Community Theatre

Being an “independent artist” used to mean being signed to an independent label. Amanda Palmer has radically redefined that formula, as without label input she appealed directly to fans to finance her latest album, Theater Is Evil, and raised a head-spinning $1,192,793. “I felt incredibly supported and lifted up by my fanbase,” she recalls of her emotions on seeing the donations rolling in. “I felt like all these people were putting their money where their mouth was and really supporting the philosophy that we've believed in. I think culture in general underestimates the typical human being's willingness to embrace and support art. I felt it a lot as a street performer and I feel it a lot as a musician. There is a fundamental truth that people absolutely love supporting artists.”

Other lesser-known bands are following close behind, such as Tom Dickins of Melbournian cohorts the Jane Austen Argument. “[He] reached out to his fanbase and crowdfunded a record and made about $10,000,” Palmer notes. “It doesn't make him rich. It pays for his expenses for a few months and makes it possible for him to record and print a record. That's all a musician fundamentally wants anyway, the right kind of musician at least; make a liveable wage, not have to work a shit job and connect with an audience. I think the culture of crowdfunding and [online funding platform] Kickstarter is educating musicians and audiences into a new system into which we directly communicate and support each other instead of relying on third parties to do it.”

The opening shows of her world tour in the US have been “explosions of joy,” whilst the album has been scoring positive reviews. It's been a technical advance, as Palmer now employs a full-time band and a musical style she describes as “crancing” – where you're simultaneously crying and dancing. “You should imagine a Goth club in the mid-'90s,” she informs, “and a black-clad Amanda Palmer, standing there isolated and lonely on the dancefloor, slowly undulating to the sounds of The Cure whilst weeping.” Given her current popularity, this doesn't seem likely to reoccur any time soon.

But considering how much of personal life she releases into the public domain – through her songs and her famously candid blog – has she ever felt over-exposed? “The funny thing is,” she ponders, “I treat the Internet as a communication tool. I use it how I want. I don't ever feel enslaved and beholden to my fans. I feel that I'm in a committed relationship with them, but not an abusive one. It feels like a really healthy relationship where we sometimes have our problems and I talk and they listen, they talk and I listen and we work out our differences and sometimes I take off for a little while, because I need my space. Y'know, as a social experiment, I take extreme joy and have a lot of gratitude for the fans who stay in constant contact with me and are following the plot of my life. As a songwriter and an artist I feel like it's the biggest gift I could possibly be given.”

But surely some fans can be a bit intense? Has she ever felt stalked? “Funnily enough, I never feel that. My fans have an unbelievable degree of respect for me, and I for them. It's a two-way street. I have the theory that, the more frequently I hang up my dirty laundry and talk about my dirty personal issues, the less likely the sordid types are to look through my trash,” she smirks. “It's already all there on the Internet.”

That relationship was celebrated last summer in new, extraordinarily interactive ways as she closed promo shows at art galleries by, “stripping off naked and having fans cover me with magic marker and paint. It was kind of the ultimate expression of that trust that I have for them and they have for me. They feel like I'm not doing it for sleazy reasons and I feel like they're going to take care of me; they're going to treat this experiment with care and love and joy and not weird me out. That's a really special relationship to be able have with your fans.”

In what may be becoming habit, Palmer also disrobed and reclined in a bathtub for the promo clip of her collaboration with The Flaming Lips. Does she ever feel bashful at the thought of public nudity? “Bashful I am not,” she states strongly, as if swearing allegiance to a worthy creed. The video reveals breasts, the top of her pubis and glistening curls of underarm hair. “I've had armpit hair all my adult life. I used to be much more conscious of showing it, or hiding it. Nowadays, I feel I've won some huge cultural jackpot,” she cackles with glee. “When I look back I realise that I had that ongoing internal dialogue of judgement, and that's the moment where I say, 'Oh my god, it took me until I was 35, but now I'm not taking this into account'. That's how long it took, for me to just think of my body as a vehicle of expression. It's a wonderful feeling to look back and say, 'Oh my god, I've been a woman for 35 years now. I've always been insecure about this. I've always been self-conscious about this. I didn't even know it, and I've finally let it go,' and that's just an incredible death, and I wish it for every single woman out there, because it plagues us all.”

Was the process as simple as that, just letting go? “Well, years of yoga and meditation and lots of talking with lots of friends. It wasn't like an angel came down and touched me with a wand.”

Talking of videos, the Wayne 'Flaming Lips' Coyne-directed clip for Do It With A Rockstar is apparently “99% locked on the edit” and “looks beautiful.” “It stars Stoya. She's a famous American alternative porn star,” Palmer gushes. “She was the inspiration for the video to begin with. I scripted the video to include her, because I wanted to do a kinda bold statement about, y'know, bisexuality and sexual freedom, and... I didn't even know exactly what I was doing,” she snickers, “but I got Stoya on board, I got Wayne Coyne on board and I had a fantastic thong. With those three ingredients I think the clip went down well.” In the interests of full and thorough research, my image search for 'alternative porn star' returned a number of deathly pale skinned damsels with cropped hair, tattoos and piercings. Some more digging revealed individual interests such as Throbbing Gristle (the band) and pretentious movies (which aren't porn). Yes, I really do get paid for this.

Since we've explored the nature of fan relationships, was Amanda Palmer an admirer of comic and book author and future husband Neil Gaiman before she met him? “I wasn't. I'd literally never read any of his work. [But] I really dig his personal forays into dark memoir and the plumbing of his inner psyche. My favourite Neil Gaiman book is actually his unpublished one that's probably going to come out next year, which I haven't technically read, but I've had read to me in bed.”

Set adrift on a haze of nostalgia, I clumsily reminisce aloud that no one's read to me in bed since I was child. “If you're a good cuddler, you might get a shot,” she purrs.