It’s September and ‘Brechtian Punk Cabaret’ duo The Dresden Dolls are in the midst of touring their new album, Yes, Virginia. They had just arrived in Sydney after performing the tour’s first show in Australia, an all-ages event at The Arena, Brisbane, when Fasterlouder caught up with singer/keyboardist Amanda Palmer in the dressing room over fruit salad and orange juice.

The national tour is being supported by friend and musical ally Jason Webley (“he’s like a one man powerhouse on accordian!”), and Brisbane band The Red Paintings, who were recommended by Australian fans after Amanda left a post on her band’s forum, asking for suggestions. “Within half an hour like eight kids were on there saying “Red Paintings! Red Paintings!” and I thought, well if there’s eight people saying this, there’s got to be something to it. Meanwhile our record label was like you should have this band! And this band! And we were just like… it doesn’t look interesting.”

Amanda accepts that their music incorporates various elements from a diverse selection of genres, but she hopes that there is something more unifying in their songs than merely ‘punk’, ‘metal’ or ‘cabaret’. “One of the things that’s great about the music that we play is that it’s very um, it’s sort of genreless, I mean the piano and drums kind of speak this universal language of… Song. I mean, it’s certainly got rock parts and it’s got punk parts and it’s got theatrical parts, but I think everything sort of combines into someone just playing a song, instead of someone very deliberately making a genre of music.

“I think the key for me is that I write songs as they come into my head and I try not to really edit due to genre; so I might get an idea for a song that’s a little bit jazzy, or an idea for a song that is a little bit speed metal, and I just let myself write all of them. And Brian is such a flexible drummer that he can play in almost every style, so,  it’s counterintuitive but it has to do with the diversity of what we allow ourselves to do and also the diversity of music that we both listen to.”

And what kind of music is that, you ask. Well, there are some answers you might not expect. “Up until I was about fifteen it was like Madonna, Cindy Lauper, Prince, The Thompson Twins, Fleetwood Mac, all that stuff my parents listen to, The Beatles. And then, when I hit 15 I sort of took this curve around The Cure and Depeche Mode, they were sort of like the gateway drug, and then I started listening to really dark, weird stuff, I got into experimental music and started listening to a lot of Philip Glass and Nick Cave and The Legendary Pink Dots and stuff like that.”

I asked her if there were any modern bands who she also gave respect and admiration to, or considered her contemporaries.
“I’m a huge fan of Regina Spektor, Antony who I’ve known for about for years is finally getting what I think he’s probably always deserved and it’s great to see him selling records and getting huge audiences, I just think that’s wonderful. Watching him and Regina getting more famous is very inspiring because there’s just been a lack of great music and all of a sudden lots of bands are getting attention. Which is good.”

But there’s more. Amanda Palmer, like the rest of us, has her guilty pleasures. “Avril. Only the last record though. I didn’t like the first record. And I keep being told it’s a guilty pleasure, even though I don’t think it is, but the Kaiser Chiefs.” True, I can understand the Kaiser Chiefs, but Avril? I can’t deny the fact that for a moment, I was utterly dumbfounded. What about the anti-pop sentiments of her teenage years? “Well, I’m still really devoted to the pop music that I love, I mean I still love listening to ABBA, I still love listening to Madonna, and the Thompson Twins, and George Michael, and you know, all the rest of the records I grew up with.”

Pop is a style that has influenced not only Amanda’s listening, but also her writing. “The songs that I write pretty much at their core can’t really escape the fact that I grew up with pop music. Essentially I write pop songs,” she admits. “My favourite band in highschool was the Legendary Pink Dots, not a pop band at all, and I think it was always my passion really to write really interesting pop songs. I usually get an idea for a song and go like okay this could be really boring, what can I do to it to make it interesting, or what can I write about to make it not the typical pop song.

“I don’t actually know the magical combination of things that needs to happen in order for me to get a song in my head. I mean it can happen in any number of ways, if I just sit down at a piano and have time, something will come out. But also if my mind is at rest and I’m walking around, or driving, and there’s no music, my mind will just start making its own music, and sometimes it’s other people’s music, and sometimes it’s mine, and sometimes I have to try very hard to tell the difference.”

In an age where every Wolfmother riff could be likened to a song from a decade before, appropriation and originality are sticky subjects. “Often, I’ll write a song and then later someone else will point out to me, like, did you realise that that melody at the beginning of your song is lifted precisely from this Dinosaur Jr song? And I’ll say ah, I know that song! That’s where I stole that melody from!” she laughs. ”But that’s allowed, I mean the music in your head isn’t just coming from nowhere, it’s always a reflection of everything you’re listening to, so you just need to be kind with yourself, and know that you’re stealing everything. Try and make it interesting.”

The songwriting process is one that she finds fairly natural and intuitive, being essentially untrained in writing and reading music. Rather than being only a hindrance, it has both its positives and negatives. “I’m forced to keep all my music very simple because there’s only so much I can retain. So I basically know that this song is in this key, it goes to these chords and everything else is up to me when I’m playing it,” which leads to one of the most important aspects of The Dresden Dolls’ live performances – improvisation – and not only in the music, but also their renowned stage antics.

“It’s all improvised. I mean Brian is very, sort of, he gestures and plays around a lot on stage, and there are shows where he’s completely stoney faced, doesn’t move an inch from where he’s sitting if he’s in a bad mood. That just, is what it is. But it keeps it interesting!” she laughs. One can’t blame them for having an off night every so often – when they’re on tour, shows come night after night and the days are spent flying. They’d have to be robots not to get worn out during such a hectic time.

“We actually almost slept right through a gig in Melbourne, because the hotel was right near the club, so after soundcheck we were just like “We’re gonna go take a nap…” and both of us slept right through until the time we were supposed to be on stage and the promoters called us and were like ‘Where are you guys?? The crowd is screaming!!!’ and we were like ‘AHHHH!!!’”

The constant travel and stress gets to Amanda on a more personal level. “I like being close to home. I don’t enjoy touring. It’s very hard for me to be constantly away from home and on the road all the time, I get further and further away from myself when we tour. I don’t write when we’re on the road which is really difficult, and just the constant travel and the constant, you know, business, is not my style.” Free time is spent on her laptop, blogging. Fans are constantly kept up to date and given insight into Amanda’s personal feelings on music, touring and life in general, and it serves as something of an outlet during the months away from home.

But as she says with relief, The Dresden Dolls are on the home stretch and playing to the “wild” and generally young Australian audiences gets the adrenaline pumping. With a tour that has sold out in every city, and an album that defies genre, they’re in a good position to be speaking to every young Virginia out there and telling them that, Yes, there IS a Santa Claus out there. Thank god.