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The Royal Albert Hall London - 14th October 1994 - The Last Level 42 Concert
This was it, the big one, the final, the ultimate appearance of Level 42. The news had been released to unsuspecting fans by
Mark King, only a couple of weeks earlier, at the Portsmouth Guildhall concert. Fans had been distraught, upset and dazed by
what seemed to be a very sudden decision taken by Mark and Mike, The decision had been taken 7 to 10 days earlier, during
the tour of Japan.
So there we sat and waited for the show to begin, and occupied ourselves by trying to recognise friends and fan club members
that we had not seen for a while. Finally at 8:50 pm, for one last time, Level 42 appeared. The songs they played were:
The Main Set - Hot Water, Forever Now, Living It Up, Mr. Pink, One In A Million, World Machine, Model Friend, Kansas
City Milkman, Heaven In My Hands, It's Over, Love In A Peaceful World, Running In The Family, Lessons In Love,
Something About You.
The Encore: Dune Tune, a bit of Love Games leading into a Bass solo, All Over You, The Chinese Way.
The concert lasted approximately one and a half hours and the band included Mark, Mike, Jakko, Gary Barnacle, John Thirkle
and Gavin Harrison on drums. During the evening I half expected Phil Gould, Boon and Gary Husband to turn up and sit in, but
that did not happen. I also wondered if Annie McCaig might appear and then magically take up her old places just behind Mike
Lindup.
Mark was using an Alemic bass and Trace Elliot kit. He swapped his Alembic after playing Kansas City Milkman, presumably
to take advantage of a new set of strings about halfway through the set.
Mike had a couple of interesting keyboards on stage. One being the Rhodes electric piano and the other looked like his Roland
Jupiter 8 (which he always said was too fragile to travel). Unfortunately I was not near enough to the stage to get a good view
of the Jupiter as most of the fan club members were at the front of the hall.
It was a good night and enjoyed by a full house, that included, Mr. & Mrs. Ray King (Mark's mum and Dad), Mrs. Nadia
Cattouse (Mike's mum) and his sister Pepita, Howard from 'Take That', comedian Lenny Henry and Carl Palmer from ELP.
Some really enjoyable moments were:
- Just before "Lessons in Love" when Mike took off his jacket and wagged his finger at the audience in a mock gesture.
He seemed to be saying, now lets get down to it.
- The slim blond girl in the sleeveless yellow top that danced all night long in front of Mr. & Mrs. King's box. I wonder if
she will ever know that she danced all night for Mark's mum and Dad.
- Just before "Something About You" when Mark shouted out, "Are You Really Okay", at that time Albert Hall was really
in the groove with ALL the balconies dancing.
- Then the Bass solo, with the entire audience shouting "go, go, go" and finally when Mark said "sing out one last time with
us' (the Chinese Way).
Thank you London. (from the last fanclub newsletter) |
