Stylistic Influences Pervade Palmer's Music
Robert Palmer doesn't sound like anyone you've heard before. But he tries. Lord knows he tries.
He tries Moon Martin power pop. He tries Todd Rundgren rock. He tries Lowell George blues. And he tries to deny it.
"That's a lot of rubbish," Palmer says. "Do people really listen to a song and decide, 'This must be a combination of jazz, funk and disco-influenced pop. I think I'll buy it'? Those labels are designed by advertising to create a market. I don't write my music or do anyone else's with a particular style in mind."
But Palmer has been tampering with all of those styles for the last 12 years. His first albums have a strong rhythm 'n' blues and reggae background, Palmer's "beat" at the time. Enter Lowell George and Little Feat, who ended up assisting in the production of about half of Pressure Drop and whose Sailin' Shoes Palmer recorded for Sneakin' Sally Through The Alley.
Suddenly, the progressive New Orleans rock and blues sound of Little Feat began to permeate Palmer's music. Influence of the late, great Lowell George? Nah. Just the beat Palmer was hearing at the time.
You see, Palmer's beats serve as the catalysts for all his compositions and arrangements. The music begins when he bangs out the bass line on his drum set, although he's primarily a guitarist. The melody evolves while he listens to the taped rhythm. Presto, another hit.
And somehow, as if by magic, your foot starts tapping along. The dog starts wagging his tail. Everybody is having fun. Before you know it, you're caught up in the spirit of Palmer's music.
"I'm not looking to bring heaviness to my audience," Palmer says. "I'm more concerned with the positive aspects, like fun."
His music is light, his lyrics tongue-in-cheek. His primary concern is not to make you think, just to make you listen. Palmer is an entertainer.
Fun, he explains, is the primary sentiment he tries to convey, both musically and graphically. Fun dominates his stylistic mergers, just as romanticism dominates the lyrics he chooses to perform. Mostly, the fun involves women. But sometimes his flippancy gets him into trouble.
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After he released Pressure Drop, Palmer received a letter from a woman who said she liked the album, but found the jacket offensive. She sent it back to him.
The album cover features the posterior view of a long-legged, long-locked woman, clad simply in black spike heels. Palmer, holding a remote-control device, beams at a television set in the foreground. Are those black-and-blue marks on the woman's backside?
"I don't know. I never met the woman," Palmer frowns.
No, Robert, the woman on the album cover.
He's baffled, then offended. "Are you serious?"
Palmer says he isn't, at least about sexism. Man Smart, Woman Smarter and Sailin' Shoes are testimony to that. Like his music, the seemingly sexist graphics are all in fun.
After his fourth album, Palmer began to suspect that the "fun" of his relaxed rock, jazz and trademark undertones of reggae weren't enough to sustain his audience. He called for a subtle switch, additional rock in the wake of New Wave, and produced Secrets, which reached the Top Twenty LP list. Clues, released Monday, continues in the same vein. The emphasis is more rock 'n' roll, less Caribbean blue.
Like the albums, Palmer's Sept. 18 visit to the University's Jesse Hall displayed an accent on rock but with tastes of all those marketable categories he is unable to avoid: reggae, funk and pop. After introducing the show with Landslide, a rock 'n' roll number, he toned down into a rendition of the Beatles' Not A Second Time.
It wasn't until halfway through the performance and eight songs later, though, that Palmer and his five-piece band became animated. It might have had something to do with four songs from the new album that appropriately quieted the audience. Or a lack of energy after a two-show gig in Chicago the night before. Or more likely, something to do with Palmer's reticent attitude about his listeners' response. He waits for them to set the pace.
"We're like mannequins on stage to the guy in the last row." His articulate speech gains a few decibels as he points to the far corners of the balcony. "If he's dancing, then my performance works." Palmer's expression evokes credibility, even if his philosophy puts the cart before the horse.
What gets Palmer on his feet? New Wave and even some classical music are his latest private passions. Current favorites include Talking Heads, The Babies and Franz Haydn. "Except for 'The Messiah'," he says. "Religion is so pompous."
It's impossible to tell which beat Palmer is hearing now. Without a clue, he turns up the collar on his black leather jacket, even though the dressing room is a virtual steam bath. He and the band are going to a place on Eighth Street to hear Columbia's translation of New Wave.
M. Kathleen Guzda (Columbia Missourian Newspaper - Sept. 1980)