Songoftheday 6/11/15 -For restless eyes egos burn and the mold is hard to break, now we've waded in too deep and love is overboard...

"Lessons In Love" - Level 42
from the album Running In The Family (1987)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #12 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 10

Today's SOTD comes from the British jazz-pop band Level 42, who finally broke through on American shores in 1986 with one of the absolute best singles of the 80's if not of all time, "Something About You". The following year they released their seventh album, Running In The Family. Carrying on the same funky sonics that made its predecessor such a hit but with even more brighter songs, the album's first single, "Lessons In Love", made a similar splash all over the world. Written by members Mark King and "Boon" Gould with longtime collaborator and co-producer Wally Badarou, the song swirls around King's fluid bassline...

"Lessons In Love" became Level 42's second and so far most recent top-40 hit in America in June of 1987, while also climbing to #12 on Billboard's Dance Club Play chart. Internationally, the record was a huge hit, topping the singles chart in Germany, Spain, Finland, and Switzerland, going runner-up in the Netherlands.and Italy, and #3 in Ireland and their native Britain. "Lessons In Love" was one of four top-10 hits in the UK from the album, but would also mark their last (so-far, that is) with the appropriately-titled "It's Over". Boon left shortly after touring behind the Running In The Family album, as did brother and original drummer Phil Gould. The band carried on, having moderate success until their most recent top-40 UK hit in 1994, "Love In A Peaceful World". The act still tours led by King...

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Here's the band on tour in 1987 at Wembley Arena...

..and again at the Prince's Trust in 1989...

Fast forward to a live show from 2010...

...and lastly from a radio show in the Netherlands...

Up tomorrow: one of the most deceptively lonely dance songs, by one of the biggest stars of the decade.