John Taylor Looks Back At The Power Station's Debut LP (part 1)

By 1984, Duran Duran were the hottest group in pop music, with huge hits (among them Hungry Like The Wolf, Rio, Is There Something I Should Know, The Reflex, and The Wild Boys) and their elaborate music videos. In that year, the British band had been in the midst of their large-scale Sing Blue Silver tour. But for two of the group’s members, bassist John Taylor and guitarist Andy Taylor, that massive success brought pressures and a yearning to break out of the Duran Duran bubble.

“There was so much going on,” John Taylor recalls recently. “When you’re hot, you’re hot, and you get these opportunities. We had Seven And The Ragged Tiger (Duran Duran’s third studio album, released in 1983), which was a difficult album to make. A lot of sitting around, a lot of waiting. And I just had energy for something else.”

That “something else” turned out to be the Power Station, the hard rock/funk supergroup featuring the two Taylors, who are not related; singer Robert Palmer; and Chic drummer Tony Thompson. Released in March 1985, their self-titled debut album became a hit and contained two charting singles: Some Like It Hot and Get It On (a cover of T. Rex’s glam rock classic, Bang A Gong). For its 40th anniversary, The Power Station has been reissued as a Deluxe edition featuring a previously unreleased live concert from the band’s 1985 tour, remixes and raw instrumentals.

The Power Station's 2026 DLX box set

The genesis of the Power Station project can be traced to 1984, when the Taylors were working with model and singer Bebe Buell. “She was my girlfriend for really not long,” John Taylor recalls. “Bebe was like an ‘it’ girl. And she could sing. So that was my first thought, ‘Let’s do a cover of Get It On with Bebe.' Our record label wasn’t going to say no to anything at that point. Then Bebe and I fell out.” he continues. "But then the train was rolling. It's interesting how ideas just come together. It's never a straight line. One thing leads to another.”

From there, the Taylors brought on Thompson, who then enlisted Chic bassist and co-producer Bernard Edwards to produce what would become The Power Station album. It’s been well documented that Chic were a tremendous influence on Duran Duran’s music; Chic guitarist and co-producer Nile Rodgers previously collaborated with Duran Duran on The Reflex and The Wild Boys.

“Nile had been so fast out of the traps, and he produced Madonna (Like A Virgin) and David Bowie (Let's Dance), Taylor says. “He was already a superstar producer in his own right. Bernard wasn't driven in that way, really. He was just hanging out at home, I think. So when Tony called and asked him to come in and meet with Andy and me, Bernard just took control.”

Recording took place at New York City’s Power Station recording studio, from which the group took their name. “We had Jason Corsaro, who was significant as an engineer,” Taylor adds. “Jason had engineered (Chic’s) albums. He was the guy in New York who was really pushing the boundaries of sound, particularly at the Power Station. He had worked on a couple of things with us. So it was just like a swing really into Bernard.”

Tony Thompson, Andy Taylor and Bernard Edwards at the Power Station

The original plan for the project was a rotating cast of guest singers—among them Palmer, who came into the studio to record the track Communication. Afterwards, he asked if he could take a crack at singing Get It On. “Robert came in, and he was amazing,” Taylor recalls. “And it was Bernard who said, ‘You don't need another singer. This is your singer.’ So we just had to come up with like another seven songs. It's so easy.”

He acknowledges that the Power Station project was a relief for him and Andy Taylor after working with Duran Duran for more than five years up to that point. “Duran had become a hit-making machine,” the bassist says. “And so there was a lot of consideration, and dare I say procrastination, that was going into every note that we were playing naturally. We found ourselves in an enviable but quite challenging position. I mean, who knows? We just needed a break from each other, maybe.”

On The Power Station, Andy Taylor’s explosive guitar really came to the fore, showcasing his classic rock prowess. “The dude had come up from the English pop scene, and he had his sights out on Eddie Van Halen and Angus Young,” John Taylor says of his then-bandmate. “He was encouraged by what he was able to do on the recording of The Power Station. He’d achieved a level of exuberance, shall we say, in what he was able to do on stage with that band. I think it was too much for him to come back and sort of fit into Duran — it's a different kind of architecture, and there's just a lot less room to maneuver in the Duran sound. And as a result, he went on and worked with some pretty serious rockers.”

John Taylor: "Robert came in, and he was amazing"

The Power Station further displayed Thompson as a formidable rock drummer beyond Chic’s disco-funk hits. “Playing with Tony was quite challenging for me,” Taylor says. “I’d learned how to play with (Duran Duran drummer) Roger Taylor. And Tony was like a stallion. I found him quite difficult to play with, but it was like capturing lightning. And the few times that we did manage to lock in, in the studio, we got incredible things.”

Similarly, the Power Station’s explosive sonics added another musical dimension for the veteran singer Palmer, whose repertoire previously consisted of blue-eyed soul, reggae, power pop and New Wave.

“He should be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame,” Taylor says. “He had a fantastic ear for what was happening. I think he understood that he was kind of like the Jack Nicholson of vocalizing. He had a really strong vibe and character, but he also appreciated that he needed to keep the background changing. He just had a tremendous sense of style, musically. Probably one of those artists who is perhaps judged more for the way he dressed than for the music that he made.

"After (the Power Station), he just had that opportunity - Addicted To Love, that was the song of the year (in 1986). It was just such a monster song. It was like everything he was about, that he'd been about for quite a few years. But it just all came together in that song.”

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