Reportedly the work of a conjoined-twin sister duo, Amanda Palmer and Jason Webley’s Evelyn Evelyn project has numerous talking points — not the least of which is the phenomenal music.
With a track (“My Space”) featuring gang vocals from a bizarre crew including Frances Bean Cobain, Neil Gaiman, Weird Al, Tegan & Sara, Eugene Mirman, and Andrew WK, a series of spoken-word storytelling interludes, and a backstory spotlighting the fact that the twins are “fluent in chicken,” the album provides a wealth of fun material to explore.
Evelyn Evelyn (Amanda Palmer’s latest project with virtuoso multi-instrumentalist Jason Webley) has been gathering a lot of buzz in the blogosphere due to a slew of high profile guest artists, including 17-year-old Frances Bean Cobain, My Chemical Romance’s Gerard Way, and Tegan and Sara, as well as the controversy surrounding the mythical twins who supposedly wrote the music. What hasn’t been tweeted about enough is just how good this groundbreaking concept album is.
From the opening title track, we’re drawn into the escapist dreams of conjoined twins Eve and Lyn who wonder “should we be firemen, can we be astronauts” as they debate leaving the freak show that has become their lives. Throughout the hour-long album, we grow attached (bad pun, we know) to the girls as we learn about their family and friends, including a similarly paired set of elephants, delightfully named Kimba and Bimba. The music is equally lush and eclectic, with touches of folk and vaudeville blended with a healthy dose of indie charm that climaxes with the ’80s-infused anthem “My Space.”
We caught up with Palmer and Webley to talk music, find out about their upcoming Evelyn Evelyn tour, and get to the bottom of who really wrote these great songs.
Last night Housing Works and Spin Magazine joined hands to welcome former Dresden Doll Amanda Palmer and best-selling fantasy author Neil Gaiman to the stage. Starting with a long line and ending with a room filled to the brim with fans, VIPs, Spin editors, and Moby (Yes, Moby!), the event began with excited, uproarious applause. From my little corner in the back, I gleefully waited for Palmer and Gaiman to take the stage. Read More »
As the mouthpiece for Brechtian pop duo the Dresden Dolls, Amanda Palmer epitomized the idea of the everyman artist: the group’s rabble-friendly antics incorporated everything from acrobatics and pantomime to avant-garde performance art and cabaret. Since the duo went on indefinite hiatus in 2007, Palmer has had no shortage of co-conspirators: her solo debut, Who Killed Amanda Palmer, was produced by Ben Folds; her recent stage adaptation of Neutral Milk Hotel’s In the Aeroplane Over the Sea is being buzzed all over the Internet; and a book project with bestselling novelist Neil Gaiman is just weeks from release. (Check them out at Housing Works later this month.)
That’s not to say Palmer is without any enemies. At odds with Roadrunner Records over the supposed “unmarketability” of her album, she’s made a series of very public demands to be dropped. Here, Palmer sets the record straight on whether the Dresden Dolls will return, and reveals exclusively to Flavorpill what went down the last time she met her label’s boss for dinner.
