Does an artist's latter day sins erase the value of earlier work? If so, how many pieces of shit does it take to cancel out a work of near-genius? For Robert Palmer it took exactly one "Addicted To Love" to erase over a decade of promising work as a premier blue-eyed soul man. What was it about that song and its accompanying video that made stomachs turn so irrevocably?
I think what really made "Addicted to Love" unforgivable is that at a time when technology was changing the cultural landscape, Palmer seems to come down fully on the side of machines. In the mid-eighties sequencers and synthesizers were fully integrated into contemporary pop, but there was still some underlying tension about the dehumanizing effect this had. Perversely, "Addicted to Love" has Palmer doing his best to make real musicians sound like machines. The drums on the track sound real, but they've stripped out any human idiosyncrasy. The guitars grind along like machinery at a giant factory, repetitively churning out product. This is a song that must fade at the end, self-conciously giving the impression that it chugs along forever. The video just reinforces this message, turning a group of models into identical, expressionless gyrating robots. It is any wonder that Robert Palmer turns up as one of Patrick Bateman's favorites in Bret Easton Ellis' "American Psycho"? Forget RoboCop--Palmer is RoboPop.
But if you go back just two albums previous, you'll find a much more complicated relationship between Robert Palmer and technology. His 1980 LP, "Clues," seems to survey the coming decade with an exquisite sense of foreboding ambivalence. Constructed with an army of state of the art synths and sequencers, it often uses them in a way that highlights the alienation they can inspire. And it juxtaposes them with live instruments to create the tension between human and inhuman that inhabits the best post-punk of that era. It's an album that is as much akin to the existential dread of Gary Numan and Berlin-era Bowie as it is Prince style future funk, and it's the key evidence in any argument for Robert Palmer's critical rehabilitation.
"Clues" is a solid album end to end, the only Robert Palmer album I can say that about. The weakest track, "Sulky Girl," flirts with the sweaty bar-rock Palmer veers toward in his lesser moments--the kind of thing he served up on his 1979 hit "Bad Case Of Loving You" and that reached its logical, if horrific,

apex with "Addicted to Love"--yet the rough-edged guitar and strong chorus keep it from falling into beer commercial territory. And there are three flat-out masterpieces on the album--probably the best three songs of Palmer's career.
The first of these is the pseudo-title track "Looking for Clues." Over a bubbling funk groove, Palmer sings about paranoia, relationship problems and financial malaise. It's the perfect soundtrack to late-period Reaganism transplanted to the beginning of the decade. I'm still waiting for this song to score a montage scene in a thriller about the Savings & Loan scandal.
The second is "Johnny & Mary," a relationship song shot through with queasy ambivalence and married to an absolutely great minor key melody. The motorik rhythm section sounds like it was borrowed from Kraftwerk, and the overall effect is not too far from New Order. Since its release, this is the song most often rediscovered and covered by newer bands--most interestingly by The Notwist in a version that suggests Belle & Sebastian jamming with Gish-era Smashing Pumpkins.
Last, and probably best is "Woke Up Laughing." Over a serpentine and hypnotic backing, Palmer double-tracks a moebius strip of a melody that seems to encompass everything from love to death to the casual nature of life's disappointments. A longtime resident of the Bahamas, Palmer nursed an interest in indigoneous rhythms throughout his career, but nowhere else did he ever apply them to such great effect.
By 1985 Palmer had replaced collaborators like Gary Numan and Talking Heads' Chris Franz with half of Duran Duran. Stardom followed, but his critical reputation never recovered. Through a series of glossy video clips and grindingly shallow pop singles, Palmer cultivated a public persona as Yuppie Scum #1. The mention of his name to this day is far more likely to bring to mind bad suits and hair gel than anything else. It's sad, but the truth is Palmer brought it on himself. But records aren't like newspapers--the newest one isn't the only one that counts. For a moment in 1980, or for a few recording sessions at least, Palmer synthesized black and white musical traditions, synthesizers and flesh and blood musicians, pathos and pop hooks into a remarkable album. A snapshot stolen of an artist posed on a precipice, right before diving back to earth.
....................................................................Nicholas S. McGaw