REVIEW - THE ART OF ASKING

Amanda Palmer’s memoir-come-autobiography-come-advice-book-thing is aptly titled. The Art of Asking: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Let People Help goes far beyond being a personal recount of one wonderful lady’s life experiences and traverses around the globe (although there IS plenty of that in the mix!), The Art of Asking constructs a kind of meta-narrative about the way asking and giving are viewed in the age of the Internet, and what we can do to bring an element of humanism back into our interactions with artists and other creatives. The book is a wonderful journey which chronicles some of the most interesting and insightful experiences of Amanda’s life, but it is also a fount of knowledge about crowdfunding, Kickstarter and the right artists have to exist in our society – which can often feel as though it prioritises financial interactions over human ones.

I have known of Amanda Palmer since the days the Dresden Dolls put out their first official album (2003-ish). During those early years, I did not quite know what to make of her. Her music was intense, almost visceral in its passion. Teenage-me loved the drama and emotionally charged nature of her singing, but I also felt somewhat… I want to say intimidated by her, but that’s not quite the right word. It was almost a scary level of respect. I was so amazed by Amanda’s ability to be herself and do what she believed in. I suppose she was kind of the epitome or idol of the whole ‘fuck what everyone else thinks, Imma do what I want’ attitude that I slowly developed during my teenage years. Over the next few years I continued to follow the Dresden Dolls’ music. Around the late 2000s I finally had the opportunity to see Amanda perform live. I believe she was supported during that tour (Who Killed Amanda Palmer) by Zoë Keating. Zoë was entirely enrapturing – watching her play, I felt more and more in awe of Amanda – I wanted to thank her personally for introducing me to such beautiful sounds that I would (likely) never have otherwise heard. Amanda’s performance was even more quirky and beautiful than I expected. Since first hearing the Dresden Dolls play, I had always thought Amanda was weird, but I had never thought of that as a bad thing. I liked weird. I too, was considered weird, and her weirdness was trumped by my respect for her amazing sense of confidence and giving.

My opinion of Amanda Palmer only continued to improve over the years. I went to more of her shows and continued to follow her blog and other endeavours. She was always willing to say what needed to be said, talk about the things so many famous people shirk away from discussing. During the early years of my undergraduate degree, I spotted a flyer proclaiming that Amanda would be giving a free lecture a few days hence. I hadn’t lived in Melbourne for very long, and didn’t know anybody who would be interested in going to something like that. But I didn’t let that stop me – it was a chance to see Amanda Palmer speak. Live. In the flesh. For free! I remember how absurd it was to see her up there on a Melbourne University lecture stage – a far more captivating soul than most who I’d seen take that stage. She played a few songs, but most of the session was a kind of open Q&A. I believe the event was set up by Melbourne Uni’s Queer Society, so a lot of the dialogue was about issues of gender – one particularly interesting discussion was led by a student who was asexual. I was so nervous, but I really wanted to ask a question. I raised my hand and had my chance – asking Amanda where the inspiration for her songs comes from. Many of them draw on quite dark themes, and I wanted to know how much of that she based in reality and how much was fictional. Her answer was really interesting, and one that she expands upon in The Art of Asking. The nature of it was that every song takes some inspiration from something in reality, whether it happened to her or someone else, but that she feels free to embellish for the sake of the narrative of a song. I had another close encounter with Amanda a while later. During one of Melbourne’s many free arts festivals, she was performing and then doing a live reading of ‘Go the Fuck to Sleep’ at the Spiegeltent – I have no idea why, but I do remember the amazing jazz band which played after her reading, and the carefree way she simply jumped onto the dancefloor with the rest of us. Swinging and boogieing our way until the early hours, it seemed so surreal that Amanda felt comfortable doing something like that – but at the same time it felt incredibly natural.

Reading The Art of Asking has simply provided more reason for me to respect Amanda both as an artist and a human being. In her book Amanda lifts the veil and reveals just how intimately she maintains her relationship with her fans – how she hates the idea of being above, and believes relationships with fans are just a kind of extension of friendship. Not a top-down relationship, but a community, for just as Amanda considers herself friends with her fans, fans become friends with other fans, building a kind of net of friendship, which tightens as the group interacts. The foundation of friendship, though, is always trust – and this is what most creatives do not invest in their fans. Amanda’s endless recounts of her interactions with fans lays a strong case for her opinion. Since the early days of the Dresden Dolls, in the late 90s, she has personally invested oodles of time in maintaining friendships with fans, and this is what enabled her to become the most-funded Kickstarter musician of all time. When requesting $100,000 to fund the production of her next album, Amanda was not simply yelling into the abyss and asking strangers for money, she was calling on an enormous network of friends to help her continue to do what she loved doing, and treat them to her art which they loved hearing. Over one million dollars were raised – at the time the most successful Kickstarter campaign ever, and still the most funded music related Kickstarter to this day. Amanda’s core message to other artists seems to be that trust and communication are key. If you communicate with your fans on a human level, if you are honest with them, if you trust them, they will trust you too. And from this trust a beautiful relationship can develop.

  

Reading The Art of Asking made me acutely aware of how human Amanda is, making me admire her even more for the fearless way she lives. You could never tell but she DOES have all those crazy doubts that my teenage self greatly admired her for NOT having – the book is extremely humanising and has only bolstered by respect for this incredible artist. She explores those horrible questions of self-doubt that all artists are plagued by and helps us understand why we are, in fact, worthy, and why what we do is important to society and IS a real job. I think most artists feel that what they do is important, but have so much trouble articulating why that is – so their self doubt (bolstered by the low value most societies place on art) grows and grows. If you are any type of creative, or more broadly, if you have EVER had these kinds of doubts, you owe it to yourself to read this book.

The advice Amanda gives about crowdfunding is grand. As it is relatively new, and exists outside of the traditional financial system, there are very few people who can claim to be crowdfunding experts, but I believe Amanda may be one of them. Aside from providing a plethora of interesting recounts chronicling her own, and her many friend’s, experiences with crowdfunding, she does an excellent job of explaining how, and why, it works. As Amanda so eloquently explains, crowdfunding is not about asking a whole bunch of strangers for free money. It is about giving people who trust in you, and your ability to make art, an opportunity to invest in your next creative endeavour, while always getting something in return for their investment. Amanda provides a plethora of metaphors and stories which will help you grasp the way the Internet is changing how our society functions, why social media is important for artists, and why it can be a beautiful thing. The Art of Asking is honest. While it is inspiring, and full of uplifting stories, Amanda doesn’t gloss over the dark stuff. It’s all there – the balance of life honestly portrayed.

Even though my direct contact with Amanda over the years has been very minimal, I love all that my distant interactions with her have introduced me too. You are amazing Amanda – thankyou for taking time out of what you seem to enjoy doing best (writing and performing music) in order to share your stories and wise words with us in your book. It made me feel shiny to read it and know that a future where the Internet makes us more, not less, human is entirely within our reach.