extra! INTERVIEW

10 extra! INTERVIEWextra!

Part one of a great two part story Mark King: Milk float to cream of the crop

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW BY PETER WHITE

When Mark King left the Isle of Wight High School for turning up in denim in a milk van that cost him just £35, jeans, and he made his sharp exit he had only one thing on his mind – to without any qualifications. He then prove to himself and others that he was drifted in and out of work before not a failure. taking over a milk round. As a rebellious teenager Mark was He recalls that as he delivered unceremoniously asked to leave Cowes his gold tops around the streets 11 extra! INTERVIEW

'I know it's very un-English to blow your own “I had just started going to Cowes High School, and one summer holiday I stayed with a mate at Thorness Bay. trumpet' I just happened to go into the holiday centre, and they did this thing where any kids could get up on stage and of Cowes he often saw former school Level 42 have 30 hit singles as well as a have a play. mates, either on university leave, or string of massive-hit albums. “I jumped up and played the drums; firmly established in white collar jobs. He reflected with a smile: “Yes, we gave it ‘seven bells’. Later Martin and But he remained undeterred. He had have been around a long time. You Annie came round to our house, told his own dreams, and as he headed off wouldn’t want to hold your breath for mum and dad what I had done, and to London in his Bedford van he was 30 years. We have had great success, asked me to join their band. We were determined to fulfil them. and you can only do that if you have playing three times a week at places Seven years later Mark returned to been around as long as us. I know it like the Gurnard Hotel, the Woodvale the Island as founder member and is very un-English to blow your own Hotel and the Ryde Queen - even the lead singer of Level 42, one of the trumpet, but there it is, and no one can Albany Prison Officers’ Club.” most successful bands of the 1980s take it away from us.” Just before his 14th birthday Mark and 1990s, not just in this country but Mark grew up on the Island when the joined group ‘Joe Bear’ and soon met worldwide. His rags-to-riches journey music scene was particularly vibrant. Phil and Boon Gould, who also became was all but complete, but he was not The holiday industry was so strong here founder members of Level 42. He the kind to rest on his laurels and count that there were always places to play – smiled: “It was fantastic grounding. his royalties. hotels, restaurants, bars, theatres and We were playing chart hits of the day Level 42 have recently celebrated the even the end of the pier. and a few old standards – a few little 30th anniversary of their formation He recalls: “I was born in Northwood. quicksteps in between other acts like with a nationwide tour, having opened My dad joined the Prison Service in some guy walking on glass or doing a September’s Isle of Wight Bestival to 1960, and we moved to Camp Hill bit of magic. Then when it got round to wide acclaim. In the first part of this when I was three. Then we lived at 11.0pm and ‘last orders’ we were really exclusive two-part interview, Mark talks Albany before we moved to Gurnard. belting it out.” openly about his early days in music, When I was 11 I started in a group He said: “When you sit and reminisce his dead-end jobs, and the delight and called Pseudo Foot with Martin and about these things it is quite funny. It satisfaction of a career that has seen Annie Cave and Dave Jolliffe. 12 extra! INTERVIEWextra! 'I slept on the floor two weeks and felt very alone'

has been 30 years, and that is a career. turn up in denims. It didn’t go down Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’. I was there My dad was a prison officer for 31 very well, and I was told my schooling for three months, and it was that bad I years. Mum and dad wanted me to be had run its course. just couldn’t do it anymore. happy, and were so supportive. They “I went home and told my dad I had “Then I heard someone up the drove me around all the pubs and finished school, and he told me to road was looking for a milkman, so clubs to play when I was 11. They did pack my bags and not come back until I went and asked if I could take over it for me until I could drive. I never I knew what I was going to do. He said the round. I loved the job and did it had any doubts that music was what he wasn’t going to work every day for a year, but still had this burning I wanted to do. Of course my school while I was just sitting around doing ambition to prove I was not a failure.” had other ideas, and the careers nothing. I went for two weeks, stayed So at the age of 19 it was time for master at Cowes told me it was not at a mate’s house sleeping on the floor Mark to take the big step away from going to happen, and get the bee out and feeling very alone. the Island and head for London. In the of my bonnet. “It occurred to me that I had to do March edition of EXTRA! read how “I remember asking him why did something, so I got a job – the only Mark and his mates formed Level 42, the best drummer have to come from one available for someone with no how the band got its unusual name, New York or London – why couldn’t qualifications - on the production line and how he eventually returned to the he come from Gurnard? I was asked at Ronson Lighters along Forest Road. to leave school when I was 17 because It was terrible just sitting there with Island a millionaire. I thought it would be a great idea to your bit to do. It was like ‘One Flew

'I just wanted to prove I was not a failure'

13 MARCH 2011 11 Level 42 step up to be Kings of music

68 MARCH 2011 'We were waiting for our ship to come in, and then we all suddenly realised our ship was right there with us'

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW BY PETER WHITE

Island music icon Mark King completed leave Cowes High School for turning up career-changing move. He said: “I an incredible rise from delivering milk in denim jeans, to a guy who was hell bought the Bedford van I had been around the streets of Cowes to fronting bent on proving his critics wrong. using to deliver milk, put a partition in Level 42, one of the country’s most Now in this final instalment, Mark it and a bed. My mum made curtains, successful bands of the 1980s and tells of his decision to take the big step and I drove to London and slept in 1990s, who still command a worldwide off the Island in a converted milk van it for about a fortnight until I found audience 30 years on. to find fame and fortune in London; lodgings.” In the January edition of Island Life how Level 42 was formed, and how the Mark found a job in a music shop, and Extra, Mark gave readers an intriguing unusual band name was hatched. within months he had met up again insight into how he changed from a While out delivering milk Mark with brothers Phil and Boon Gould, rebellious teenager who was asked to decided it was time to take a massive who he knew from the Island, and Mike

MARCH 2011 6969 island life extra! - interview www.visitislandlife.com

Lindup. He said: “We got together to bass by revealing: “Although I had going to get this lot home’? So when to do a bit of ‘jamming’ as we were a job in this music shop they didn't I got home I used to pick up the bass waiting for our ship to come in, so to sell drums. I had been out to Austria guitar and started ‘drumming’ on it. It speak. to play, but having starved out there was all about right place, right time.” “We all wanted to make it in bands, for a couple of months, the guys I had Joker Mark smiled: “In the 1991 Blues but at the time we didn’t realise our been working with got me a ticket and Soul Bass Players’ poll I was voted ship was coming in right there. We home, and said they would send my best bass player in the world after 12 were waiting to join a band and we drum kit on later, which of course never months. As far as I was concerned it were in it. Within two months of being happened. was well deserved, because look at all together, a guy came along to listen “I went back to get my drums, and the hard work I had put in – all in a to us, with me playing bass guitar, and saw them for sale in a shop window. year!” that was the start of it. Playing bass It was my ‘Clint Eastwood moment’ as He returned to the Island a millionaire was supposed to be a stop-gap until I went steaming into the shop saying: after seven years of massive success I went back to drums, but it never ‘Those are mine’. Then I stood there with Level 42, saying: “It was my goal happened.” on a pavement in the middle of Vienna to be a millionaire by the time I was 30. Mark explained his switch from drums with a drum kit thinking ‘how am I I did it by the time I was 27.”

70 MARCH 2011 www.visitislandlife.com island life extra! - interview

On his return he felt the one thing the Stranglers, The Sex Pistols – always a Island needed was the re-instating of the statement, and quite hard. Festival. He said: “People around the world “We wanted something different and would ask me where I came from. When I decided to call our band just by a number. said the Isle of Wight they all knew about the At first it was going to be 88 because that 1970 Festival – Jimi Hendrix and all that. was the number of the bus we would jump “I spoke to a lot of people about re-starting on to go to practice. But there was another the Festival, but at the time there were such band already out there called Rocket 88. negative vibes. It was 1989, and it was like Then I was reading a book ‘Hitch Hikers...’ banging your head against a brick wall. and thought what could be more pretentious Maybe the Island wasn’t ready, but I would than the meaning of life? like to think that was the first hammer blow “In the book the computer works out what in getting the Festival back.” the meaning of life is, and seven million years Finally, Mark explained why he and his later the computer comes up with the answer mates opted for the name Level 42. He – 42! The ‘Level’ bit was put on by our first said: “It is from the book ‘Hitch Hikers producer Andy Sojka who said we couldn’t Guide to the Galaxy’. It is the meaning of have just ‘42’ because it still sounded like the life. When we began in1980 all the bands number of a bus.” had aggressive names like the Clash, The 'The first hammer blow to getting the festival back on the Island'

'My Clint Eastwood moment in the middle of Vienna'

MARCH 2011 7171