If I don’t get back to writing soon, I’m going to have to turn this into an Amanda Palmer fan blog but anyway… Amanda Palmer and her band, The Grand Theft Orchestra, played at The Commodore in Vancouver last night as part of their Theatre is Evil tour and despite the temptation of the Garbage gig that was happening at the same time, I ch-ch-chose Amanda and her Grand Orchestra. Amanda Palmer Their set featured a mix of new songs (the highlight being the amazing Killing Type which is an even better song live) and old including a couple of Dresden Dolls classics; finishing off with a masterful rendition of one of my favourite Amanda Palmer songs – Leeds United. There were also no less than four support acts – Zoey Boekbinder, Ronald Reagan (Boston’s premier 80’s pop saxophone duo) and two sets by members of The Grand Theft Orchestra – some stunning bass playing by Jherek Bischoff and a couple of songs by The Simple Pleasure featuring guitarist Chad Raines. Amanda Palmer and Ronald Reagan If that wasn’t enough, at each stop on the tour, The Grand Theft Orchestra is supplemented by a string quartet and horn players crowd sourced from whichever city the tour is … Read More
The Tale of the Sad Gen-X-er
Amanda Palmer‘s fantastic Kickstartered album, Theatre is Evil, came out last week and as with most of Amanda’s music you can ‘pay what you want’ for it on her website – and what you want can be $0. It’s an approach she’s taken pretty consistently since breaking up with her label and it seems to serve her well. The theory is that it’s more important to get long term fans than short term profits, those fans will pay back your investment in them tenfold at a later date. It’s an admirable policy if you can afford it and given the success of her Kickstarter project (with over $1.1 million raised) it seems to be working but I was reading through Amanda’s Tumblr site a few days ago and came across a post that, frankly, made me sad. You can read the whole thing here (look for the first comment from Thom Martin) but here are the relevant bits. “…it’s about perceived value. I have TBs of music. Mostly “free”. I’ve bought music online because I exhausted every way to try to download it free…Make me, the typical Gen-X-er give you money after the music is already out by sending me something useful like a … Read More