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Robert Palmer - Riptide

At first glance you'd think this was a release by Julio Iglesias, but you'd be wrong. I'm not an expert in all things Palmer, but I've been a fan of sorts since first hearing him kill it covering Moon Martin's "Bad Case of Loving You" when I was in high school. While I never listened to this album in its entirety until now, I did  have the excellent compilation Addictions Vol.1 (I never did get the second as the first one hit all the high points for me) and recently found a copy of 1979's Secrets (which I enjoyed, and may revisit here at some point - or not) so I was prepared to hear some odd musical choices that were sort of his thing. He always seemed like a rather handsome class clown who was out there to have fun and do what he wanted.

Robert Palmer was riding a wave, coming off the rather surprisingly good Power Station album and he would use the bump in notoriety to his advantage. When Riptide came out in 1985 he was primed and ready to go. You'd have thought that based on the radio and video hits the album would charge out of the gate, kick the listener in the figurative balls (not everyone has balls so whatever the equivalent is should be used instead, hence "figurative" - yeah, I've lost the thread but can't seem to stop myself from digging a deeper hole) and make you pay attention.

Instead Riptide opens with the title track and the suave Mister Palmer croons away over a wall of synthesizer cheese that oddly sounds like carnival music, and makes the Julio shot earlier seem like less of a shot than a wink and a nod. Now that he'd set the tone he launches into the more upbeat mid 80s rock and funk that were pulled as the singles from the album. Heck he even does a nod to "Looking For Clues" musically on the delightfully quirky "Trick Bag."

Of course the highlights here are "Addicted to Love" where drummer Tony Thompson is hitting so hard you'd think he was trying to get to the bottom head on his snare. Also from his time with the Power Station, Andy Taylor (I wish his soundtrack work would be collected and released) lends his guitar to the track, giving the song an extra kick. The song is so intertwined with the video images of the dancing sexy mannequins I can't hear the song without thinking of the video. It became a thing where it was used again on "I Didn't Mean to Turn You On" one of the other highlights on the record. Heck it would even follow him to "Simply Irresistible" which would come out three years later. That's a hell of a call back.

He liked his synth-cheese so much he opens side two with "Get It Through Your Heart" a song that would have felt at home being sung by Chuck and Lyle on the Ishtar soundtrack. Not content with two helpings he added a second helping of Riptide to close out the album.

Yeah he was suave. 

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