Mark King (musician)

Mark King
Mark King of Level 42 in San Francisco, California – 1986
Background information
Born	(1958-10-20) 20 October 1958 (age 58)
Origin	Cowes, Isle of Wight, England
Genres	Pop rock, jazz-funk, new wave
Occupation(s)	Singer, bassist
Instruments	Vocals, bass guitar, drums, guitar, keyboards, drum programming
Years active	1979–present
Labels	Polydor, RCA, Virgin, DFP Music
Associated acts	Level 42, M, Re-Flex, Jakko Jakszyk
Notable instruments
Thumb Jaydee Mark King Signature Alembic Mark King Signature Status Graphite "The KingBass" Mark King Signature

Mark King (born 20 October 1958) is an English musician. He is most famous for being the lead singer and bassist of the band Level 42. In the early 1980s, King popularized the 1970s slap style for playing the bass guitar by incorporating it into pop music.

King was born and brought up in Cowes, Isle of Wight, off the south coast of England. His father, Raymond King, was a dairyman, and the family lived in a tied dairy house. King recalled in a 2006 newspaper interview, "it was post-war, with one brass tap, an outside toilet and a zinc bath in front of the fire". He later lived on the Camp Hill and Albany prison estates on the outskirts of Newport. He attended Kitbridge Middle School where he met his childhood sweetheart Tracey Wilson, later writing a song about her. He then went to Cowes High School.

Originally, King began his musical career as a drummer (starting at the age of nine after his father bought him his first kit for £10) and learning guitar from the age of eleven. In 1974, when he was fifteen, King met a rival Isle of Wight drummer - his future Level 42 bandmate Phil Gould, who remembers that the young King "came and sat in with the band that I formed, at one of the gigs we were doing. He brought his kit down and blew me off, blew me off the stage because he was so much faster than me." Gould also remembers the young King as being a budding multi-instrumentalist, a "really good guitarist" who would "play around with programming, synth stuff. He was one of those natural musicians."

King received encouragement to pursue a career in music from his music teacher at middle school, but was asked to leave Cowes High School at the age of 17, when he turned up at school wearing denim jeans. King recalls in a magazine interview "It didn't go down very well, and I was told my schooling had run its course." King then left home and stayed at a friend's house for two weeks, sleeping on the floor, before getting a job on a production line. After quitting this job, King became a milkman, but he was still determined to "prove he was not a failure". So, at the age of 19, King moved to London, along with his milk van, in hope of finding a career in music. He played drums for the band Re-Flex in their early years, before starting his later career as a bass player.

King moved to London at the age of 19, subsequently forming Level 42 in 1979 with Phil Gould, keyboard player Mike Lindup and Phil's guitarist brother Boon. Although a drummer, King found himself having to learn bass after landing a job at Macari's. In an interview with the magazine Music U.K (Issue May 1984), he states: