Amanda Palmer
Amanda Palmer
Amanda MacKinnon Gaiman Palmer, sometimes known as Amanda Fucking Palmer, is an American singer-songwriter who first rose to prominence as the lead singer, pianist, and lyricist/composer of the duo The Dresden Dolls. She has had a successful solo career, is also one-half of the duo Evelyn Evelyn, and is the lead singer and songwriter of Amanda Palmer and the Grand Theft Orchestra...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionRock Singer
Date of Birth30 April 1976
CityNew York City, NY
CountryUnited States of America
The key is to just focus on the spots where the love is real, because you can just drive yourself crazy focusing on the negativity, focusing on the relationships that are irreparable and just aren't going to work, trying to convince the haters that you are indeed lovable. So much of that is wasted energy.
I get really fantastic results when I just get out of my own way.
I never wanted to grow a thicker skin; I felt a real sense of pride in my thin skin, and in a weird way, I still do, because it's my thin skin that allows me to empathize with other people. It's the thing that allows me to create vulnerable art. It's the thing that allows me to create other feelings and make songs that actually grab people and touch people. I feel like I've spent my life fighting that thicker skin because I don't want to become an embittered asshole.
I had a real come-to-Jesus a couple of years ago when I started to see the direct line between feminism and everything else - feminism and climate change, feminism and poverty, feminism and hunger - and it was almost like I was born again and started walking down the street and was like, "Oh, my God, there are women everywhere! They're just everywhere you look. There's women all over the place!"
I think a good role model has to be sexy. Real, empowered, self-possessed women are sexy. When you're really in control of your choices, your mood, your body, and your opinions, people find you sexy.
I had very literal parents and I wanted to survive with metaphor and art, and there was a real sense of shame around it.
Twitter fascinates me because it's real. It feels kind of unreal, but it makes very real things happen.
I remember being a teenager and being really impressed by "let's sit around and b*tch" people, and I have so little time for those people nowadays.
You know what’s really cool? Wake up every morning, decide what you feel like doing, and do it.
There’s no “correct path” to becoming a real artist. You might think you’ll gain legitimacy by going to university, getting published, getting signed to a record label. But it’s all bullshit, and it’s all in your head. You’re an artist when you say you are. And you’re a good artist when you make somebody else experience or feel something deep or unexpected.
There are a lot of ways in which Brian and I have nothing in common. I remember saying to Brian - it broke his heart but it was true - this is the one-year point where if you were my boyfriend I would break up with you, but this is a band.
All of my music, my stage show, my personality, my blog, my twitter feed, anything that's made me me, and a huge part of why people like and respect me, is that I just don't spend much energy on that other stuff. It's not worth it. It's a losing battle too. You're just screwed the minute you engage.
Men find powerful women so threatening, and finding a partner was starting to look laughable, because I would be really attracted to guys and they would just be so threatened and I didn't like feeling threatening, I didn't want to feel threatened, I didn't want to feel like I was towering over anybody.
I wanted to feel like I could extend someone else's joy and not crush it, and that is the giant paradox nowadays of being a powerful woman: you want to live in a space of compassion and helpfulness and joy and expression, and the world is standing there, pointing the finger at you and telling you that you're greedy and domineering and attention-grabbing, and all you can do is shrug and just say, "Hopefully, someone out there understands and isn't misinterpreting."