Mark King and the Gould brothers — Rowland (universally known as "Boon") and Phil — had all been brought up on the Isle of Wight and had played together in various bands during their teenage years. Phil Gould went on to study at London's Guildhall School of 
Music and Drama, where he met keyboard player Mike Lindup. Although Lindup was primarily studying piano, he had also taken a course in percussion alongside Phil. The two musicians found that they shared musical heroes: Miles Davis, John McLaughlin, Keith Jarrett and Jan Hammer.
By 1979, Mark King was also living and working in London. Both he and Phil Gould became involved in Robin Scott's pop project M — Gould contributed to the US number one single 'Pop Muzik'. Another musician who contributed to M was a renowned Afro-French keyboard and synthesizer player called Waliou "Wally" Badarou.
In late 1979, Phil introduced King and Lindup to each other and the band which would become Level 42 began to coalesce via loose rehearsal sessions, developing their own jazz-funk fusion style. The first of these incarnations featured Dominic Miller as guitarist, but he was soon replaced by Boon Gould on the latter's return from working in the United States (Miller would later find fame playing with Sting).
Initially, the instrumental responsibilities in the band were not easy to decide. Boon Gould was equally adept on six-string guitar and bass guitar, as well as playing saxophone. Like Phil Gould, Mike Lindup had trained as a percussionist and played drums in addition to keyboards. Although he also played guitar, Mark King was primarily a drummer but (after an ill-fated European venture) had recently had to sell his own drumkit in order to fund his journey back to the
UK. With Phil Gould set to take the drummer's role in the band (and Boon Gould established as the most skilled guitar player) it made most sense for King to use his own guitar-playing skills in order to take on the role of bass guitarist, so he volunteered to learn how to play the instrument.
At the time, King was working in a London music store, where he observed visiting American funk players demonstrating the thumb-slap bass guitar technique. King (already a notably flexible musician) was an extremely quick learner and developed his own soon-to-be-infamous slap-bass style in a matter of weeks. With the bass player position taken care of, Boon Gould could now concentrate on guitar, Mike Lindup on keyboards (and occasional percussion) and Phil Gould on drums. The band was soon christened Level 42.
Having maintained their links with Wally Badarou, Phil Gould and Mark King invited him to work with Level 42. Although he never formally joined the band, Badarou would become a fifth member in all but name: co-writing songs, playing keyboards and synthesizers in the studio and co-producing the records. King, Badarou and Lindup would generally write Level 42's music, with the Gould brothers concentrating mainly on lyrics.
After they were seen jamming together, the band were invited to sign to a small independent record label — Elite Records — in 1980. They were also encouraged to branch out into vocal music (previously, the band had been purely instrumental). They considered looking for a singer from outside the band, but eventually King and Lindup (with some reluctance) became the band's singers. They developed a complementary style, with Lindup's falsetto frequently used for harmonies and choruses while King's deep tenor generally led the verses.
"Boon" says : "bam bam tepaww - paw" ( thumb-slap bass )
here's the link :
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