ROBERT PALMER : Music & Style

Duran Duran, Chic, Robert Palmer alliance: great expectations or is this a joke?

Even in rock 'n' roll, where the real world is very far away, the mere mention of a Duran Duran, Chic, Robert Palmer alliance draws a rise and the sign of the cross from the most jaded observer of the passing scene.

Now Robert Palmer is one of the most respected of rock people, a veteran of the British R&B campaigns and one of the few real innovators in a business where the status quo is etched in spandex.

Likewise New York drummer Tony Thompson of Chic, founder of the mechanical disco heart and timekeeper on more studio sessions than anyone can remember, although names like Mick Jagger and David Bowie float to the cranial surface almost immediately.

But Andy Taylor and John Taylor? Come on now! Don't they pick up paycheques for some Brit video band with pretty faces and fans who call themselves Duranies?

Isn't Duran Duran the group that exploits women and flaunts the sacred tenets of rock 'n' roll with their New Romantic bubblegum. You must be joking!

"A lot of people flipped when they heard about us getting together for this project," Thompson laughed yesterday over the phone from the Apple.

He'd called to discuss the gestation of a band known as The Power Station and, as long as the call was on the record company, to send his regards to "hundreds" of his relatives living here in Montreal.

"Even we didn't believe the project would really happen till we found ourselves in the studio," Thompson recalled.

The band is named after New York's Power Station studio, where much of the coming album was recorded in record time late last year. But there's more to the story.

"It took almost a year to put the thing together, pull the right strings and arrange our schedules. I first met John in the south of France, and then again in South America and we tossed the idea around." Andy Taylor was keen, they met Palmer at a bar called Rumrunners in London (in fact, it was at the Rum Runner nightclub in Birmingham) and the thing started to jell.

Because Duran Duran is one of the most popular pop bands on the globe, because Thompson was working on Jagger's just-released solo LP She's The Boss, and because Palmer was supporting John Martyn on his LP and working on his own stuff, the gel took some time to firm up.

"Andy, John and I laid down the rhythm tracks before we even knew who would do the singing," Thompson explained. "We'd originally thought about asking someone like Jagger or Bowie, but we figured they'd throw the rest of us into the background, and we wanted this to be a group effort. Robert came in, sang one song, and we said, 'To heck with Jagger. This is it!'"

The band built their material from the ground up while working in the studio. Chic mainman Bernard Edwards produced the proceedings and Thompson pronounces himself happy with the results.

"It's kind of a Chic funk foundation with a Duran Duran, rock 'n' roll top and R&B feel courtesy of Palmer, if you can believe it," he exults.

The LP is due soon but don't hold your breath for a tour. "It's a one-shot deal for now," says Thompson, although he admits he's "dying to tour."

Right now his future consists of studio work with Elton John and Palmer, and the real possibility of getting his wish by touring this summer with Men At Work. (I thought they had a rhythm section, says an innocent Beat reporter. "Well, ah, there seems to be some changes afoot," replies a coy Thompson. The upshot is a new band built around leaders Colin Hay and Greg Ham. You read it here first). Chic is also on hold, thanks to outside production duties assumed by Edwards and the ever-present Nile Rodgers.

But, if nothing else, The Power Station has allowed Thompson to escape the shadow of his bosses in Chic, and given him what he's always wanted - "the chance to do my own thing."

"We made this album, not to get a supergroup together or anything, but because we really wanted to make a record on our own. We've done that now, and it feels great."

And if Power Station should happen to sell millions of copies? "Well, that would be fine, too."

John Griffin (The Montreal Gazette - 1985)