Who Killed Amanda Palmer?

08/26/08 4:25pm

by Stephanie Joudrey (CHARTattack)

You may recognize Amanda Palmer as the singer/pianist of The Dresden Dolls, but she'll try to reinvent herself through the Sept. 16 release of her debut solo album, Who Killed Amanda Palmer.

Palmer worked with Ben Folds, who produced the album and played on many of its tracks. The pair were determined to make it sound different from the Dolls.

"One thing Ben and I did very deliberately was making sure that we didn't resort on any song to just doing the sound of rock drums and piano," Palmer says. "Ben actually plays a lot of drums on the record, but they're a lot more percussive and orchestral.

"The songs sound like my songs. A lot of them would have been Dresden Dolls songs had they not ended up on this record. You can definitely hear the difference in approach."

Folds transformed the album from a bedroom project to a full-blown concept that will also include a series of interconnected videos and a book.

"My original intention was to make a tiny little solo piano and voice record in my bedroom," says Palmer. "It was only going to take a week or two.

"It was just going to be a collection of songs that I had lying around. It was going to be really small and for the fans and pretty much unpromoted. Then one thing led to another and Ben Folds asked if he could get involved. I ended up recording what was going to take a couple of weeks and ended up taking a year and turning it into a full production.

"At that time, Brian [Viglione, The Dresden Dolls' drummer/guitarist] and I were going through some issues and I was turning my attention to the fact that this solo project might actually really be the start of a whole new part of my life instead of just a diversion. That encouraged me to pay more attention to it and spend more time on it. So things were sort of happening organically as the months were going by."

And the months did go by. Who Killed Amanda Palmer was originally slated to be released in the spring of 2007. But it was pushed back more than once due to Palmer's other commitments. Palmer says she doesn't regret that.

"I could have called things done when I wasn't totally happy with them. But that's definitely not my style. My style is I'd rather wait two years and not compromise the perfection. I'm really glad I waited. I could have put it out in the spring when it was originally slated. It might have meant that we wouldn't have had the record remastered or a few things slightly different, but it would have been pretty much the same album. I looked at my schedule and I realized that I have just been running myself into the ground, so that one ended up being just an emotional one. I could do this, but if I put this record out in the spring I am not going to see my family and not going to have time to myself. I had just been working on the record non-stop, travelling non-stop and doing touring.

"That was a decision where I was like, 'What is this really going to negatively affect?' The answer was nothing, so I just waited. That ended up being the right choice because I got to recentre myself and spend time at home and fall in love and do some other good stuff."