goes Down" with this guy. Nothing but The One. Dennis Chambers: Another P-Funk alum, he too could deliver The One with power, but he was very jazzy as well with lightning hands. Just listen to some of his single-stroke fills. He never played too many notes in my opinion. His style of play would have been right at home with the Level 42 we all know and love. Omar Hakim: Jazz/Fusion master who could subdivide a groove turn it around and back again and never lose The One. I loved Weather Report during his tenure. Tony Williams: The Late Great Tony Williams was perhaps the greatest funk-playing jazz drummer of them all. Again, he too had a mastery of delivering The One on time and with power, but he could also turn the drums into a "melodic" instrument at times, f@*#ing brilliant! In the end Phil Gould and Gary Husband proved to be just right for Level 42, but the band would have sounded "very interesting" indeed with any of these other masters. What do you think? Regards, Joey Vela ------------------------------ Subject: L42 in USA Followup From: Dave Mock Date: Sat, 2 May 1998 17:53:51 -0700 (PDT) Hey, Micro-Kids: A followup on my comments yesterday: 1) I meant to praise the remix of "Two Hearts Collide," not "Take A Look." 2) I see parallels in what happened to Level 42 after "Running in the Family" and what happened to Hall and Oates after "Big Bam Boom." That H&O album represented a change in stream, basically a hip-hop-influenced pop album, which probably cheesed off the rock portion of their audience. When Daryl and John came back with "Ooh Yeah," which sounded nothing like the old Daryl and John of "Voices" to "Rock and Soul" fame, they barely managed to go platinum. The duo hasn't maintained momentum since. TCOY, Dave ------------------------------ Subject: Level 42 in U.S From: brunkle @ bigreddog.com (Brian Runkle) Date: Sun, 3 May 1998 01:48:49 -0400 Thanks to everyone who gave their opinions on Level 42's fall from grace (in U.S). After thinking about all of this some more, does anyone feel that Level 42 lost a lot of their magic after Phil and Boon left? Don't get me wrong, the music from SATS, G, and FN is still very good. I just can't help but feel that after the Gould's departure, the band was never again the same. Ahh...The good ol' days!!! New question. Why did Level 42 break up? I know the basics that you all know, but I think their is another major reason...because they keep having musicians bail on them. Phil and Boon leave, in come Gary and Alan. With great respect, Alan passed away much too young and only recorded one album w/the band. Gary stayed on. Like a baby, (sorry Gary fans) Gary doesn't like playing to click tracks so he bailed.(musical differences) Guitar players have come and gone. They have been good musicians, but where is their commitment with the band??? I'm sure you all can imagine what a royal pain in the a*s it must be to take all this time to teach new musicians your material then have them leave. Process repeats again and again and again. You can't keep a band when members keep coming and going. Mark and Mike probably decided enough is enough. So after all of my ramblings...What do you think??? Brian brunkle @ bigreddog.com P.S. After watching "Fait Accompli", I think Alan Murphy's attitude toward the band was incredible. He would have stayed for as long as possible. He wouldn't have bailed on Mark and Mike! God rest his soul! ------------------------------ Subject: SATS US tour From: Mike p3099 Date: Sun, 3 May 1998 03:21:40 EDT Hi all, OK, this is the second person in as many days that mentioned that there was or at least was gonna be a Staring at the Sun support tour in the US. Did this actually happen? Were any of the dates played here in the Sates? I never knew. I though that I had seen the last club date (Austin) and one of the last opening act dates (Austin opening for Tina Turner) that they did in the US. On the Japanese Forever Now reissue again: I have listened to both of my copies of the Japanese issues of FN again and they do really seem to be identical. The # on the inner ring of the CDs themselves is identical as well. They were probably stamped from the same glass master. They both have the same bonus tracks as well. Ian, Morgan, Winston any new news on the reissue front? Do we have a date for the updated Greatest hits package or a schedule for the album reissues? Definite track lists, bonus tracks etc? > If there any fans who have adopted the DVD format already, I currently > heading up an effort to encode L42 assets to disc. Furthermore, I'm > also going to license select songs for transfer to High Density Audio > (HDA) at 96Khz 24bits deep. If none of you have ever heard audio at > this data rate, make sure your sitting down when you do as it can be > down right emotional. Bye-Bye CD's. BTW those of you who do live in > the area should come by my lab for a demo. This sounds very interesting. I can't wait to hear some good analog masters transfered to DVD. Is there actually an audio standard for DVD agreed to yet or are these DVDs with minimal video and alot of wide bandwidth audio added ala Classic Recs, Chesky etc.? Has there been any research into resolution enhancement for material that only exists on CD or on 44.1K 16bit masters? Audio Alchemy had and Camelot has devices that *enhance* the data from regualar CDs before sending it on to higher resolution DACs. I have considered investing in one of these devices to burn CDR copies of existing CDs. Transfer the data through such a device, store it as 20 bit data on hard disc and then brun it to CDR after dither and noiseshaping it back into 16 bit CD data while preserving some of the added resolution with the noiseshaping. While I'm at it. With all this talk of MTV: did anyone happen to catch or better yet tape an appearnace by Mark jamming live in the studio around the lunch hour back around the time that Wrold Machine was popular here in the States? I didn't get to see it but a guy that I work with described Mark and his playing to a T one day after going home for lunch and turning on MTV. I think that he said that he was being interviewed by Carolyn Heldman. If you have this on Tape I will gladly trade copies of anything I have for a copy. Cya, Mike ------------------------------ Subject: songs From: "jeff mahoney" Date: Sun, 3 May 1998 17:21:24 +1000 Hi level friends I have noticed that the Chinese Way has been getting a mention lately. No worries there but how about physical presence from world machine. It never gets a mention but its a great song. it leads into one of the best. and the finish Lying Still .........wow. i think that is my favourite Phil track. closely followed by Its Over. OK.......What are your favourite.... Mark Mike Phil Boon.........tracks For me..To Be With You Again.......mark Lasso the moon ...............mike Lying still..........................phil Anything by......................boon I don't know how i got into this tangent but what do you think. an impeccable groove cheers from sydney jeff