After winning over rock and new wave audiences with Secrets and Clues, Robert Palmer returned to one of his enduring interests for 1983’s Pride: the music of the Caribbean. Recorded at Nassau’s Compass Point Studios—familiar ground for Palmer, who'd been signed with Island Records since its early days—the album is a fluent merger of '80s technology and tropical flavors. Though those elements might at first seem irreconcilable, Palmer was a master of musical pollination. “Pride,” “You Can Have It (Take My Heart)," and “It’s Not Difficult” boast a bright pop edge that makes them kin to tunes by Hall & Oates from the same period. At the same time, “Deadline” and “Want You More” exude the menacing sensuality that defined early singles from Grace Jones, who, like Palmer, was a mainstay at Compass Point. “It’s Not Difficult” might also remind listeners of some of Peter Gabriel’s biggest hits, but Palmer was by no means a mainstream panderer. As always, he was attuned to emergent innovations in pop music, as evidenced by “The Silver Gun”—just one of the songs here that presage the future sounds of techno music.