BBC Radio 2 in the Park - Sunday

Flytjendur

• BBC Radio 2 in the Park
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  Simple Minds

  Widely popular Scottish art rock outfit, Simple Minds found huge fame in the 1980s, best known for their breakthrough hit single, "Don't You (Forget About Me)" which established the act on both sides of the Atlantic.

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  Level 42

  Internationally popular Brit-funk quartet best known in the UK for their hits 'Lessons in Love', 'Something About You' and 'The Sun Goes Down (Living It Up)'. Level 42 started life on the Isle Of Wight, Though their membership has fluctuated throughout the years, the original and perhaps best-known lineup consisted of Mark "Thunderthumbs" King (vocals & bass), Mike Lindup (vocals & keyboards) and brothers Boon Gould (guitar) and Phil Gould (drums). After the success of the Running In The Family album, Phil & Boon left the band, citing musical differences & nervous exhaustion as their respective reasons. They were replaced by Gary Husband on drums and former Go West & Kate Bush guitarist, Alan Murphy.
  
  At the end of the 80s, Mark King was recognized as one of the best bass players in the world having pioneered the 'slap and pull' technique, treating the bass as a percussion instrument. His style and virtuosity still are hugely influential, considering he also sang while he played very difficult basslines.
  
  King and Lindup continued under the Level 42 name, picking up new musicians along the way (including Gary Husband and the late Alan Murphy, who passed away after suffering from an AIDS related illness in October 1989) from the late 1980s through to 1994, when Forever Now became their last commercially-released album.
  
  King continued to perform with an new lineup under the Level 42 name until recently. He and Lindup again joined forces in the autumn of 2006 to release their first album in over a decade called Retroglide.
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  James Blunt

  Cockney rhyming slang for the good stuff; Proof that one song is all you need.
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  Blue

  Blue is a popular English pop and R&B group that have sold over 16 million records worldwide, formed in 2000 in London, England.

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  Cast
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  Deacon Blue

  Thirty-five years since their debut single, Dignity, and millions of record sales since, Deacon Blue are digging out all their old 45s - the Top 10s, the favourites, the sing-a-long rarities - and touring the UK & Ireland in September / October 2023. The band have always thrived onstage, but they’ve never played gigs quite like this: they’ll perform two sets, with no support. The first half will be an intimate acoustic show, and then they’ll go electric for a raucous trip across their hits.

  Vocalist and songwriter Ricky Ross is raring to go on this celebration of Deacon Blue’s brilliant and loyal fans, roaring the Caledonian gospel from the South Coast to the Uplands. “We’ve decided to play a Greatest Hits show with a difference,” he says. “Yes, we intend to play all (or nearly all) the old 45s, but we also want the first half of the evening to be an intimate acoustic performance, the band gathered round the piano with acoustic guitars and whatever Dougie decides to hit. We’ll play some album tracks and reinterpret a few favourites from the back catalogue. We’ll take a short break then come back and make a lot of noise. We hope you can be part of that noise.”

  Kicking off in the birthplace of pop (as Ross’s recent memoir attests, everything comes back to The Beatles), the tour will launch in Liverpool (at the M&S Bank Arena) - a city which has long held a special place in the band’s collective heart - before travelling the length of the land. Ross, co-vocalist Lorraine McIntosh, Dougie Vipond (drums), Jim Prime (keyboards), Gregor Philp (guitar) and Lewis Gordon (bass) will breathe new life into well-loved songs like Dignity, Loaded, Wages Day, Real Gone Kid, I’ll Never Fall In Love Again, Your Swaying Arms, Twist & Shout, Your Town, The Hipsters and City Of Love. And so many more.

  The dates will culminate in a homecoming show at Glasgow’s OVO Hydro, a stone’s throw away from the Finnieston Crane, which defined their debut album, Raintown. It’s a suitably celebratory space for the final fling on a special tour of Deacon Blue’s greatest hits - and the rest - as they reel in the years and the ships and the songs, in the hurricane days and summers and suns, amplified and unplugged, surrounded by friends in cities of love.

• Appleton