Sea Level was an American rock band from Macon, Georgia. Formed in 1976, the band was an offshoot of

the Allman Brothers Band The Allman Brothers Band was an American rock band formed in Jacksonville, Florida in 1969 by brothers Duane Allman (founder, slide guitar and lead guitar) and Gregg Allman (vocals, keyboards, songwriting), as well as Dickey Betts (lead guit ...

. Between 1977 and 1980, the band released five studio albums which incorporated elements of funk, blues and

Latin music Latin music ( Portuguese and es, música latina) is a term used by the music industry as a catch-all category for various styles of music from Ibero-America (including Spain and Portugal) and the Latino United States inspired by Latin Amer ...

. Sea Level took on a life of its own as tensions grew between

Gregg Allman Gregory LeNoir Allman (December 8, 1947 – May 27, 2017) was an American musician, singer and songwriter. He was known for performing in the Allman Brothers Band. Allman grew up with an interest in rhythm and blues music, and the Allman Br ...

and other members resulting in the loss of two of ABBs founding members. After the Allman Brothers Band broke up when Gregg Allman and Dicky Betts left, the remaining members who evolved into Sea Level were "We Three" comprising

bass Bass or Basses may refer to: Fish * Bass (fish), various saltwater and freshwater species Music * Bass (sound), describing low-frequency sound or one of several instruments in the bass range: ** Bass (instrument), including: ** Acoustic bass gu ...

ist

Lamar Williams Lamar Williams (January 14, 1949 – January 21, 1983) was an American musician best known for serving as the bassist of The Allman Brothers Band (1972–1976) and Sea Level (1976–1980). Early years Williams was born in Gulfport, Mississippi, ...

, drummer

Jaimoe John Lee Johnson (born July 8, 1944), frequently known by the stage names Jai Johanny Johanson and Jaimoe, is an American drummer and percussionist. He is best known as one of the founding members of the Allman Brothers Band. Johanson played ...

and piano player

Chuck Leavell Charles Alfred Leavell (born April 28, 1952) is an American musician. A member of the Allman Brothers Band throughout their commercial zenith in the 1970s, he subsequently became a founding member of the band Sea Level. He has served as the pri ...

. The trio would occasionally open shows for the group in 1975 and 1976. The trio added

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected string ...

ist Jimmy Nalls and took their name from the

phonetic Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds, or in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sign. Linguists who specialize in studying the physical properties of speech are phoneticians. ...

pun of their new

bandleader A bandleader is the leader of a music group such as a rock or pop band or jazz quartet. The term is most commonly used with a group that plays popular music as a small combo or a big band, such as one which plays jazz, blues, rhythm and blues o ...

Chuck Leavell's name: "C. Leavell." They toured relentlessly, experimenting and refining their sound, eventually signing with

Capricorn Records Capricorn Records was an independent record label founded by Phil Walden and Frank Fenter in 1969 in Macon, Georgia. Capricorn Records is often credited by music historians as creating the southern rock genre. History Label and studio fou ...

(home of the Allman Brothers) and recording their self-titled debut album in 1977.

Musical style

Sea Level's music fuses elements of funk, blues,

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power ...

and

rock music Rock music is a broad genre of popular music that originated as "rock and roll" in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles in the mid-1960s and later, particularly in the United States and ...

. A

jam band A jam band is a musical group whose concerts (and live albums) are characterized by lengthy improvisational " jams." These include extended musical improvisation over rhythmic grooves and chord patterns, and long sets of music which often ...

, Sea Level's sound has been classified as

southern rock Southern rock is a subgenre of rock music and a genre of Americana. It developed in the Southern United States from rock and roll, country music, and blues and is focused generally on electric guitars and vocals. Author Scott B. Bomar specul ...

jazz rock Jazz fusion (also known as fusion and progressive jazz) is a music genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and improvisation with rock music, funk, and rhythm and blues. Electric guitars, amplifiers, and key ...

, and funk pop.

Career

After the release of their first album, the group expanded to a

septet A septet is a formation containing exactly seven members. It is commonly associated with musical groups but can be applied to any situation where seven similar or related objects are considered a single unit, such as a seven-line stanza of poetry. ...

with the additions of Davis Causey (

), George Weaver (

drums A drum kit (also called a drum set, trap set, or simply drums) is a collection of drums, cymbals, and other auxiliary percussion instruments set up to be played by one person. The player (drummer) typically holds a pair of matching drumsticks ...

, percussion) and

Randall Bramblett Randall Bramblett (born 1948) is an American musician and singer-songwriter, whose career as a solo artist, session player, and touring musician, has spanned more than three decades. He has worked with Gregg Allman, Bonnie Raitt, Goose Creek S ...

(

saxophone The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of Single-reed instrument, single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed (mouthpi ...

s, keyboards and

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or witho ...

). That configuration recorded the group's second album, ''Cats on the Coast'', in 1978 (with the leadoff track, "That's Your Secret", reaching #50 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100). By the time of the third album, '' On the Edge'', Jaimoe and Weaver had both left, replaced by Joe English. The sextet of Bramblett, Causey, English, Leavell, Nalls and Williams recorded the fourth album, ''Long Walk on a Short Pier'' (1979), unreleased in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

for nearly twenty years, adding

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...

ist Matt Greeley for their fifth and final album, ''Ball Room'', issued on Arista in 1980. Their greatest hits album (CD) wrapped up their body of work, minus a handful of appearances on various compilation albums (mostly

Southern Rock Southern rock is a subgenre of rock music and a genre of Americana. It developed in the Southern United States from rock and roll, country music, and blues and is focused generally on electric guitars and vocals. Author Scott B. Bomar specul ...

). They were also featured on a 1978 live Southern Rock album which included a live version of "Grand Larceny."

Later years

Leavell later emerged as a much sought-after

session musician Session musicians, studio musicians, or backing musicians are musicians hired to perform in recording sessions or live performances. The term sideman is also used in the case of live performances, such as accompanying a recording artist on a ...

and producer, touring with Eric Clapton and eventually becoming a "permanent" session player touring with

the Rolling Stones The Rolling Stones are an English rock band formed in London in 1962. Active for six decades, they are one of the most popular and enduring bands of the rock era. In the early 1960s, the Rolling Stones pioneered the gritty, rhythmically d ...

. In 1998, he issued his debut solo LP, a Christmas album called ''What's in That Bag?'' and more recently ''Forever Blue'' that includes solo versions of two classic Sea Level compositions: "Whole Lotta Colada" and "Song for Amy." He also released ''Southscape'', an album of Southern anthems that hearkens back to his Southern roots. A documentary of Chuck Leavell's career and life outside of music,"Chuck Leavell: The Tree Man
IMDb Listing
directed by Allen Fars
IMDb
premiered at Dayton, Ohio's "The Neon" theatre on November 6, 2020. The film, featured in a number of film festivals in 2020, won the Sedona Film Festival's People’s Choice Award. The film, featuring

Mick Jagger Sir Michael Philip Jagger (born 26 July 1943) is an English singer and songwriter who has achieved international fame as the lead vocalist and one of the founder members of the rock band the Rolling Stones. His ongoing songwriting partnershi ...

Keith Richards Keith Richards (born 18 December 1943), often referred to during the 1960s and 1970s as "Keith Richard", is an English musician and songwriter who has achieved international fame as the co-founder, guitarist, secondary vocalist, and co-princi ...

Charlie Watts Charles Robert Watts (2 June 1941 – 24 August 2021) was an English musician who achieved international fame as the drummer of the Rolling Stones from 1963 until his death in 2021. Originally trained as a graphic artist, Watts developed an ...

Ronnie Wood Ronald David Wood (born 1 June 1947) is an English rock musician, best known as an official member of the Rolling Stones since 1975, as well as a member of Faces and the Jeff Beck Group. Wood began his career in 1964, playing guitar with a ...

David Gilmore David Gilmore (born 5 February 1964) is an American jazz guitarist. Gilmore studied at New York University with Joe Lovano and Jim McNeely. In 1987 he began working professionally with the M-Base Collective and Ronald Shannon Jackson. In the ...

Dickey Betts Forrest Richard Betts (born December 12, 1943) is an American guitarist, singer, songwriter, and composer best known as a founding member of The Allman Brothers Band. Early in his career, he collaborated with Duane Allman, introducing melodic tw ...

Warren Haynes Warren Haynes (born April 6, 1960) is an American musician, singer and songwriter. He is best known for his work as longtime guitarist with the Allman Brothers Band and as founding member of the jam band Gov't Mule. Early in his career he was ...

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Julian Lennon Julian Charles John Lennon (born John Charles Julian Lennon; 8 April 1963) is an English musician. He is the son of Beatles member John Lennon and his first wife, Cynthia, and he is named after his paternal grandmother, Julia Lennon. Julian ...

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Bonnie Raitt Bonnie Lynn Raitt (; born November 8, 1949) is an American blues singer and guitarist. In 1971, Raitt released her self-titled debut album. Following this, she released a series of critically acclaimed roots-influenced albums that incorporate ...

Bruce Hornsby Bruce Randall Hornsby (born November 23, 1954) is an American singer-songwriter and pianist. His music draws from folk rock, jazz, bluegrass, folk, Southern rock, country rock, jam band, rock, heartland rock, and blues rock musical trad ...

, Chris Robinson,

Miranda Lambert Miranda Leigh Lambert (born November 10, 1983) is an American country singer and guitarist. Born in Longview, Texas, she started out in early 2001 when she released her self-titled debut album independently. In 2003, she finished in third place o ...

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, and

Lee Ann Womack Lee Ann Womack Liddell (; born August 19, 1966) is an American country music singer, songwriter, and musician. Her 2000 single, " I Hope You Dance" was a major crossover music hit, reaching No. 1 on the Billboard Country Chart and the Top ...

among others will be available for streaming beginning December 1, 2020
Chuck Leavell: The Tree Man website

Deaths of members

Lamar Williams died from lung cancer on January 21, 1983, at age 34. Jimmy Nalls, who suffered from Parkinson's disease, died on June 22, 2017, at age 66.Guitar Star Jimmy Nalls Dies Amid A Celebration Of His Life
/ref>

Discography

* ''

Sea Level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datuma standardise ...

'' (1977, Capricorn) * '' Cats on the Coast'' (1977, Capricorn) * '' On the Edge'' (1978, Capricorn) * ''Long Walk on a Short Pier'' (1979, Capricorn) * ''Ball Room'' (1980, Arista) * ''Best of Sea Level'' (1990, Polydor) * ''Best of Sea Level'' (1997, Capricorn)

Group members

– piano,

Moog synthesizer The Moog synthesizer is a modular synthesizer developed by the American engineer Robert Moog. Moog debuted it in 1964, and Moog's company R. A. Moog Co. (later known as Moog Music) produced numerous models from 1965 to 1981, and again from 2014 ...

, organ, clavinet, keyboards, percussion, vocals (1976–1980) *

– bass, vocals (1976–1980) * Jimmy Nalls – guitars, vocals (1976–1980) *

– drums, percussion (1976–1978) * Davis Causey – guitars (1977–1980) *

– saxophones, piano, keyboards, vocals (1977–1980) * George Weaver – drums (1977–1978) * Joe English – drums, percussion, vocals (1978–1980) * Matt Greeley – percussion, vocals (1980) Timeline

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sea Level (Band) American southern rock musical groups American jazz-rock groups Jam bands Rock music groups from Georgia (U.S. state) Capricorn Records artists