The Tim Ferriss Show - Ep 67: Amanda Palmer on How to Fight, Meditate, and Make Good Art

Episode Date: March 30, 2015

Amanda Palmer first came to prominence as one half of the internationally acclaimed punk cabaret duo The Dresden Dolls. She is widely known as “The Social Media Queen of Rock-N-Roll” for her intimate engagement with fans via her blog, Tumblr, and Twitter (1,000,000+ followers), and she has been at the vanguard of using both “direct-to-fan” and “pay what you want” (patronage) business models to build and run her business. Amanda's new book, The Art of Asking, is a New York Times' best seller and a damn fine read. Show notes, links, and resources from this episode can be found at www.fourhourworkweek.com/podcast***If you enjoy the podcast, would you please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts/iTunes? It takes less than 60 seconds, and it really makes a difference in helping to convince hard-to-get guests. I also love reading the reviews!For show notes and past guests, please visit tim.blog/podcast.Sign up for Tim’s email newsletter (“5-Bullet Friday”) at tim.blog/friday.For transcripts of episodes, go to tim.blog/transcripts.Interested in sponsoring the podcast? Visit tim.blog/sponsor and fill out the form.Discover Tim’s books: tim.blog/books.Follow Tim:Twitter: twitter.com/tferriss Instagram: instagram.com/timferrissFacebook: facebook.com/timferriss YouTube: youtube.com/timferrissPast guests on The Tim Ferriss Show include Jerry Seinfeld, Hugh Jackman, Dr. Jane Goodall, LeBron James, Kevin Hart, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Jamie Foxx, Matthew McConaughey, Esther Perel, Elizabeth Gilbert, Terry Crews, Sia, Yuval Noah Harari, Malcolm Gladwell, Madeleine Albright, Cheryl Strayed, Jim Collins, Mary Karr, Maria Popova, Sam Harris, Michael Phelps, Bob Iger, Edward Norton, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Neil Strauss, Ken Burns, Maria Sharapova, Marc Andreessen, Neil Gaiman, Neil de Grasse Tyson, Jocko Willink, Daniel Ek, Kelly Slater, Dr. Peter Attia, Seth Godin, Howard Marks, Dr. Brené Brown, Eric Schmidt, Michael Lewis, Joe Gebbia, Michael Pollan, Dr. Jordan Peterson, Vince Vaughn, Brian Koppelman, Ramit Sethi, Dax Shepard, Tony Robbins, Jim Dethmer, Dan Harris, Ray Dalio, Naval Ravikant, Vitalik Buterin, Elizabeth Lesser, Amanda Palmer, Katie Haun, Sir Richard Branson, Chuck Palahniuk, Arianna Huffington, Reid Hoffman, Bill Burr, Whitney Cummings, Rick Rubin, Dr. Vivek Murthy, Darren Aronofsky, and many more.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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or on Facebook at facebook.com forward slash timferris with two r's and two S's. Hello, boys and girls. This is Tim Ferriss, and welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show, where I deconstruct world-class performers, whether they be billionaire hedge fund managers, early stage investors like Peter Thiel, or celebrities, Arnold Schwarzenegger, musicians, chess prodigies, and so on. They have commonalities and they do have tools and tricks and routines that you can use. This episode, I am interviewing Amanda Palmer, who is a musician, but also a social media virtuoso and innovator as a musician from the standpoint of both music and business models. Some of you, I'm sure, have seen her hit TED presentation, The Art of Asking, which has been viewed more than six million times.

But her story goes much, much deeper, and we will plumb the depths. We will talk about, of course, perhaps the Dresden Dolls, where she first rose to prominence as one half of that acclaimed punk cabaret duo. Then the journey from solo album to leaving her record label altogether and experimenting with things like Kickstarter. She made international news in 2012 when she raised nearly $1.2 million pre-selling her new album, Theater is Evil, which went on to debut in the Billboard Top 10. It's one hell of a story.

And she's also known as the social media queen of rock and roll for her constant and disarmingly intimate, and I say disarmingly intimate, such as standing naked in front of a room full of fans who sign your body with various markers. I'm not kidding. Engagement with fans via her blog, Tumblr, Twitter, where she has more than a million

followers. And she has really opened a lot of eyes to say, uh, direct to fan or pay what you want business models for building and running her business. So we get into all of this. Uh, and we of course dip our toe in the different tactics and stories from The Art of Asking, how she manages relationships, and much more. So let me stop this preamble and allow you to enjoy a very fun conversation I enjoyed immensely with Amanda Palmer. Thank you. less faster why are you always hanging on the cast you shake your fist to god you're even noticing that they're all passing amanda fucking palmer welcome to the show thank you tim fucking ferris. How are fucking you? I'm great. And the only reason I ask or rather introduce things that way is because I've been dying to ask you.

You have Amanda fucking Palmer listed as your alias or also known as everywhere I've been able to really try to do homework, including Wikipedia. How did you end up with fucking as an alternate middle name? Well, as you know, Wikipedia is not authored by the, it's not authored by the artists, right? Amanda fucking Palmer is a, is a joke nickname that Ben folds gave me while I was working on my first solo album. And the funny thing about the name is it was actually aimed at me as an insult. It was sort of like, it was one of those take back the night moments, you know, like, well, like all the words that you're not allowed to say.

Right. Yeah, you can say anything on this podcast too. I encourage you. Right. But I mean, it was one of those things where ben ben had someone who was a a friend of a current enemy who referred to me every time she referred to me she referred to me as a man a fucking palmer and so ben as a joke because we were working on a record in nashville together for like a month as a joke, because we were working on a record in Nashville together for like a month, as a joke started calling me AFP. And it just became

because you also lose your mind in the studio and everything devolves into toilet humor instantly. That just became the running studio joke and Ben, you know, that was Ben's pet name for me. And I thought it was funny enough that I started using it myself and then it just

sort of turned into a thing. I don't even know how it turned into a thing. But I think that's a good nickname isn't really deliberate. It kind of like it lands on you and then it sticks like glue. Oh, I love it. So you disarmed the insult by adopting it completely. Which kind of is my life philosophy. I love that. I love that. Take on the pain and wear it as a shirt. I love this. And I'll trade a really quick anecdote, which is I was really bummed out at some point a few years ago when a new book came out and got panned by this guy in the New

York Times that I don't particularly like. But what I decided to do as retribution- Did you steal part of his- That's exactly what I did. I took part of it, which was intended to be this over-the-top insult. But out of context, it sounds amazing. It was like Tim Ferriss walks on air and land or something. Dot, dot, dot. And I put it the inside uh flap of the four-hour chef as a reward i have a i have an indie rock friend who got panned in like you know i don't know if it was the new york it was the indie rock equivalent of the new york times which means it was you know it was pitchfork or something and they wrote this scathing you know no stars review of his new album saying, you know, so and so thinks he is

like, the second coming of Christ and the most amazing musical genius to ever walk the face of the planet. And he just removed the beginning of that and stole the rest of the quote and plastered it on his press kit. And I was like, you are awesome. Yeah. The, uh, the, the movie poster dot, dot, dot Matt amazing. What magic can be worked doing things that way. Uh, so I, I have a confession and that is your book. So the art of asking, I, uh, I, I got halfway through it. And the reason I haven't read the second half is because I was so inspired by the book that I put it down to start asking people around me for all of the help that I've been too ashamed or embarrassed to ask for. And as a result, I have fixed my… You have no more time to read.

I have no more time to read. I'm so busy asking. And I ended up fixing my health after a severe bout with Lyme disease last year and have just had these multiple quantum leaps forward. So I wanted to thank you for putting the book out there, first of all. Oh, that's wonderful. I'm so happy to hear that, actually. I'd rather hear that than hear that you finished my book and loved it, but it didn't change anything in your life. It makes me really happy. Oh, I was so just completely smitten with the book.

And the subtitle, I think, is really important. So correct me if I get this wrong, but I believe it's How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Let People Help. And I wanted to ask you, and of course, we're going to come back to some of your background and everything else, but why did you, a book is a hard thing. I mean, a lot of things in life are hard, but books are a challenge. Why did you decide to put this book together and put it out there? I don't think I would have put this book together if I hadn't been offered a totally

we will make this easy for you book deal. Because I'm one of those people who's always got 19 projects on the back burner. And one of them was, someday I should write a book. I'll write a book someday. When I have time, Ha ha ha ha ha. Like, you know, someone who tours 250 days a year

and has, you know, millions of unrecorded songs and, you know, all sorts of bizarro side projects. You know, a book always seems like a great thing in theory and in practice, just a huge pain in the ass and not something that I ever really imagined fitting into my life as a runner arounder. Because I know enough about book writing to know that it's not something I could like tap out on the fly on flights from one place to the other. I was really going to have to put press pause on my life as I knew it. And after I started working on my TED talk, you know, I had had, I'd had the,

the vague idea of writing a book sort of the, the first time I really thought about it other than the basic narcissistic, I'll write my memoirs someday, which I think every artist who lives a kind of an off-kilter, bizarre life with interesting stories probably has the thought someday to just write the stories down. was actually after my experience street performing, because street performing in my particular experience is street performing was, it was so unique. And I didn't know of anybody out there who had written about what it was like to be a living statue. And, and then later in my life with crowdfunding and the internet and really seeing the connections, the strange but philosophical connections between living statue work and stripping and starting a band and trusting fans and asking for money. And I was like, all of these things are really related. They're all kind of part of one philosophy and one story. And that would make a great book. And it's unlike anything else I know. I mean, it's not really a book about music.

It's not really a book about being a street performer. It's kind of a book about an approach to life that is about abundance and trust instead of about scarcity and fear, you know, in the frame of art and performance art. But also like, as I found, as I kept carving out the book, it's, you know, it was also about relationships and, um, a risk and, you know, kind of the big themes. And once I did the Ted talk, you know, while I was working on the Ted talk, I worked together with my really good friend, Jamie Ian Swiss, who's this fantastic magician and essayist. And, you know, he sort of fell into my lap as my TED coach, because I called him one night. And I knew that he had given talks at conferences.

So he was one of the people in my life that I could tap as you understand TED, you understand conferences, I can't ask most of my friends about this. You know, what makes a good talk? Can I read you what I've written? And I had what I thought was going to be a 20 minute phone call turned into a three hour phone call with Jamie, giving me all sorts of advice and all sorts of opinions and all sorts of, you know, calling me on my bullshit. And by the end of that three hours, I was like, Jamie, you're going to, you're going to be my wingman on this TED Talk. If you help me do this, I will love you forever.

And he was like, I am here for you. I will help you with this TED Talk. So I would say he's sort of like the hidden hero, man behind a curtain of my TED Talk, because he was the guy on the phone with me every other day for an hour while I read him draft after draft after draft of my TED Talk. And there's a reason my TED Talk wound up so good. I didn't just knock it out and read it. I worked slaved on that fucker for two months. Really, it was like constructing a perfect little monologue with we came up with the phrase, you know, it'll go in the book. You don't have to put it in the talk, Amanda. You only have 12

minutes. That'll go in your book someday. And so that was when the imaginary book took shape, which is, you know, for this 12 minute TED talk, I was trying to condense my entire life philosophy, you know, into a teeny amount of time, but there were so many other stories that were relevant. And I comforted myself with the idea that if the TED Talk resonated, I would someday expand it all into a talk. And then I didn't have to worry about that at all, because the minute the TED Talk went online and went viral, my phone rang off the hook with book deals. And I just decided I would take one. And then I would just go down the rabbit hole and figure out how to write a book. The TED Talk is fantastic. And for people listening, I'll put the TED Talk in the show notes so you guys can check that out as well.

It's a great introduction to the then expanded narrative and collection of stories and lessons that is the book, of course. And I'm sure when you wrote the book, you're like, well, it doesn't all have to go in the book. This will be the online extras. But the mention of TED and the Amanda Whisperer, your friend who is helping you with the presentation. I call him the Ted doula and then the book doula. Yeah, exactly. The Ted doula. I'd be very interested to hear what some of the best feedback or changes were that he gave to you for the TED Talk itself.

Well, a lot of it was not unlike writing a book. he gave to you for the TED Talk itself? Well, you know, a lot of it was not unlike writing a book. And since you've written, I'm sure you know this quandary, which is you get so interested in your topic that you keep wanting to expand and expound. And the true beauty of making a good TED Talk or a good book is that you edit down and you distill. And so the key with the TED Talk was, you know, I kept wanting to add, like, oh my God, and then there's this, and how could I not talk about this? And, you know, there was this amazing thing that happened and our, you know, and our, and our goal was to just literally using an economy of language, you know, I would write a sentence and write an anecdote and speak it, you know, I would be on Skype with Jamie and it would take me a minute and a half to tell this story about couch surfing, you know, with this, this girl and her family down in Florida.

And then the goal was how do we take this story that took a minute and a half to tell, and I thought I had got it as far down economically as possible. And then take that minute and a half story and condense it into 20 seconds. What literally, what words, what single words could we use to convey that whole sentence? And it was like songwriting or poetry where instead of saying and expounding and going off on tangents, you just pick that one perfect sentence that sums up everything you felt and in that sense there was there was a real artistry behind it and i found watching other ted talks and looking at other ted talks they had that in common which was an economy of emotion and and of expression

you know they didn't need to explain this and that and the other thing they with a single anecdote or a single detail they emotionally take you right there and they don't need to say this and that and the other thing they with a single anecdote or a single detail they emotionally take you right there and they don't need to say anymore and they can get on to the next thing i um it it brings to mind uh a couple of things the first was an exercise that a writing professor of mine back in college named john uhPhee used to have us do, which would be to take something like the Gettysburg Address and have to pull out five lines or six lines, which was always so torturous. But separately was told very early on. I think it was related to teaching as opposed to writing, although I that the two are very similar when you're talking about nonfiction and that was that most teaching fails from too much information,

not too little. And I think that Ted presentations are very similar. I think you could say that about art. Sure. You know, like the best art is, is about economy. And,

and, you know, even if you're, you know, even if your art is, you know, durational performance art, even within that, there can be an economy, because the artist who's just trying to do everything, you know, winds up unable to express whatever it is that's of importance. Durational performance art, what would be an example of durational performance art? I mean, Marina Abramovich sitting in MoMA for three months. Got it.

That's a long duration. That's durational performance art. But if you look at Marina Abramovich sitting in MoMA for three months, there was an economy about what she did. She didn't wear a different costume every day and also try to do 90 other things at once. It was her and a chair and another person, and there was a real economy in that. So, you know, I've, I've definitely had a battle all my life with economy. I've, you know, I'm an, I'm a maximalist and I have driven collaborators and managers and boyfriends and girlfriends and pretty much everybody in my life. Crazy. Because I always want to, I want to add more and I want to do more. And Oh my God,

if we're going to do this, we could do this on top of it. And we could do this too. And like, let's add more dancing girls and let's add more, you know, more like more triangle, like all the, you know, more cowbell, all the things. And it's, you know, as an, as an artist and you, you see this in the wisdom of older artists as they, as they talk about their processes, they, like your life, you know, your life goes on and you pare down and you keep paring down to the point where, you know, you realize that it wasn't the extra performance artists that made your show good. It was the ability to pare down to the detail, the impactful detail. And, you know, that's, that's just true in art as in life, for sure. And how have you become, do you feel like you have become better at editing and distilling in your art? And if so, what has been the most helpful in getting you to that point?

That's a really good question because it also really depends on the form. Songwriting is a good example. Sure, songwriting. And even recording songs is a good example. I used to think here's a really specific, but a really good lesson. I used to think, and one would think that if you were just recording a single song, you know, but let's say it's a really aggressive piano song and it's just piano and vocals, you would think that layering and overdubbing more piano would make for a stronger sound. So instead of just having, you know, one single piano playing a bass line and a right hand and your vocal on top of it, you know, you record the piano 10 times over. And so you've basically

got the entire range of the piano on the recording and you crank everything up to 11. And the fascinating thing about that is, and, and incredibly poetic as related to the rest of art and life is the strongest, loudest sound you can get from a piano is playing two notes, you know, a low C and a middle E and banging the shit out of those two notes is way more impactful and striking and strong and aggressive than overdubbing 27

notes on top of that. And, you know, ACDC is kind of the perfect example. You know, those, those guitar riffs and those single notes, they burn themselves into your brain and they don't need a whole lot of extra. It's the, it's the, it's the sheer, you know, epic simplicity of, um, of the, of the, of the minimal. And, you know, I've found that this is true pretty much everywhere in life, especially when it comes to, I mean, you were mentioning it with teaching. It was, it's something that I have been learning in my relationships from day one and still struggle with to this day and found myself even doing in the last 48 hours of my relationship with Neil, which is learning how to say less. And especially for someone like me, who's a motor mouth and wants to be constantly communicating and engaged, the ability to have a thought and not just blurt it out and to have something that you think is interesting that

you want to share or to have an observation or a criticism and not say it and and deliberate and consider is this actually useful is this actually compassionate Is this actually necessary to the conversation? Or does saying less actually leave more space for more love? And I have found the best advice from my mentor, who I also talk about in the book, and funny enough, it's pretty economical advice as well, is life advice to me when I'm going into a conflict or a difficult situation with my parents or an argument with Neil.

His advice is say less. That's it. Just say less. It's such good advice. It's great advice. Great advice for say less. That's it. Just say less. It's such good advice. Great advice for emails too. We should just skip the next 60 minutes of the podcast. Right. Play two notes on a piano for the next 45 minutes. Please stand by. I definitely want to come back to your relationship briefly a little further down the road, but I'd love to rewind the clock a little bit and talk about the eight-foot bride. Could you give people a little bit of context for those who don't know your story, just a little bit of context on the eight foot bride. And the question I'd like to then add on that is just what your main lessons learned were from that experience that have translated to all of the other

endeavors and experiments that you've had. Okay. Well, the basic background is, um, is that I was a living statue and most people know what that is because they've seen it if they've traveled to any metropolis. But if you don't know what a living statue is, it's a street performer, usually monochromatically colored, all white, all silver, all blue, face painted gloves. And sometimes living statues wear sunglasses and wigs and, you know, my least favorite living statues wear masks. I think that's cheating because there's a real beauty in watching somebody's frozen face. That's a real part of the talent. But I basically graduated college. I knew I wanted to be a performer, a musician. I knew I was either going to go into music or theater, but my main passion was songwriting. And I was working my collection of shitty jobs. My main shitty job being, and it was a great shitty job, just in case my old boss is listening because I love him. I worked in a fantastic little ice cream shop

in Harvard Square that was called Toscanini's. And we scooped ice cream and made coffee for the denizens of Harvard Square and Harvard. And I had seen street performers all my life. And I had, I had, I, I remember mentally noting, you know, every time I saw a living statue, who does that? And, you know, who gives you permission to do that? And I could do that. You know, anyone could clearly do that. You just need to paint yourself and get on a box. Um, and so one day I just, I just did it. I, I painted myself white and put on a bridal gown and a veil and some gloves and I stood on a box. I was terrified. And I, and I put a, I put a hat at my feet and I gave out flowers. And, you know, that first time I got up and did it was a real, it was sort of one of those life breakthrough moments where I felt so, I felt so fraudulent. I was like, this isn't, no one's giving me permission to do this.

No one's taught me how to do this. I'm really faking this. I mean, I assume you just stand here. I don't know. Are there rules for being a statue? And I, and I just did it. And it was, it was delightful. And I really, I, I had this moment of incredible feeling, incredible freedom, just, you know, taking that $17 I made that day and just going out and buying a sandwich and a packet of cigarettes and going, Oh my God, this money is just mine. People just gave it to me. You know, it was such a, it was such a, you know, like a eureka moment after, you know, only having been, you know, been given money, you know, in the form of a paycheck from a boss to just

have people giving you cold, hard cash for performing in the street was a real, really beautiful feeling. And I never went back after that. Although being a living statue in Boston is a clearly seasonal occupation. So, you know, I would sort of, um, I would go back to, to, you know, to cafe work in the winters, or I would, I would travel and, you know, perform the eight foot bride in, in warmer hospitable climbs. Like I went down to Key West and I went to LA. I, I tried my hand at Vegas. I went to Australia one, one winter, But I would say I made about 95% of my living statue income right in the middle of having transferred into the music and rocking and rolling touring performer career that I realized how much street life and busking life had shaped my approach to everything. My life philosophy was not an academic approach. It was not a music business approach. It was a busking approach, which is you have to be good at what you do and then you rely on the way busking works. Nobody buys a ticket. You do your thing and you have to captivate a crowd and then you pass your hat. What separates a good living statue from a great living statue? I think there's two answers to that question. I have seen some shitty fucking living statues.

I have seen some, I have seen some people with the, who have put the absolute minimal amount of care and effort into their costumes and makeup. Um, and it's always really depressing to me to see a bad living statue, you know, someone who's just like,

you know, someone who's just like, you know, wearing a raincoat and a bad mask and isn't even really standing still, you know, and is barely interacting with the people who are giving the money. And, you know, regardless, everyone is always curious about a living statue, even a bad living statue. And children's curiosity is unrelenting. So they can't really tell the difference between an immaculate living statue who spent $2,000 on a beautiful latex costume that looks completely realistic, or someone who's just wearing a shitty raincoat and a mask, all they know is that there's something happening and it might be magic.

And if they put their dollar in, something magical is going to happen. But I have seen some really incredible living statues with just glorious costumes. And they're just killing it in the aesthetics department. But they don't love you. And my favorite living statues are the ones who have some pathos and who actually connect with you. I took to, to the eight foot bride, which is, you know, I, as a, as a performer hungry for love and connection, I, I treated every single patron, um, as a, as like a 10 second love affair. so deeply the act of looking into a stranger's eyes and thanking them for giving me a quarter that, um, you know, that it was a real part of the job, but also means that, you know,

I'm really disappointed if I go up to a living statue and they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. You gave me a dollar now. Fuck off. That always makes me sad. It feels like a, like a cheap trick or something. Yeah. Yeah. So what, uh, you mentioned eye contact and you have very, you have very striking eye contact and certainly use that in your Ted talk. And I I've seen it in other photographs and videos. What advice would you give? I think that most people avoid excessive eye contact. But what advice would you give to average Joe or Jane out there about using eye contact to connect with people? What are your thoughts on that? Oh, I have a lot of thoughts on that. I mean, I think eye contact is very hard for a lot of us because it is,

it's so threatening. And the more disconnected we are and the more time we spend looking into our devices and barely looking at each other, the more threatening it is to, to, to keep and hold somebody's gaze. But God, is it powerful. I mean, looking somebody in the eye,

unthreateningly, unaggressively, it is the, I really feel like it is often the antidote for what is ailing us. Because we feel so connected superficially in so many ways. I really feel like it is often the antidote for what is ailing us because we, we feel so connected superficially in so many ways. And perhaps we are through our Twitter feeds, through our Facebook feeds, through our many events,

through our doing this and that and running around. But if we're able to do all that and we're not able to look at and see each other, it all, it all can feel really superficial. we're able to do all that and we're not able to look at and see each other. It all, it all can feel really superficial. And I had some, I had some really life changing experiences, um,

in yoga retreats particularly. And I write about one of them in the book. One of the, one of the first, um, teacher training yoga retreats I went on, I about one of them in the book. One of the, one of the first teacher training yoga retreats I went on, I was, I was probably 26, 27. And we did this exercise where, you know, there's maybe 50 of us in the group total. And, and we did this exercise where we, we got into groups of like 10 and we took turns just standing in a line facing each other. And it was basically an exercise in presence. and face another person, maybe about a foot apart, eye to eye, just gazing into each other's eyes

and not reacting, not smiling, not giggling, not rolling our eyes, not saying, oh, doesn't this feel kind of uncomfortable and silly that just really just holding the gaze. And what was so incredible to me about that. And this was after I had clocked my five years as a living statue. So I, of course, I'm just loving this. I'm soaking this in. This is like crack cocaine to me, basically. I'm like, yeah, I get to just look in someone's eyes for three minutes and then I get to look in someone else's eyes and I just to me the the the juicy intimacy of that was uh you know felt like a warm bath

but for six or seven people in that group of 50 they burst out sobbing. They could not handle actually what, and we did a lot of talking and kind of breaking down, you know, post-mortem of this experience afterwards. And it wasn't even that they felt overwhelmed by having to look at someone else. having to look at someone else, they felt overwhelmed by actually feeling seen by another person. And the emotional overwhelming experience of feeling really just, you know, intimately seen by another, having spent possibly an entire lifetime not being seen by their parents, not being seen by their peers, not being seen by the people around them, and maybe avoiding it, you know, for reasons of just fear, fear of intimacy, fear of being found out, fear of whatever

it was. And I remember looking at this and these weren't fucked up people. These were, you know, these were your average, you know, totally functional adults in their 30s with jobs and kids and the whole nine. And I remember thinking like, this isn't just them. I mean, this is really all of us. We, we do not connect with each other at nearly the level we could. And though we live in close proximity and though we sit on the subway with each other and though we have a wide variety of things connecting us and making us sort of pseudo-intimate, a lot of us are really alone. And that was a real eye-opener. Excuse the pun. rush, just enter a zone of sort of profound loneliness. And it's the, the irony in some ways I think is that of course you have, uh, you have an incredibly loyal fan base and, uh, I've, I'm very fortunate to have a really fantastic group of readers and listeners. And I'm, I'm,

I find it so easy to love them, to love my friends, to love my family. I find it very difficult sometimes to love myself. It seems almost self-indulgent and that's some kind of weird. I'm sure there's plenty of analysis that could be done on that. But one of the most therapeutic, we were talking about, you mentioned yoga before we got started. And also again here, one of the most therapeutic, unexpectedly therapeutic experiences I've had in the last six months is starting to play with something called acro yoga, where you're doing acrobatic yoga and there's a trust element and a vulnerability element of balancing each other upside down and staring. You have to maintain that point's eye contact. And it's a very visceral, primal need that is being satisfied. Um, anyway, I, I don't want to, to ramble on, but it's, it's been a really profound realization for me that I can't think

myself out of, I can't think myself out of this loneliness. No. Yeah. I mean, we, I think we think that we can think a lot of things, you know, we can think our way out of, um, a relationship problem. We can think our way out of a sexual problem. We can think our way out of a work problem. And to me, yoga and also like meditation and really trying to have, um, you know, a constant level of body awareness, it's so important because you really can get lost in your head. And if you, you know, if you demand that your head and your body are disconnected, and you really can just like, as long as you sort of like feed your body and drag it around as a container for your mind, everything's fine. The whole system starts to fall apart.

And I see that more and more, especially as I get older. If I neglect my body and I neglect actual physical contact with other people for too long because it's just a pain in the ass, because I just don't have time because I'm too busy this week to get to yoga because it really like the, the, the, you know, the whole building starts to feel like it's, it's built on sand. Shit just falls down. And, you know, I, there's still something in us and in me, because, you know because we are taught to be so rational and so head-oriented that you kind of don't want to believe that it's true and that you can get away with it. But you can't.

It all eventually comes back to roost. You mentioned meditation. I'd love to dig into that for a second. And as I understand it, you've also written about meditation before. There's one piece that when I was doing a bit of research, Melody versus meditation. What does your meditation practice look like? And what are the benefits that you've seen? Well, I have this special room in my house that's covered with candles and lots of statues. And I burn six sticks of incense. And I drink a special stick tea. And then I float into the air. And it's really rad. When can I come to your house?

That's all bullshit. I get a feeling. that's all, that's all bullshit. What I usually do, uh, if I'm, if I'm being good is, um, first thing in the morning, I will just use my phone as a timer and I will sit on whatever I can grab. If I don't have a meditation cushion around, I'll grab a, a, you know, a bed pillow or a towel and I will sit cross-legged somewhere. If I'm, you know, if I'm in a teeny hotel or a friend's house, sometimes it's in the bathroom or on the bed. Um, and I try to, I tried to meditate for, you know, 10 minutes if it's a crazy busy day and a half an hour, if it's, if I can carve out the time. Um, and I, I definitely notice, I notice a huge difference in my day if I actually make the time to do that.

And, you know, I was brought into the world of meditation in my late teens, early 20s, and just basic Vipassana meditation, you know, nothing fancy, no crazy mantras no no gods or deities just basically sitting sitting on the earth as a human being and paying attention to your breath and your body and letting thoughts come and go but really trying not to be attached to to the the drama that comes visiting and um i wish i could tell you i was great at it i've been meditating for 20 years and i still feel like a shitty meditator which i i think i think that's i think that's part of the journey is realizing that it's you know it's not like you meditate for a year and all of a sudden you're you're enlightened and you can sit and think about nothing for a half an hour. But what you do learn is that just the act of watching where your brain is obsessing

for a half an hour, you know, and if my timer goes off after a half an hour of meditating, and I realized that all I have been doing is, you know, constructing an argument in my head with a person in my life, or, you know, thinking about merch designs, and I somehow lost the plot, you know, two minutes into my meditation and flew off. That just tells me, that tells me where my head is at. It tells me that I'm stressed out. It tells me that that's, you know, that's what's preoccupying me. And on a good day, you know, I think about constructing an argument. I think about my list of things to do. I think about what I'm about to eat when I get up. And those thoughts come, but I'm able to let them go five or ten seconds later and say, like, hi, okay, I see you.

Yep, you're here. Okay, now you're gone. Let's, you know, let's go back to paying attention to our breath. And then five seconds later, it's another thought. And you say hello to it. And you say goodbye to it. And that's, you know, to me, that's a much more, you know, quote, unquote, productive meditation practice. But the real productive meditation practice is just that you sit your ass down and you actually do it and you watch what happens. That is the practice. It's, you know, and it's never, it's never easy, but you do, you do get a perspective onto the inside of your head and your thought process that I think is

essential if, if you're going to progress because you get to know yourself, you get, you know, you get to watch the little tricks that your brain is playing and the, you know, in the places where you are obsessive and getting stuck. And, you know,

it has been in moments of meditation and honestly, actually more moments in yoga. Often just like at the end of a yoga class, lying on a mat on the floor, watching, watching my thoughts enough that I'm not just caught in them where I have had the most, uh, insightful, um, you know, and, you know, i want to say the most insightful insights but you know i've had the most insightful moments of my life looking at my thoughts and going are you serious amanda like you actually really just you know spent five minutes coming up with a plan that actually you know is really destructive and yet your brain was having a field day with it and just and just the act of being able to stand back

and saying wow you you're thinking this you've actually been thinking this way all your life. This is not necessarily good. Maybe we should find another way out of this problem or whatever. And you don't get insights like that unless you give yourself some perspective. Because if you're just spending your life going and going and going and being trapped in the thoughts and not giving yourself, you know, a different point of view, you just, you stay in the crazy. Yeah. I think the developing the skill as the observer is I found just so critical to be able to step out of the rapids onto the shore and just observe it for a while, as opposed to being sort of trapped like a monkey in the slipstream of thought getting washed over the rocks. And I mean, as you put it, I think a lot of people have this

pass-fail mentality with meditation where if they can't think of a candle flame for 20 minutes straight, they're a failure and they quit. And I tell people all the time, I say, look, almost without fail, every time I sit down to meditate, a portion of it will be spent fantasizing about some elaborate retribution against someone who cut me in the salad line in college or something so fucking ridiculous. But it's just the act of meditating somewhat like stretching, I suppose. It just gives you a certain responsiveness as opposed to reflexive, knee-jerk response to stuff that I find very helpful. Yeah.

Well, it is not unrelated to the, um, to the say less conversation we were having. You know, it, it, it is the ability to realize when you are not saying less, uh, is, you know, is, is directly related to the amount of perspective you can take in any given moment, argument, you know, conflict. Definitely. I would love to ask you a couple of questions that are a bit of a lateral step, but I'm curious nonetheless. The first is what book or books do you give most often or have you give most often as gifts to other people? Well, I go to- people? Well, I go through phases.

Besides your own, I suppose. That one doesn't count. I go through phases, but I have some perennials. And two that I can think of off the top of my head, one is directly related to what we were just talking about, mindfulness and meditation and sort of cutting through the bullshit. One of my absolute favorite books of all time, because it changed my life, is a book called Dropping Ashes on the Buddha.

It's by a Zen master, Sung San, and I read it, who was a Korean Zen monk, and I read it when I was maybe 24. And it's a short book, and it's actually, it's just a series of letters that this really funny, very direct, very no bullshit Korean monk wrote back and forth with his students in the 70s. And most of the students are Americans. They're, you know, they're sort of that first wave of, we are getting into meditation, we are lost, please help guide us, you know. And the way the this guy's ability to economically get to the point of what's important and how to explain to somebody else how to cut through the bullshit and just get to mindfulness was a game changer for me at 24. And all of the,

you know, yoga and meditation I had kind of dabbled with up until then sort of coalesced. And that book really opened my mind. It was sort of one of those, oh my god, I think I get it books. And so I have given that book to probably 30 people or 40 people, especially people who have told me that they are feeling kind of lost and or depressed or directionless or at a, you know, younger people who are at crazy crossroads in their life and need something to hang on to. I've given many copies of that book. I can't wait to read it. Oh, it's fantastic. And there's actually, if you like it, there is a companion book that was his second collection of letters called Only don't know which was one of

his because he spoke in this thick korean accent and had all these hilarious ways of phrasing things which isn't it's like one of the most amusing things about the book um and he keeps saying to his students all the time only say only don't know. It was just a great accent. So my other one that I have given to a gazillion people, which is sort of on the flip side of the other metaphysical side of the fence, is Bill Bryson, who is one of my favorite nonfiction writers, wrote a book called A Short History of Nearly Everything, which is, I don't know if you've read Bill Bryson, but he's one of those guys, he could write about anything and I would read it. What is it? Into the Wilderness?

Or he has one about hiking or attempting to hike the Appalachian Trail. I love that. I've read all of his stuff. And he, so he decides to, you know, as an everyman with a basic understanding of the history of the earth, and, you know, basically, you know, the history of science and how things work, decides to tackle this with his basic knowledge and, you know, spends a few years researching a book. And just the first 20 or 30 pages of this book are of great comfort to me pages expounding on exactly how small the earth is in relation to the rest of the universe. And, you know, along with like reading about Zen meditation or anything, if anything is going to put you in a good mood or maybe send you into an existentially angstful crisis knowing how totally insignificant your life as a human being on the planet earth is in the grand scheme of things and we're talking space and time uh this book is just like it just you know

is incredibly humorous but also it's just one of those great perspectives where you read it and you, you, you feel totally emotionally connected to Bill Bryson and, uh, and his desire and his hunger to learn these things. And also, um, you know, it, it, it, you get to feel like, and you know, your, your place in the, your insignificance in the cosmos. And that's another favorite. And that's just in the nonfiction department. Fiction, I think, is for another podcast. We can do that in a round too, for sure. Well, I know what I'm getting on my Kindle then,

is particularly dropping ashes on the Buddha. I on the Buddha. The collection of letters format is really one of my favorites, so I'm excited to grab that. A lot of what we've talked about ties into, directly or indirectly, how people define success. And I'd be curious to know, when you hear the word successful, who is the first person you think of and why? Oh God. Um, you know, it's funny when you said it, uh, the first person who popped into my head was Neil, but that's probably cause I just spent all day with him and he is successful. Uh, you know, I, the only, I, it may feel like a dodge to answer it this way, but success is something that has been so plastic and,

and, and fungible in my life, especially because I live in a, you know, I live in a world in entertainment and in performance and now in book writing. It is a competitive field. It's not like my sister or someone else who just has a job in science and gets you know, gets their job at the university. And maybe I'm, you know, maybe I'm full of shit and everybody out there with any job from shoemaking to plumbing feels highly competitive. But, you know, especially being a

female singer, the world sort of views you as being in competition with the woman next to you, you know, right down to the fact that you are on the charts here and she is on the charts there. And the world measures you and measures your success by a number of downloads, number of fans, number of Twitter or whatever. And I have found that part of the struggle of actually finding happiness as an artist is the daily fight to not define success by the way the rest of the world defines success, which is hard because you have to fight the same battles every day because you go out into the work environment and the entire industry and even to a certain extent your own fans because they're sort of all drinking the same Kool-Aid

are kind of all telling you, well, success is defined by this, success is defined by this, success is defined by this, success is defined by this. And you're there in your own little bubble going, well, I know that's not really true. I know that there is that superficial level of success, but then there's also my personal success, which no one else can define for me and really is only defined by how happy was I when I woke up this morning and how happy am I when I'm bedding down at night. And that's not reflected in any of the Billboard charts or in any of the iTunes downloads. Success has this bizarro, two-faced, I'm losing my words today.

What's the word for what a thing is? The essence? Essence. Perfect. So, yes, success has this very two-faced essence where, you know, you especially as a artist playing the game in the industry and putting out music and putting out books and so forth, you kind of have to play that game a little bit and ride the balance of, you know, trying to get your book on the New York Times bestselling list and knowing what to do to do that. But also simultaneously not drinking the Kool-Aid, like swishing it around in your mouth and then spitting it out. Going for a success tasting.

Exactly. It's like being a wine sommelier who doesn't drink. And, you know, I think I, speaking of, you know, of meditation, it all kind of, this, this winds together and is it, is it actually a really good example of the sort of thing I would notice myself thinking and, and, and finally get to a point where I could really catch myself in the act of comparing myself to other artists and being jealous of people who had more chart success or being jealous of artists who seemed to me to be more successful. And so in my crazy brain, they must somehow be happier or must somehow have beat, or must somehow have beat me, or must somehow have something that I don't have. And it's honestly, it's in the moments of yoga and meditation that I find myself, it's like

you and your revenge plot against the person who cut you in the salad bar. My moments like that are going, oh my God, I really am doing that thing. I really am thinking about, you know, Fiona Apple, Regina Spector, or, you know, Lady Gaga as the person who sold more records and therefore must be happier. Why didn't I make that decision? Why am I not where they are? Why did I not do this? Why didn't I go into fashion? And watching and actually having the ability to watch my brain and stand back and go, you know, Amanda, you realize that that's not actually success. You realize that even if you had that, you know, whatever thing X is, it's not going to buy you happiness. Just sit with that for a second and notice what you're doing. And to that, I am grateful, really grateful for a mindfulness practice. Because I don't stop having those crazy thoughts. They come, but I can at least catch myself in the act and see that I'm doing it. You're getting better at training them, the wild thoughts, in a way, perhaps. So this, I think, underscores a really important point.

I mean, the definition of success and the misconceptions or self-delusion that we can get caught up in. Looking externally, what are common misconceptions about you? Those people who think, I know who Amanda Palmer is. What are the common misconceptions? I know who Amanda Palmer is. She's that narcissistic, talentless, hairy cunt married to my favorite Oscar Neal Gaiman. Fuck her. You I, I would like to think in my darkest moments, I would like to think that the most common misconception about me is that I, is that I am not self-reflective and that I, and that I don't have self-knowledge and that if I am a, you know, narcissistic, evil attention getting,getting, fill-in-the-blank,

that I'm not the kind of person who knows myself and dissects myself. And one of the weird things about especially being a female performer is you get a lot of the same grief, you know, you start to notice the patterns. And, you know, when I was when I was in my mid 20s. And it was sort of the dawn of the Dresden Dolls. And I sort of faced my first wave of internet criticism. And the main criticism was, you know, she's an attention whore. That was the big, that was sort of the big goado, you know, and simultaneous shame that I felt when I would see people saying that about me is really interesting. Because on the one hand, you know, I was intellectually and emotionally smart enough to go, okay, well, people are calling me an attention whore.

But you know, I'm a performing singer songsongwriter. My job is to get attention. So I can see the double standard here. And I can also see that nobody is calling the male artist who I opened up for or who opened up for me, no one's calling him an attention whore. I think this is a thing that's more or less aimed at me because I'm a woman, but I could be wrong. I mean, you know, maybe, maybe this, you know, maybe there's something in this and maybe my, you know, maybe my very insecure secret self is right. Maybe I am in this for all the wrong reasons. Maybe I am just too narcissistic. Maybe I am too hungry for attention. Maybe I'm doing something wrong. But honestly, you know,

having now been in the business for, you know, it's now whatever it is, 13 years later since I, you know, since I started the Dresden Dolls, I feel like I've seen enough waves of criticism and also detected enough patterns after enough time and done enough self-inquiry that I can sort of piece the puzzle together and get, yep, I was kind of right and I was kind of wrong. Mostly, you know, looking back at how I reacted in, you know, anger and fear at 25, I was mostly right. Most of the people criticizing me, you know, as I was 25 and struggling to make

it as a musician in Boston and, you know, aggressively pounding at the piano and aggressively, you know, wearing few clothes and aggressively doing whatever the fuck I wanted and aggressively pounding at the piano and aggressively wearing few clothes and aggressively doing whatever the fuck I wanted and aggressively not caring about the etiquette and the fashions of the day. Yeah, mostly people were threatened or angry, but it didn't have a whole lot to do with me. It mostly had to do with them.

And it still feels true. And it's, you know, I think one of the, I think one of the things you come to terms with as a performer and especially as a female performer is, you know, you are so desperate, especially at the beginning of your career, you are so desperate for universal approval, universal love. You know, and you figure that if you do your job right, and you really work hard, and you write fantastic songs, and you are a consummate entertainer, that everyone must love you. And it's not a bad way to be. You aim high. You aim for the center of the target and the brass ring that's furthest away. But also, you realize whoever you are, there is no universally beloved performer. There are people out there who hate John Lennon. There's people you know, name an artist and there's people who hate them. And one of the things that you, that you discover as you journey down your, you know, your livelihood as a performer and you sort of negotiate your own career is, is sort of developing an acceptance that your audience is going to be your audience and your audience isn't everybody. And there will be those out there, you know,

who decide that you're not their cup of tea and that your style rubs them the wrong way and that they don't like your voice or they don't like your songs or they don't like your appearance or they just don't like you. And it's just part and parcel of the job. And I remember people telling me at, you know, at 25 and at 27 and at 29, you know, that if I was being criticized, you know, if I was being criticized, it was a real sign of success. And even though I intellectually knew that, that took me years to actually emotionally take on and feel the truth of that. That if people are angered by you, if people care enough to write about how they don't

like your music, or write about at this point, you know, write about how they don't like your book, you're doing something right. Because, you know, if you're being discussed at all, and your work is of enough merit to merit criticism, then you're just on the path. And, you know, you're not so naive, you know, as you were at 24, thinking that if you just pushed all the right buttons, everyone would eventually see the light and love you. It just doesn't work that way. It doesn't work out that way, yeah. I think that you could mention any artist,

any person of note or who's had a decent amount of public exposure, and they probably have a hate page dedicated to them. I mean, it really doesn't matter who it is. But you mentioned fans and wanting everyone to like what you do. But certainly, I think that to business as an art, if everyone is your customer, then no one is your customer on some level. think somewhat famous for having a very diehard fan base. And maybe this is a tired question, but I would love to still hear from you why you think that's the case. And I'll just leave it at that. We can certainly dig into it, but you have such a dedicated fan base. I mean, above and beyond, in a way that has sort of mesmerized a lot of people in the

music industry and elsewhere, ranging from the huge success of your Kickstarter campaign to, I think, challenging the status quo, which may be part of the reason that you get a lot of the flack that you do, couch surfing with fans, bringing fans up on stage. There's so much we could dig into. Why do you think your fans, you have such a large contingent of diehard fans? Well, I think that has to do with how specifically intimate my writing is. Because it's certainly not for everybody. specifically intimate my writing is.

Because it's certainly not for everybody. And when I look back at my career, you can hear me, right? Oh, I can hear you. Okay. I just thought I lost myself for a second. So when I look back at the last 10, 15 years of my life, I definitely see a lot of moments where I could have turned to the left or I could have turned to the right. like for lack of a better word, more palatable, more radio friendly, more universal, more, this is the kind of thing that I know more people can digest. And when I look at those I pretty much have on the whole chosen not to take that turn. And which isn't to say that I want to alienate people.

In fact, the opposite is true, but I, I have kind of deliberately resisted commercial success, mostly because as I grew in my career, which did grow slowly, you know, it's not like I started writing songs one day and then the Dresden Dolls started and then six months later we were famous. I was on a really, you know, really slow climb from the time I started as a songwriter as a teenager to solo performing, to meeting Brian and starting the band, to touring locally for three years, to ultimately getting signed. and gauge who I was and which bands I really admired and kind of what forms of success were available to me.

Because when I was 18, there was only one thing. It was like, get on MTV, be famous. That was success. But then as I grew into my 20s, I realized there were a lot of artistic choices and a lot of lifestyle choices open to me. And I was master of my own fate. I was allowed to choose whether I was going to be the kind of artist who spent two hours getting ready before shows, doing massive hairdos, putting on makeup, getting into fashion, trying to work with pop producers, you know, putting dancing in my videos, you know, really trying to sell myself as someone who could

hopefully ultimately go platinum and sell 4 million records. And part of the curse is, if you want to look at it that way, which I don't, but it was like I learned too much too soon. And I knew that going the Lady Gaga route or whatever and taking the bare structure of my songs and handing them over to a pop producer to turn them into dance hits wasn't necessarily going to make me a happier person. I just sensed it. And I don't want this to come across sounding pretentious or anything, because I think there's really different ways of being happy. And I think it's very possible that Lady Gaga is happy. And I don't know, cause I don't know her, but I, I looked at, you know, my life as a long expanse

of time, energy choices and who I was going to get to hang out with. And I was like, you know, I think it may mean less chart success, radio success, less chances of getting on MTV. But I know if I make this choice and this choice and that choice, it's more probable that I'm going to enjoy my day. And so those are the choices I kept making. I'm sorry, is that what you mean by lifestyle choices is it a quality of life thing or is it something else well i mean one it's both you know the choice to and you know there's just some certain things especially if you're talking about pop life you know there's certain choices as a woman where like some shit just comes down to time and energy. I got into a conversation about this on Facebook. I have never spent any time doing my hair and it may seem, it may seem stupid or,

you know, like a kind of irrelevant thing, but I actually know, you know, for the pop stars out there who kind of want to do the fashionista thing and, you know, take that particular fork, it just takes time out of your day. If you want to, you know, if you want to go in that direction and do fashion and, you know, always look photo ready and Vogue ready on stage, I know what it takes. I've done it for video shoots. I've done it for photo shoots. You need to sit in a chair for two hours. And I sort of looked at that and was like,

I don't want to sit in a chair for two hours. I want to spend that two hours going out to dinner with my friends in Philadelphia and hearing about their art projects. And I want to spend that two hours, you know, meeting and greeting with fans before the show. So I get that it's kind of a sacrifice and I get that I won't look like Katy Perry on stage, but it's okay. I'll give that up. I'll make this choice and not that choice. So I've been fascinated with your story on so many levels. And one of them, if you're able to discuss it, relates to crossroads that I find myself in, which is being tired of the charts, the New York Times bestseller list. I'm just fatigued by it. I've been through

that game several times. It's exhausting. It's not objective. There is a very subjective kind of editor's choice element to it that I dislike because I feel that it's not a real reflection of the true success of any given book. And I was hoping that we could chat about the rebellion and splitting with Roadrunner Records, if you're able people a little bit of context on that, um, I, you know, I'm thinking of going completely indie as a writer, potentially, uh, moving forward. And there's a certain appeal and simplicity of that. And we'll see if I have the fortitude to do it, but, uh, are you able to, to give people a little bit of context on what happened with Roadrunner and then what you learned from that? Sure. Well, the rebellion specifically was this hilarious moment in my career.

This would have been 2008. I had put out my first solo record, Who Killed Amanda Palmer? I was really proud of it. I still am. I think it's a great record. And there was a song on it called Leeds United. That was like a big band,

crazy, drunken, brash, you know, you know, it was one of sort of one of the poppiest songs on the record. And I decided to make a video for it. I made the video in London.

It was really fun. And the, the record label at the time I was still on Roadrunner Records. I had things with them had just sort of started falling apart because they, they barely lifted a finger to promote the Dresden Dolls second album. And, um, that left us feeling really disillusioned, but I sort of gave them a chance to, you know, to make good, um, on, on, on my, my first solo record, which came out right after that. And, uh, they didn't, by the way, long story short, but, um, somewhere in there, this, this video got shot and the rough cut was sent over to the label. And I, in the time in between, had made my way back to New York, and the A&R guy called me into his office. A&R is advertising and something else? Technically, in old school terms, it meant artists and repertoire. But in layman's terms, your A&R guy is basically your representative,

your dude, because it's usually a dude, but your dude or gal at the label who is the artist liaison, basically. Your point of contact, got it. Yeah, your person. So my person, Dave, Dave Rath, bless his heart, because he had to speak for the trees. And he called me into his office and tried as delicately as he could to tell me that the label had had a meeting and they thought that I looked too fat in the video and would I be willing to cut the shots that showed my bare midriff. And I was astounded at this because I am vain and I had seen the rough cut and I thought I looked fantastic. I was really thrilled that,

you know, I had been a little, cause you know, I'm not, I'm not trim, but I'm, you know, I have like, I have my little pot belly, but you know, some pot belly can be, can be attractive as long as it's not hanging out over your pants. And I was actually really thrilled when I saw the rough cut. Cause I thought I looked fantastic. And so I sat there with my jaw dropped to the floor going like, you're kidding me. No. Like, what shots are you talking about? Because I think I look great. I'm a vain motherfucker. So like, you just clearly disagree. And, and I at that point, I had kind of had it with the label. And I had sort of decided at that point to just probably split off and go my own way. So I basically did, I, I did an act of war and I posted to my blog, I posted this story to my blog, knowing that my fans would all be aggrieved and everyone would,

you know, everyone would, would be sad on my behalf. Uh, and at the end of the day, the, the, the label backed down, they down they you know they put the video out they of course did nothing to promote it which you know was probably shooting myself in the foot but who knows um and this was also at the point where this you know the video was basically internet only so it was up to me to this story and that was it. I gave no directive. And then on their own, the fans created this movement where they started a page on the band forum, uploading selfies of their own stomachs with messages written on them to roadrunner records saying things like this is what a normal belly looks like and you know fuck the label and long live and they gave the movement a title which was the rebellie and get it because their belly was in the middle. But this wasn't just

a couple people or even a couple dozen people. This was like hundreds of fans did this. And it was hilarious because it was a lot of huge man bellies and teeny little baby bellies and people wrote on their cats and stuff. It was fucking hilarious.

And someone even, one of the fans even collected all of these photos and published a little chat book. And with my permission, which they didn't even need, printed up a thousand of these books and just offered to send them to people. And it was one of those moments where I stood back like a proud parent and looked at my fan base. And I was like, you guys are awesome. I just love that you fucking did this.

You're creative and you're weird and you're all with me. And that was just, it was also one of those moments where I looked at them. And this was, this was my demographic. Like these were my fans. These were the people for whom the video was made. And they were all so, you know, they were all so proud of me and also so happy for me to be authentic. And I sort of looked over at the label who were like, well, you know, Amanda, if you really want to be successful, you have to XYZ. And I was like, you know, I really don't think you guys get it. This is my audience. This is who I'm making the video for.

This is who I'm making the music for. They understand. You guys don't seem to. I think this relationship has come to an end. But it was also, it was, you know, if you look back at internet history, it was one of those moments where, you know, in 1995, that wouldn't have happened. But these people all found each other grouped together and could create their own moment. And it was one of the blessings of the internet, which is, you know, the paradigm shifts, the people in power, you know, really everything is called into question. And it's very possible that in 1995, I might have believed the label.

I might not have understood that, you know, that my audience really did just want me, the authentic me, not the airbrushed one. And, you know, and this is why it's sort of been a, it's been a lifelong conversation, a dialogue with my fan base. It's not just me, the artist with the megaphone. If you had to choose one way online to communicate with your audience, what would you choose? As it stands right now. If I only got to use one social media platform, or do I have to choose between Twitter and email? Yeah, you have to choose. So it would be one online tool,

whether social network or otherwise. What would you choose and why? If I could only communicate one way on the internet. You know, probably Twitter because Twitter has direct messaging so i could mini email people that's right yeah that's true you could you could email um email uh email can't um you know for lack of a better word email can't uh it's only person to person so it can't collect you can't create a movement on email

if that were the case I would probably find myself on massive chain group emails with 900 people all BCC into conversations. I do. Uh, let me ask a,

uh, just a couple of fan questions, a couple of listeners who were very curious to know, how do you, what is the dynamic like having two creatives in, in one household? So your, your husband is, is of course a very, uh, prolific writer. You have many different creative endeavors. Uh, what is the, do you, would you work together? Do you work separately? Do you ask each other advice? Is there collaboration? How do your creative tempos differ?

That's a lot at once. You can kind of answer it however you want. But I'm just so fascinated to know how you guys make that work. Oh, boy. Well, that's a huge question. I mean, that's a huge lot of questions. I think the biggest blanket answer is we help each other a lot. But we also have private areas and rooms where we really don't fuck with each other.

And we've learned the hard way. I have learned, if nothing else, Neil and I have found that we are insanely similar. And we both constantly make the mistake of thinking that the other one has a thicker skin than they do. When the truth is, we are both, at at our core really fragile artists. And I think most artists at their core may seem thick-skinned, but when it comes down to it, we really want people to love and understand our work. And so I've learned, you know, I've been with Neil for six years and I still am constantly fine tuning how honest to be with him about something he shows me

and vice versa. You know, Neil, Neil read me something he wrote a couple, you know, a couple weeks ago and I gave, I gave him my honest opinion and immediately wanted to take it back. Cause I was like, you should have just not, you should have, God, Amanda, why did you say that? Now he's going to be depressed for three days. And he was, um, cause you know, I didn't particularly love this or that and was totally blunt and, you know, and I would have, I would have wanted the same thing from him if i had you know if i had written a piece of music and played it for him and no one had heard it yet and i was feeling my small fragile self crawling out of my little art cave waving my watercolor

around as even when you're 54 i totally think of know, that whether it's a novel or a song or watercolor. I don't know what it is. It's totally abstract. I know it's supposed to be a tree. It doesn't really look like a tree. But every artist in that way is kind of five. And you really do have to choose your words carefully. And on the other hand, the reason Neil and I love each other and respect each other so much is we don't really bullshit each other. You know, and we know we speak the language. We know that there's a difference between, holy fuck, I think that's the best thing you've ever written. And, yeah, that's really good. You know, and those are basically two ends of the spectrum.

And if you're trying to be kind and a good, attentive art spouse, you're really not supposed to go into, yeah, I think I get it. Not your best work. I didn't really dig it. You're just not allowed to say that. It's more of like a Japanese tea ceremony exchange. And, you know, and that's what the work itself. We also help each other with, you know, more of the nerdy stuff. We edit each other on social media. There have been nights where one of us has, and this has happened in both directions,

where one will text the other and be like for fuck's sake delete that tweet before you find yourself in the middle of an internet shitstorm tomorrow because you have press tomorrow and you're too busy to spend all day writing a blog defending your right to XYZ

and 90% of the time the person will be like I knew not to do it I just want to know, fuck it, you're right, I'll delete it So for fuck's sake sounds distinctly non-American so I'm guessing you get a fair number of those

We both do that for each other and we not only text each other and say hey, delete that tweet, you're an idiot. But we'll also run things by each other. Neil and I have both stepped in the middle of controversies unwittingly. Neil more recently than me, he got himself in an internet shitstorm with the title of his most recent book. And we sat in bed and had long conversations about, is this a really a good idea? And, you know, when people come yelling at you, how are you going to

deal? And, you know, why don't you actually write something in the introduction of the book to explain it so that you can kind of proactively blah, blah, blah. Like we sit there like a couple of marketing managers, like dealing with the kerfuffle before it actually blows in the window. But we both, we've both been there. And we've both been there holding the hand of the other while the other stands in the internet shitstorm, you know, having to deal with the op-eds and the angry tweets and the angry Tumblr people. And there's something really wonderful about having a spouse who really fundamentally understands you and has your back we we deeply understand each other and we we and we deeply share a philosophy about you know life work freedom of speech and compassion

that even even if we express it differently is one of the reasons we were so attracted to each other to begin with. It was like, Oh, you're, you're one of me. I see what you're doing over there. Got it. And, um, and there there's something really, there's something really comforting about that. Um, because it can be a really lonely job when you're out there trying to explain, you know, how your work was misunderstood, how your book title was misunderstood, how your intention was misunderstood. It's nice to, you know, deal with that kind of

bullshit on the internet all day and then sit down to dinner with someone and have them deeply understand, you know, not just the intellectual bit of it, but how it emotionally feels to go through a day like that. Yeah, someone else who's been deployed to the internet before. Exactly. Last questions. You walk into a bar. What do you order from the bartender?

What temperature is it outside? It is Boston in the winter. Oh, I order a red wine or a hot toddy oh hot toddy good choice uh if you could give one piece of advice to your 20 year old self what would it be uh leave college okay leave transfer while you're still a sophomore and go to art school in new york leave the liberal arts bubble for god's sake run while you still have time although you know in the back to the future time space continuum problem would i be talking to you right now about my wonderful marriage to neil gaiman and my best- book? I don't know. So it's dicey time travel. It's dicey time travel. I think, you know,

I've got no regrets, but I'm sure if I had, um, if I had, uh, if I had escaped my shitty situation at 20, I might've just jumped into another shitty situation. So you never know. Well, this, this has been so much fun. I want to be respectful of your time. Perhaps we can do a round two sometime, but I would love to, I can talk for hours. This is really fun. Where can people find you on the internets and say hello and learn about what you're up to and so on? People can find me in the obvious places. You know, you can Google up Amanda Palmer on

pretty much any social media site, Amanda Palmer on Twitter, and I'm on Facebook. And I actually, one cool thing that you might not find Googling is I just created a special page of my website for people who aren't familiar with my music because I've had so many people coming to me as blog readers and readers of the book and as followers of me on Twitter who actually didn't come through the music but came through some other avenue and really want to get to know the music but are kind of overwhelmed by you know the whole. And so I created a page on AmandaPalmer.net that's called A Walk Through AmandaLanda. It just starts with the beginning of the Dresden Dolls

and kind of walks you through the basic albums and what the singles on the albums were and what the best videos are. And it's a really good primer if you want to just go in and sample the last 13 years of albums and music and stuff. And it's pretty funny. I wrote it. Beautiful.

And that's it. I think if you Google Amanda Land, you'll probably find it. Or just go to amandapalmer.net and kind of have a browse around. And your name on Twitter is? It's just at Amanda Palmer. You got, you got the name. That's a good one to have.

Uh, awesome. Well, Amanda, thank you so much. Uh, everyone who's listening, of course,

I'll put links to everything that I can track down that we've talked about in the show notes, the books, Amanda, Landa, everything that was mentioned. And I will let you get on to another creative day. I'm sure.

So thank you so much for the time. Yeah. Thank you, Tim. I think you are awesome. And, um, if you decide to,

uh, fly solo, um, Godspeed. Thank you. It's a, it's, it's a,

it's a lot of work that boy, isn't satisfying. Got to jump, jump off and grow wings on the way down, yeah. Yeah. I mean, one final thought on that, because I wanted to say something when you said that. I think I went solo and did solo music everything once I dragged myself off the label, but then I decided to put my one of, one of the biggest publishers. And, you know, I think the freedom to pick and choose is more important than the freedom of being independent. I think,

and it really is, it's like, you know, work with the man when you're digging the man and the man can actually help you make your art and then don't when you don't want to. But there is no such thing as true freedom because you're always trading something for something else. And having tried to run my own record label and all of that, you really do appreciate the people sitting in offices shuffling the papers that they do shuffle. So when in doubt, and if you go through round one, two, three, and four,

just remember that at the end of the day, you get to do whatever the fuck you want, whether it's work with a publisher or work with yourself, and you get to change your mind 10 times if you want to. Here, here, here. Because I have. Well, I wish you and yours many more adventures and uh i hope we get a chance to have a hot toddy in person soon i would love that and we can invite neil and he

can talk british at you oh i would love that i want him to narrate my entire life uh but with all of his free time, just like so soothing. I want Neil Gaiman to narrate my entire life. It doesn't pay well, granted, but we could talk about that over alcohol. No, but you know, you could create the app. All you'd have to do is get him to read the entire Oxford English Dictionary.

That's it. And then you could make gazillions on the Neil Gaiman Narrate Your Life app. That's true. That's true. All right. Well, Amanda, you're very sweet and very generous for taking the time. I really appreciate it. And you're an inspiration.

Thank you. You are too. Take it easy, Tim. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. back home big fish little fish dying in the

dark if I had one just a wish