Pull The Plug, Now: NME's Original Bad Review Of Power Station Album

Here it is. The album which proves that John 'Duran' Taylor is every micrometre the nouveau riche, styleless, vain young shitball he always hinted at.

The Power Station, named after the studio where this specimen was committed to tape, seems to have been the baby of Taylor and Duran's guitar abraser Andy Taylor. Somehow Robert Palmer was enticed over to sing with them. The only good idea the two Taylors are ever likely to have.

This product is disgusting. "Conceived in Paris, London, Nassau, and bars throughout the world"... coming with many additional glossy extras (Power Station bios, 'the story', quotes, ...) as if every mega-stellar movement has to be preserved in platinum aspic.

These artists - bar Palmer - are boring and rich and bored and it shows.

The single Some Like It Hot is misrepresentative for it's light and very Palmerfied - except for that typical high-cholesterol 'axe' solo from A. Taylor - barely hinting at the simplified progressive rock that massacres the low-key crooning of Palmer.

It appears the next single is to be Marc Bolan's Get It On. It might just as well have been Smoke On The Water for all the consideration they gave it.

It's easy to go on and whine on about progressive metal since the Taylors and former Chic drummer Tony Thompson cite rancid influences in print; but the fact that Robert Palmer's talent is stomped upon by his fellows'musical size 12 clodhoppers is revealed in the one wonderful track Lonely Tonight. OK, It contains the obligatory P.S. grafted-on guitar interference and it seems to be based on a direct lift from Rufus' Ain't Nobody - but the feel is there and it's the track that the grisly Taylors had least to do with.

God, I'd rather sit and peel stickers off the censored cover of the Princess Tinymeat LP than sit through another spin of The Power Station. The only thing to look forward to is the Robert Palmer solo LP - to be done with the help of Bernard Edwards and Tony Thompson. Hmm. Maybe they'll gang up on Andy and John, tie them to their platinum discs and dump them in the Caribbean. Hope so.

Cath Carroll (New Musical Express - April 1985) 

Robert Palmer and John Taylor (1985)

Voir aussi :

• Robert Palmer: An Appreciation écrit par John Taylor (2000)
• Coke & Wet: The Power Station Versus Arcadia  The Quietus (2015)
• Andy Taylor Looks Back On Forming The Power Station extrait du magazine Classic Rock (2024)