ROBERT PALMER: PRIDE & PREJUDICE

It was a case for the toughest and the best. They were both out of town, so CREEM sent me instead.

Them out of town, me out of luck. Robert Palmer was the guy they wanted me to track down and shake up, a guy reputedly harder to read than an eye chart after an all-night neck with a whiskey bottle. An ambiguous question about an ambiguous guy: what was behind the Mr. Normal number? What was the mystery?

I was looking for dirt more personal and pertinent. Did the guy ever sweat? It had been eight albums for the smoothie, each one bringing in more greenbacks than the one before it. Italy and Spain still loved him hardest, but the fame oozed farther westward every year. In no picture, video or apocryphal tale had I ever heard that this GQ refugee perspired. It was a question worth putting on my trenchcoat for.

The trenchcoat was my first mistake. Within two blocks of my trip to Palmer's hideout on Central Park South, my skin began to curdle from sweat like your thumbs do when you take naps in the bathtub. Sitting on the curb to rest would have taken me,from sunny-side-up to third degree burn in under a minute. What was a dick like me doing with a daylight gig? And what was the rock star doing up before noon? Only normal people function before noon.

This was the gig for addicts of the impossible. Palmer had maintained this shtick as long as rock's original dapper Dan, Bryan Ferry. Palmer had the added advantage of bangs that never fell in his eyes. Hm. Standing at the traffic light with the bad manners to be red, I looked down at the soppy case info sheets in my hand. British, 34 years old, a new LP called Pride and a steam-spitting dance single called "You Are In My System." Like a few of his bigger sellers ("Bad Case Of Loving You" for instance— bad case indeed), this one was a bigger hit for Palmer than for the writers themselves.

I yawned, into a cloud of bus exhaust. Palmer was well known for taking whatever he needed to get the job done—songs, island rhythms, third world sounds, a shipment or two of smooth American soul music, white guitar rock, a little moonlight crooner singing. Boy, no mystery there— the property was always looking like his before anyone noticed the heist. Stuff like "Sneakin' Sally Through The Alley," "Johnny And Mary," "Looking For Clues" (no kidding) or "Every Kinda People" clearly belonged to Palmer. No matter what, always that reserve—some said "ice." Try to get fingerprints off of ice. My brain felt like Sea And Ski on the back of a blonde at Rockaway Beach.

I wiped the waterfall out of my eyes and did a double take when I walked in the room. This was the mystery? The room gave off waves of middle class and the color beige, and so did the cordial, compulsively tidy man that offered a chair and a drink. The 90 minutes rolled past in cheerful, elliptical chat mostly about music and kids and how weird show biz is. In other words, normal talk. If this was a personality more complicated than Sam Spade's rolodex, well, then I was Alan Ladd. I persisted more and perspired less as we continued.

I knocked on every door but no big secrets or boogey men answered me. A wife, two kids "who are the real teachers, not me," a lovely home in Bermuda. Rock star selfdestruction? Publicity? The brass ring, the brass beds, the brass bands? Palmer managed a second-degree shrug and a face full of bona fide befuddlement. "If I had to worry about all that, I'd be stuck. I wouldn't know what to do."

Nor did he fall off the catwalk when I asked about all the musical borrowing people panned him for. Eyes demurely cast to his clean socks and smoking cigarette, Palmer ushered in his innocence like a hungry kid at a Christmas party. Seems that he just goes along following his love of music in general, his predisposition for weird rhythms, his fix on good grooves and his affection for singing that feels like satin sheets. He sells a lot of LPs, but not mobs; he gets people interested in him, but not too interested—so the intrepid press doesn't know what to say. When other musicians come along and do what he's doing, at the same time he's doing it, and sell more records and tickets doing it—Palmer is once again hoisted up to the bandwagon. Whichever one. "Like Boz Scaggs, or David Bowie, who's this year's choice. I saw David, and we laughed about it." A mock mournfulness passed over his face. "It's not going too well, being David. I can't sell the mega-tickets."

We talked on, following the conversation's natural drift as if it were a kite on a breezy day. He doesn't like producing that much because it's not creative enough. Traveling is fun. Both the press and his sense of rhythm are often out of his control. He's proud of the musical risks he took on Pride. He loves to sing, finds it. more challenging as the years go by. I was almost forgetting my reason for being there when Palmer dropped the big clue in my lap. "I'm a more subtle singer now. Used to get hysterical. 'Sneaking Sally Through The Alley' and 'Pressure Drop' were hysterical. "

Things were clear as celibate vodka. Here was a man with a drip-dry temperament, a character with hospital corners. That night at the gig, Mister Mystery did a good show, solid, but normal. What a racket. The guy was gifted in more things than music.

When he started to sweat at the end of a vigorous set, I smiled. The trench coat hung lank on my arm. It was a dirty coat, but somebody had to hold it. Besides, it was beige. %