Tuesday 3 March 2009

Amanda Palmer and The Danger Ensemble @ The Corner Hotel, Melbourne

We can count on two fingers the number of gigs we’ve seen that have started with a wake, and both featured Amanda 'Fucking' Palmer. Last October, Londoners witnessed the Dresden Dolls singer/pianist filling a sold-out Koko with drama and laughter - not to mention Steampunk physical theatre, courtesy Brisbane troupe The Danger Ensemble. Tonight, as Amanda's eventful tour (distinguishing features: 1x break-up, 1x broken ankle) draws to an emotionally-charged close, it's Melbourne's turn, albeit in a considerably more intimate space.

And don't they know it’s their turn. The mis-shapes, punkish queers and graphic novel bookworms are out en masse, drawn as much by Amanda's basque-flaunting sexuality, disarming emotional candour and cultish literary leanings as by her gripping piano-bludgeoning finesse and breakneck singalong gothic nursery rhymes. (Tonight features 'Google You', a song she co-wrote with Neil 'Sandman' Gaiman, who also narrates the show's curtain-up tune.) Like icons before her from Bowie to Siouxsie to Marc to Polly, Amanda inspires and encourages devotion. The four-strong Ensemble are equally captivating, about as dangerous as a feather duster but acting out Amanda’s tales with appropriate dark wit and a large slice of delicious ham.

Is she worth it? Well, Amanda certainly earns her keep, tonight playing for two and a half hours with barely a pause for breath. Her "crappy" keyboard gives up now and then, but with bravura cello and violin accompaniment the defiant likes of 'Ampersand' (from 2008’s Who Killed Amanda Palmer? album, much of which is injected with new vigour here), new song 'Trout Heart Replica' and Dolls standard 'Half Jack' hit hard. A cover of ‘My Favourite Things’ is cute, and even a mid-set half-hour q&a fails to slow the momentum, Amanda's clearly personal, painful storytelling keeping the room rapt.

Preaching to the willing converted, however, is one thing; it'd be interesting to see Amanda and her curious cohorts risk a mid-afternoon festival slot and work on drawing less artsy, less swishy punters into her Tim-Burton-does-Vaudeville world. Tonight though, with a semi-finale trumpeting the virtues of moving to Australia, Amanda Palmer is happy just where she is - on the inside, pissing out. It’s the way the operation made her.

Charlie Ivens

Originally published on the-fly.co.uk