Customer Reviews

Drive

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It's hard not to write with a bit of sentiment given Robert Palmer's recent death, but this album stands as a fine, if inadvertant, tribute to one of the great popular music artists of the past 40 years.

More than anything, Palmer was one of modern music's best arrangers, a talent that is little recognized in the restrictive world of rock music. He put his inimitable stamp on whatever he touched, and never more distinctly than on Drive. He does rock, but it isn't a rock album. He does blues, but it isnt a blues album. Drive is Palmer mining his seemingly bottomless reservoir of joyfully idiosyncratic musical ideas. From his vocal phrasing to the way he refreshes old rhythms, Palmer excites the senses. It is apt that his youthful influences were the likes of Basie and Ellington, because, like them, he didn't succumb to the idiotic predictability that quickly afflicts almost all "rock stars," and especially those who had huge hits. Palmer was still making exciting music in his fourth decade in the rock business! Who else can that be said about? Only Ry Cooder comes to mind. Of course, neither has allowed himself to be confined within the suffocating boundary of rock.

Drive very much deserves a listen, and I cannot do justice to what you will hear. I will say that anyone who can not only equal but best Big Mama Thornton's version of Hound Dog has accomplished something special.

The U.S. release of Drive is missing some songs that are on the U.K. CD. It is worth a few extra dollars to buy the U.K. disc from Amazon UK.

Drive, recorded for an indie label shortly before Palmer's untimely death, is clearly a work of passion by one of the great blues artists. Palmer is in a category with Eric Clapton, Keith Richards, Eric Burdon, and Stevie Ray Vaughn when it comes to reinventing the bluesÑand he may well be the finest white blues vocalist to record since Elvis' early days. Drive is essentially a sample of his favorites from every blues subgenre, Delta, Caribbean, juke joint, Chicago, R&B, rock, and alt-blues. Different songs will appeal to you at different times, depending on your mood, but each one will at some time thrill or charm you. Palmer also does blues aficionados the favor of turning us on to new materialÑthere is only one chestnut in the collection, and, amazingly, Palmer carries off the nearly impossible challenge of recording a "Hound Dog" as memorable as Big Mama Thornton's and, I'd argue, more nuanced than Koko Taylor's version. The first time I heard this album, I cried because I knew that Palmer wasn't able to devote the best years of his career to blues. But this album pretty much makes up for it. At the top of my top 10 for 2003.

I'm surprised how many people are dismissing DRIVE as just another off-the-wall release from Robert Palmer. True, it's no RIPTIDE or HEAVY NOVA, his two top-selling pop releases but, at the same time, it's no vanity project like RIDIN' HIGH, his foray into jazzy standards. No, DRIVE is just a return to roots for Palmer, akin to his first three or four releases, and smacking of his bar band blues beginnings. In fact, throughout much of the CD you can just picture Palmer belting these tunes out in a pub somewhere! The disc opens with the driving (no pun intended!) "Mama Talk To Your Daughter." With it pounding arrangement (love the horns and harmonica!) and forceful lead vocal, Palmer comes across large and in charge, more earthy and grounded than he's sounded in years. His vocals snake thru "Why Get Up?" in a way that allows him to showcase just what an incredible singer he really is (a fact that's been overshadowed and/or forgotten over the years). The instrumentation is minimal at best (there are still nice touches, though, like the boogie woogie piano bridge), allowing this to basically be a vocal-driven track. Cool...VERY cool! Palmer next touches on his R&B roots, with the silky "Who's Fooling Who?" Once again, the arrangement is tight and the vocal just soars. The true beauty, though, of "Who's Fooling Who?", a clever tune about infidelity and two - and three! - timing ("Last Saturday evening you stayed out all night long/You said with your best friend/Doing nothin' wrong/I knew you were lying/'Cause any fool could see/You couldn't have been with her/When she spent the night with me"), is the fact that it could have fit on RIPTIDE just as easily as it could have on SNEAKIN' SALLY THROUGH THE ALLEY, Palmer's debut album. In other words, a timeless classic! "Am I Wrong?" is a bit too mannered for my tastes, but things rebound on an up note with a remake of ZZ Top's "TV Dinners." Palmer takes the Taxas boogie band's song and makes it his own, delivering it with a smile and a smirk. And, once more, Palmer is in fine voice. "Lucky" is also a unique cut; on this spritely track, Palmer seems to touch upon all of his major influences - pop, blues, reggae, new wave and world beat - and wraps them all up into one nice little vibe. "Stella" provides a dash of reggae, a genre that has appealed to Palmer for years. At first I thought the cut stood out like a sore thumb but, hey, he seems to be having so much fun performing it that you HAVE to enjoy it! "Dr. Zhivago's Train" floats along on a romantic wave of sleepy-eyed beauty. Palmer wraps his velvet-and-iron pipes around the lyrics in a way few men can. Things are kicked up a notch or ten with the next two tracks, "Ain't That Just Like A Woman" and "Hound Dog." "...Woman" barrels along with such conviction and energy that you can almost picture everyone bopping out to it in some back-alley underground dive. A TOTAL groovefest! "Hound Dog" is grittier, grungier and a whole lot guttsier than any Elvis Presley version, and believe me, that's saying a lot! "Crazy Cajun Cake Walk Band" is also a pure joy. Palmer wears the slippery bayou grooves well, sort of like a musical tails and top hat. Once again his voice is at the forefront, and it just sparkles! It's like being transported to New Orleans! Another gem! DRIVE ends with one last vocal workout, Little Willie John's "I Need Your Love So Bad." Backed only by a bare bones combo, Palmer's vocals are authoritative, passionate and from the heart. This kind of passion is what's lacking from so much of today's music. So pick up DRIVE...it may not be what you're expecting if his RIPTIDE-era material is all you know about Robert Palmer, but believe me, this disc is a brilliant example of both the singer's roots and his remarkable voice.

In a way this album may have been the way for Robert Palmer to go out. Basic, not overproduced (his stuff never was), just some great raunch and blues. The man could sing anything. Check out his take on Robert Johnson's 'Milk cow calf's blues' on the Hellhound on My Trail recording. When you feel blue over his passing too soon, put this one on the player and remember a great, versatile and gifted artist.

These are blues songs, but it isn't Chicago, it isn't Texas, it isn't the scratchy ole stuff which you can only dig if you are that type of person.
This is singing & music that is full of voo-doo vibrant hi-voltage rhythms that throb, pulsate, propel, & (yeah) DRIVE "blues" into a whole new realm of being.
Starting with the relentless beat of TALK TO YOUR DAUGHTER, on to testify!wail of TV DINNERS, to the sparse insistence of AM I WRONG, to the just plain fun STELLA, to the plaintive beauty of
DR ZHIVAGO'S TRAIN, the o-what-a-piano of AIN'T THAT JUST LIKE A WOMAN, the swamp-humid-funk of CAJUN CAKEWALK, the od@mn! amazing rage of HOUND DOG...
AND EveryThing Else in between...
it will assault your senses & get you boppin' to the beat
movin' to the groove &
you will be
*happy*.
Peace.

I lost my hero recently when Robert Palmer suddenly passed on.
He has inspiring, everchanging music styles that are clearly
the one and only Robert Palmer. I had the pleasure of seeing Robert on Secrets, Riptide and Living In Fear (Power Station).

This new collection of songs is a very good album. Bringing back a little of the funk he did in the 80's, but with a heaavy
blues and bar room rockers. Buy this one, it's very good with
some smoking guitar.

My favorite album by Robert Palmer is Double Fun.

This new album from Robert Palmer is truly great !! Although I'm a Palmer-fan since 1979, I didn't expect, that he will release such a good album again and I was very surprised, when I listened for the first time to his new songs. Unfortunately I had to order this CD via import at Amazon... It's a shame, that "Drive" possibly never will be released in Germany.

Robert Palmer is making an impressive comeback with this fantastic collection of blues covers.
If you know the man only for his "Addicted to love" video, you will be surprised.
Yes, Palmer can sing the blues. On this self-produced record, his voice sounds absolutely amazing (listen to the opening track "Mama talk to your daughter" or his poignant rendition of "I need your love so bad"). The musicians are excellent too.
Stand-out tracks : "Who's fooling who ?", ZZ Top's "TV dinners",
"Dr. Zhivago's train"...
This is a very convincing effort and, probably, Robert's best album to date.
(Notice that the UK edition contains 4 bonus tracks).

Robert Palmer has done it again. Fans have complained about the ubiquitous "collections" of his music being circulated by every label that ever let him through the door. Well, this is something new, that's old, and wild and hang onto your seats, kiddies!

Talk about running the gamut. The "cover" photo is naked and rather sleazily elegant, then he leads off with an absolute scorcher that sounds like he's channeling Leadbelly on speed! WOW! This is really a grab-you-by-the-throat collection, and definitely one you have to listen to a few times before the shock wears off. Not as "accessible" as he usually is (with a few exceptions), but then when did RP ever try to bore us with the same old stuff?

The idea of covers of old R&B stuff from Robert Palmer may sound like a non-starter, but there ain't no guitar-playing android-girls within 100 miles of this baby. If you're expecting smooth crooning, forget it. Think Wham Bam Boogie and Big Trouble meets I'll Be Your Baby Tonight, all done with a genuine feel for the R&B roots of this music. Elvis may have had the megahit from Hound Dog, but Palmer's rendition harks back to the earliest recording by blues great Big Mama Thornton.

If you like Robert Palmer, take a chance and you might expand your horizons. If you like classic R&B, don't let the Palmer mystique keep you away - he's got what it takes. Dig it or get left behind. ;+)

What a surprise this was, Robert Palmer in sparse arrangements doing mostly blues covers! Nobody can contest the outstanding voice so suitable for rock, r&b, soul....whatever you want, but he really shines on this self-produced recording. According to the liner notes the idea came from being asked to join a Robert Johnson tribute, and he does cover Milk Cow Blues (on the Bonus Track edition). The musicianship is outstanding and original, with a "choir" that evidently is all Robert Palmer and inventive grooves throughout. "Mama", "Why" and "Who" is a fantastic start to this CD, and in the middle he also induces some Caribbean sounds. The production is lean and direct, the songs bursting out of the speakers. The cover of Little Willie John's "Need your love" is fantastic and "It hurts me too" with the added gospel choir sound is maybe the best cut. The music may surprise some fans, but this is an excellent CD and should be heard. Apparently the UK edition adds 4 tracks ("It hurts me too" among others) and must therefore be recommended.