Robert Palmer

Is this fraud really the Dorian Gray wannabee of jacket photos? I don't know, and unless the women he beds are a lot more interesting than the models who populate his videos, I don't even want you to tell me. Rather than a tax-exiled roue, I prefer to imagine him as a secret straight who takes the fast train to his modest Surrey estate after a hard day's posing in London, arriving in time for a civilized dinner with wife and children before plopping in front of the VCR with a bottle of cognac. Honesty compels me to acknowledge, however, that my wife doesn't think he's a fraud--once spied him buying groceries just around the corner, and liked what she saw. In a world where male rock critics get Sheena Easton and Kim Gordon--who owns Palmer's only great song, "Addicted to Love," the way Junior Tucker owns "Some Guys Get All the Luck"--she's got a right. But I still give the grades around here. (Grade: B-)