I would like to talk to you about a woman for whom I have a tremendous deal of respect and admiration, Amanda Palmer.
(A brief warning for those who might be offended or bothered by strong language and/or nudity. As much as I love Ms. Palmer and her art and music, she won’t be your cup of tea. Whatever else can be said about her, terms like “shy”, “proper”, “modest”, or “conservative” aren’t used. You’ve been fairly cautioned.)
If you know of her and her music and her Kickstarter project of a year ago and her February 2013 TED talk, then you may love her art as much as I do. In that case, perhaps you can pass this article on to others as a quick primer to her art. It’s possible that you’re familiar with her and hate her guts and now think that I’m a freakin’ idiot and you never want to speak to me or read my work again. That’s OK. (Bye!) Or perhaps you just don’t care but you’re tired of me proselytizing and sending you links to her videos, and that’s OK too.
She’s not a middle-of-the-road personality. Commonly known as “AFP” for “Amanda Fucking Palmer”, she tends to have people either love her or hate her. I am quite obviously in the former group, and proud of it.
For those of you who don’t know her, she’s a musician and artist. She was a singer in the Dresden Dolls alternative rock duo in the mid-2000’s. She was and is a performance artist. She’s a writer, a poet, a lecturer, and so much more. She’s also now married to one of my favorite authors, Neil Gaiman, and that just makes her even more cool and special.
In May, 2012 she used Kickstarter to raise funds for her new album, “Theatre Is Evil”, raising $1,192,793 after setting an initial goal of $100,000. It’s still one of the handful of most successful Kickstarter campaigns ever. (That album, by the way, is fantastic.)
Over the past couple of years AFP has been a pioneering genius in using online social media (Twitter, forums, blogs, YouTube, email, Tumblr) to break the conventional model for how music and art is exchanged between the artist and the audience. (Which I realize is like describing the Golden Gate at sunset with the fog rolling in as “a bridge”.)
Listen to what she has to say.
Listen to her talks, play her music, read her poetry.
You may be awestruck, you may be infuriated, you may be overwhelmed.
I seriously doubt that you’ll be bored.
AFP’s art, music, words, and thoughts will make you think. They’ll make you care. They’ll make you pay attention. It’s quite likely they’ll sometimes make you cry.
Today I just was able to watch her latest video, a 34-minute speech she gave at The Muse 2013 in early May. This talk is wonderful. Watch it here.
In February she gave an astonishing TED talk in Long Beach. Listening to it is one of the most wonderful thirteen minutes you can spend and one of the best TED talks ever. Watch it here.
I said there were songs and music videos? Yeah, some of the best I’ve ever seen. These are all from the “Theatre Is Evil” album with the Grand Theft Orchestra. If you like them, just check out her site or Vimeo or YouTube for many others. (I will also point out that the links below are for the full, unedited, versions of the video – if you want to see versions with edited and censored language and images, you can find them on YouTube for most songs.)
“Want It Back” is very Not-Safe-For-Work (NSFW) but has excellent stop-motion animation & it’s a great song. After I got hooked on AFP’s work about eight or nine months ago I realized that I had already seen this video, not realizing who did it, just that it was an amazing video and song and I really wanted to find the artist. Now we know! Watch it here.
“Do It With A Rock Star” is also NSFW, a good rocking song and a great, fun video! Watch it here.
“The Killing Type” video doesn’t contain any nudity or actual violence, but it’s an extremely powerful song and video with lots of blood, so be forewarned. I like it a lot. Watch it here.
“The Bed Song” video is completely safe for work, but it may well rip your guts out & leave you in tears. A gut wrenching, emotional song with an excellent video, it’s her best yet! Watch it here.
If you like any or all of this, look for other videos, concerts, clips, music, and so on. She’s everywhere! (Much like Chicken Man.)
I hope you find her as inspiring, moving, and motivational as I do!
We Love The Stars Too Fondly 