Running in the Family by Level 42

Running in the Family, Level 42's seventh album, came out on Polydor in 1987, and it's the Isle of Wight jazz-funk outfit polished to a showroom gleam: slap-happy bass lines, glassy keyboards and choruses built to be sung back from the cheap seats. Wally Badarou produced, with Basing Street Studios in the credits, and the hits simply kept coming. "Lessons in Love" had already reached No. 3 in Britain in May 1986 and gone to No. 1 in Germany, Switzerland, Denmark and South Africa; the title track, "To Be with You Again", "It's Over" and "Children Say" followed it out the door, and all five went top 10 in the Netherlands.

It was also the end of an era. Brothers Phil Gould on drums and Boon Gould on guitar, worn out and unhappy with where the music was heading, made this their last Level 42 album of the decade. A Platinum Edition stuffed with remixes arrived before 1987 was out.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.