Dark piano music seems an odd fit for college house parties, but
that is where Amanda Palmer first performed shows as a shy solo artist
before forming the Dresden Dolls. “They were so intense,” she says. “I
hadn’t found the humor to balance out the dark shit.” Her friends who
attended the shows were encouraging but concerned by Palmer’s emotive,
diary-entry intimate and revealing performances. “They would come up to
me after the shows and say, ‘That was really good, Amanda … are you
OK?'” Now years later, Palmer, 32, is back for round two of the solo
shows in support of her debut solo album Who Killed Amanda
Palmer, though this time, a bit more seasoned and a bit less
depressing.
Palmer grew up in Manhattan and Boston, as the youngest of four
kids. She describes herself as a “greedy little attention-seeker” as a
child and was an incessant performer since birth. “I think I popped out
like that,” she says. Palmer was a member of the school choir and a
community theater participant, whose early musical diet consisted of
the Beatles, The Beach Boys, Fleetwood Mac, and ABBA. Prince and
Madonna were added to her mix in the 1980s, but her love of happy pop
faded as a teenager. “I got into darker, weirder stuff,” she says.
Bands like the Cure and Depeche Mode moved into her world, and under
this influence at the age of thirteen, she started writing songs.
Palmer attended Wesleyan University, and it was at one of the Boston
house-party performances during college where Palmer met drummer Brian
Viglione. Palmer says she was at the point where she had to decide to
“get her shit together” and start a band or forget the music career.
Lucky for both parties, the two decided to form the Dresden Dolls in
2001, and Viglione ended up being the support Palmer needed to feel
more confident on stage. The band slowly became known for its dark,
theatrical melodies with a punk twist, but despite the production with
makeup and costumes that made Palmer and Viglione look like Cabaret
extras, Palmer says everything developed naturally. “If we had an
aesthetic, it definitely wasn’t planned,” she says. “Whatever wasn’t
fun, we didn’t do.”
During a Dresden Dolls hiatus — there was “nonstop bickering”
— Palmer began to toy with her own music. “I had a pile of
drum-less songs,” she says. Her original intent was to make a small
record quietly, but that plan changed once she fell into the production
arms of piano wizard Ben Folds.
The Dresden Dolls met Folds at a joint gig in Australia, and when
Palmer shared with him her plans of making a solo album, Folds offered
his studio in Nashville as a recording space. The brusque and
throaty-voiced Palmer mixing with a sunny pop symbol like Folds might
seem like an odd combination, but they found that they had a lot of
overlapping similarities. “We share a love of dorky musical theater,”
Palmer says. Palmer and Folds also have a mutual appreciation for sick
humor and speak the same piano language, which bonded the two
musicians. “Even though we belong to different genres, our approach of
songwriting is not far off,” Palmer says.
Palmer compliments Folds on being a strong producer who became
someone she could trust for an opinion. Though Palmer came into the
studio with nearly thirty songs, Folds helped her to whittle the count
down to only a dozen. All of the tracks remain true to Palmer’s
slam-and-attack piano style and dark lyrics, but hints of Folds slip in
on tracks like “Oasis,” where Palmer sings about rape, pregnancy, and
abortion to the tune of a jolly piano romp and a clap track.
Palmer released her album this September and has been on the road
promoting it ever since, intentionally leaving little time for the
Dresden Dolls. “We’re taking a break,” Palmer says. “We both need some
space.” Palmer says the break has been good for her and Viglione and
that the two are now on better terms. But she insists that they will
only “gradually start up again as we feel it.” In other words, no
promises.Â
