The State of All Things: August 2023 {official Thing} (Patreon)

Here's the basic contents of the Althing:

• BASIC LIFE UPDATE
• WHAT ELSE HAPPENED THIS MONTH
• WHAT'S COMIN' DOWN THE PIKE/UPCOMING EVENTS
• DISPATCHES FROM TEAM AFP
• HOW THE PATREON ITSELF IS DOING
• ARTISTS TO SUPPORT & OTHER ART/EVENTS TO CHECK OUT
• ART BEGETTING ART
• THE PATRON COMMUNITY BULLETIN BOARD

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BASIC LIFE UPDATE....

Hi Everybody. 

I'm tired, and happy, and feeling more grounded than I have in years.

This has taken work.

I know I have been barraging you with a ton of words lately, so I'll try to keep this one short, but that's always hard for me. So suck it up.

First up!!! 

$5 patrons - I'm going to get into the habit of sending you more photo drops like the one the other day, I hope you enjoy. It's a visual smorgasbord around here lately.

$10/webcast patrons - we haven't casted/caught up in a WHILE. I know. I’m about to send you a huge list of times to set aside for webcasting. We are well overdue, but it’s been full-house and scramble season for me. After Ash gets back in school (in about two weeks) I’ll be firing on more cylinders with more webcast time.

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This month has been FAMILY MONTH. I TOOK TIME OFF to do normal life shit.

This is mushroom forraging, with Rachel, Asa and Zoe.

Really. You'd have been proud of me.

Ash, my dad, and Michael, throwing a tiny bye-bye party for Ash’s friend Aya.

Time.

Water.

Space.

I ripped a page out of my own damn book and decided to really give myself a mental health breather given everything that's about to come up...it's about to be hardcore show and work season. 

My dad was in residence for three weeks, Ash's best friend from New Zealand her two moms and two little sisters were here, my half-brother came, my aunt came, my cousins came, my oldest friend from Boston came, my ex-step-daughter and my granddaughter came....and on top of that I hosted a hot and cold running stream of dozen other artist friends, and it all gave rise to a beautiful mess...from which I plucked a lot of insight, inspiration, reflection.

I spent most of the month in the kitchen, making food and cleaning dishes. I loved it.

Me and my half-bro Alex, makin pancakes.

The extended fam, eating said pancakes...

Hina gave us sushi lessons….

Me and Dada Jack….

Ash and Aya..

Esther’s birthday party at my house. I’m sitting here with Maria Popova….and so happy. Deep discussions all around.

I have made like 16 gallons of gazpacho. 

No shitting. It's my fave. 

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I've been thinking a ton about scale lately, and life priorities, and money, and ambition, and (basically) about what's truly important. The company we keep. The sorts of people and stories we surround ourselves with .

I've been around so many WAYS of doing life. I've been exposed to the hyper-rich and the hyper-famous and whatever the opposite of that is. I've seen people try to achieve happiness through celebrity. I've watched people die - this month - of addiction. I've been a close witness over the last year to at least four divorces. I've watched quietly as people try to step back and re-assess the whole mess of What To Do Before We Die

Me too - especially since returning from my recent travels....with a new and painful outlook on America (ouch) and the UK (super ouch) that I just cannot shake. I find myself really thinking about how I want to live my life in this upcoming era.

I have a lot of upcoming choices to make: about space, about place, about people, about health, about time, about Ash, about me. It's scary. But it's also FUN. I'm leaving a whole life and lifestyle that wasn't particularly healthy, and I feel like I'm re-learning how to walk after being in a little comatose. There's so much joy that wasn't accessible, there's so much more light in the house, there's so much of myself that I lost and I'm finding her in music, in boxes, in the parts of myself that I squished down and made small because it was just...easier.

So: I'm trying hard to rip the script up, dig deep, and find what's truly important. I'm trying to make space to do that. My inner workaholic wants to crack the whip, and I know the longer I wait to make certain decisions, the more my bank account will sort of falter, nut there's the bamboo-style faith. Time is money, but space is critical. You cannot rush everything, you cannot rush all art. You cannot rush making massive decisions about life.

When I slow down, the themes arise, slowly.

When I slow down with Ash, they scream loudly, after the dust settles. Again and again I find myself coming back to the obvious: time at the dinner table, time with friends, kin, chosen family, time talking about the truth; time and attention as a measure of real, true love.

Work still works.

The team has been chugging along over the summer and taking it easy - there haven't been too many huge moments. We need to hire a new staff member to help direct all the web, community, patreon and AFP/dolls media traffic, and that's up on the docket. I've been flailing in that department for a long time, but we need the bandwidth to make the hire. You'll know when we do.

I've been slowly working on a piece of writing that Ash's Kiwi Friend inspired, and I allowed the last-minute Sinéad cover to take the front seat as the Big Project of the month. It drops in a couple days and everyone on Team AFP has been working super hard to make it all happen.

I've also been trying to clean the house and rehearse for the dolls. I've been failing on most fronts most days...it never all gets done. But other things have gotten done; bigger more important things.

The two biggest: I finished a brand-new song for the dolls (I've going to test it out tonight at Strom Large's show at Graveside) and I've spent a lot of time just BEING loved by the people around me. I was surrounded by strangers (and near-strangers, and then less-strangers) when I was waylaid in New Zealand for those two and a half years, and I just really missed being AROUND people I knew and loved. I cannot deny that it feels like a key ingredient to life, to healing, to being able to make good art, write good music.

The new material that I'm writing for the dolls record is so rich, and so dark, and so beautiful, and so true. You know me; I love instant gratification...so it's hard not to just instantly send you all the demos and want a pat on the head. But that's been my lucky lot for years here on this patreon: this dolls record is different.

There is, like my old yoga teacher used to say, a kind of time faith. I don't know if y'all remember the passage from The Art of Asking where I relay his story about the farmers who tend to underground fetal bamboo for years and years before the bamboo suddenly shoot ups up fifty feet in a matter of weeks. I think the dolls record is going to feel a little like that. The patrons here who are following along the bouncing ball are hopefully going to feel an incredible pride in having been able to nourish this struggling mom-artist as she incubated what I hope is really going to be a masterpiece.

The Dolls are about to play THREE sold-out shows (this Thursday, Friday and Saturday Aug 31/Sept1-2) at Colony in Woodstock, and if you're coming to town, Liz and I put together this GUIDE to help you find thingd to do and see and eat..https://www.patreon.com/posts/87915768...and there's a TON of good stuff happening at Graveside Variety.

OH I FORGOT TO ASK YOU IN THAT POST: if you're coming to town for the dolls shows and you're swinging by Graveside, BRING SOMETHING TO HANG ON THE WALL! Any little framed photo or painting (not too big!) with a hook or wire on the back. We have nails and stuff.

Graveside has really been feeding my soul, and the souls of so many.

This is Candid Amanda the other night … Liz just texted these over, they were emailed to the Graveside Variety gmail address by a dad of a girl named Miriam who is about to start High School, and who took these the other night at my last-minute patron-only “open rehearsal” show. That means she’s…14?

I love looking at these pictures she took. I didn’t know they were being taken and that means … I don’t know. It means that I can see me, through the eyes of a teenager, and it looks like I really, truly was enjoying myself on stage to the hilt.

I’d announced this little show with almost no notice because I needed to practice, and it was such fun seeing who showed up in the room after announcing it to Patreon.

Notes galore.

I rehearsed Dresden Dolls songs, I shared what I was working on, and I talked about what was happening in my life. It made me feel whole. I asked the crowd to help me name the show - in case we do it again - and Ry came up with “Amanda Palmer’s Private Practice”. LOVE. I’m gonna keep doing these - for patrons only - so stay tuned for dates.

The vibe at Graveside - this little venue in Woodstock, NY that we have started with community help and patron funds - is becoming *infectious*. It’s just so so good.

Meanwhile.

Here's me before dolls rehearsal today, in my new dolls stage bra, which matches my blue reading glasses, which makes me feel powerful and very wise and old.

I love you all a lot. Really a lot.

I'll see some of you locals TONIGHT at Storm's show!

And all of you...thank you for being here, for supporting, for making all this art and writing and bamboo-growing possible, and for following the bouncing dolls.

Thank you for supporting me while I write.

xxx

AFP

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WHAT ELSE HAPPENED THIS MONTH....?

THE SINÉAD O'CONNOR COVER....drops this week. Funded by YOU.

Me and the Righteous Babes - with strings by Jherek Bischoff - are about to unleash a cover of "The Last Day of Our Acquaintance".

Here are a couple sneak peeks of the recording process...

If you want a little preview of the song, I joined the Babes at their show at Colony Woodstock last week, and we played the song live together, live-streamed on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?ref=watch_permalink&v=604753948453718

(photo by Sam Margevicius)

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We also (finally) put out the BIG CAMPERSAND WRAP POST.

You can read the whole thing here:

https://www.patreon.com/posts/campersand-2023-86258603

But, in a nutshell.... it was a deeply gorgeous week of community, love, sharing, healing.

It really tied a lot of things together.

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WHAT'S COMIN' DOWN THE PIKE/UPCOMING EVENTS

THE DRESDEN DOLLS WEEK IN WOODSTOCK IS UPON US.

Shit's gettin' real, we're hitting the stage this Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, with extra fun shenanigans happening at Graveside Variety - again; check out the OFFICIAL GUIDE TO WOODSTOCK post here, for recommendations on food, activities, and - most importantly -the Graveside Variety schedule.

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And after the Woodstock extravaganza will be our RETURN TO NYC....ALL SOLD OUT.

These are our first NYC shows since 2016... they're all sold out, and will be WILD.

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That is ALMOST the full Dolls Tour schedule for the year.... but if you're out on the west coast of the USA, we have a special announcement for you in the next couple of weeks. Save the end of December. (Hi, Tom).

You know what to do by now.

If you want the news first....

GET ON THE DOLLS MAILING LIST.

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And finally, there's a TON of beautiful, inspiring and silly (and KIDDO!) stuff happening at Graveside Variety.,,,,

Here's the flyer for events in the next month (put together by Ry, Graveside's latest addition to the crew)

For full details, ticket links, and information beyond September 28, you can check the Graveside Variety website:

https://www.gravesidevariety.com/

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DISPATCHES FROM TEAM AFP!!

From Liz:

Hello Patrons!

It’s been a wonderfully busy month at Graveside Variety.  I cannot get over the joy of so many things quickly coming together so beautifully.  It feels so natural because this space feels so necessary.

We’ve had a pop rocks chocolate firework party , we had our first kids workshop, Amanda’s first open rehearsal here (dubbed “Private Practice”) , Joan as Police Woman for two glorious nights, more wonderful music, more coffee hours, and the heart-warmingly incredible evenings that are known as “Party Around the Piano with Lance Horne.”

My favorite things are neighbors and our community sharing how excited and grateful they are for the space and just SEEING regular magic of art, love, and support happen…. ALL THE TIME.  I am so glad Amanda had this vision. I am so grateful for the team of humans at the core who helped make this happen..Wren, Holly Miranda, and Gracie Coates.  I am so grateful for YOU GUYS helping us get started.

I am writing this in my studio as we are gearing up for DOLLS WEEK at Graveside….our most jammed packed stretch of programming EVER!  I am so excited about the Dolls shows at Colony, and I am so excited to see so many of you soon.

So much gratitude to you all,

Liz

PS I am working on my Graveside Graveyard tour for this fall.

Who has histories of local Woodstock graves that they’d like to share??

Also - I keep running into young deer in the graveyards.  I’m not mad....

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HOW THE PATREON ITSELF IS DOING....

As of this writing there are about 9,800 patrons pledging about $31,500 for the first Thing each month.

A VERY IMPORTANT NOTE FOR NEWCOMERS: you are welcome to (and encouraged to) CAP YOUR PLEDGE.

CAP CAP CAP CAP!!

CAAAAAAAAP!!!!!!!!!!!

I sometime release one thing a month; sometimes three. We know this can create financial insecurity and uncertainty - so Patreon allows you to cap your pledge. This is, essentially, setting a MAXIMUM amount that you want to pay per month.

YOU CAN BUDGET. Say for example, you're happy to pay $3 per Thing, but you don't want to pay more than $10 a month. In that's the case, you can "cap" your pledge at $10, and whether I release 4 Things or 4,400 Things, you won't be charged more than $10. But MOST IMPORTANTLY, you will still have access to ALL the things/posts/links, even if you cap your pledge!!! It doesn't effect your access.

You can read all about capping your pledge here.

I go over this stuff in every Althing, but if you're new to all this: Patreon charges you monthly & retroactively, meaning that you get billed on the 1st of the month for all the Things released the month prior.

Because people have their pledges capped (SEE ABOVE), the first "Thing" raises the most money by far, and anything released thereafter raises less and less. I LIKE THIS! THIS IS GOOD! It means I never feel guilty about releasing TOO MUCH!!

So really. Please, cap your pledge.

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In July, I Thanged THREE Things:

GRAVESIDE VARIETY -a joyous update, which earned about $37,454 from 9,750 patrons

LOSE THIS NUMBER, which earned about $14,990 from 5,355 patrons.

The State of All Things: July 2023, which earned about $8,578 from 3,253 patrons.

(we say "about" because patreon may be still trying to process some pledges that have yet to go through...we never know, you know.)

Them's the numbers.

And remember: these numbers are gross. Not net. Meaning: it's the money raised before fees were deducted by patreon and is not the total deposited to me. Patreon takes a 5% fee (which they use to build and sustain the platform, which is GOOD) and then there's a payment processing fee, which varies on a ton of factors and is usually between 5-9% of the total collected.

These numbers also do not reflect the money I SPENT MAKING THE ART, paying our staff, paying the office rent, paying the Graveside rent and costs, paying for crowdcast, getting myself around, getting the team around and fed and slept, all the collaborators, and my actual staff payroll, etc....you get it.

I don't share that level of nitty-detail-stuff with you because I assume it would bore you to fucking tears. but you can trust me: paying for a full-time staff, office, manager, accountant, and massive team of art-collaborators ain't cheap.

Sometimes we barely break even.

Right now, because I'm not touring or putting anything out, we're just about breaking even.

Which is nice.

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ARTISTS TO SUPPORT & OTHER ART/EVENTS TO CHECK OUT

Our UK Merch Queen Alex is currently out on the road merch queening on this tour!

Grace Petrie is usually a left-wing protest singer-songwriter, but this time she's performing a stand-up show about sexuality and gender, and what it means to exist in the world as a butch lesbian in the current world of the gender critical movement, transphobia, and non-binary identities.

You can find tickets at www.gracepetrie.com/gigs (and come say hi to Alex at the merch table)

AND if you're sat at home somewhere that's not the UK, the show in Glasgow is being live-streamed on September 26th, tickets for that are here.

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She's a Badass: Women in Rock Shaping Feminism, by Katherine Yeske Taylor

I'm in this book! YAY.

Twenty female rock musicians, including me, Suzi Quatro, Lydia Lunch, and Fefe Dobson, were interviewed about our experiences in the music business…and damn, it was a delicious and uncomfortable exploration that went very deep and very dark. I cannot wait to read the results and see what all these other powerhouse women had to say.

The book comes out in January, but you can pre-order now here.

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I also just signed up to join this Patreon...

https://www.patreon.com/AbortionChat/

Sharing and telling super important stories about abortion. Speaking up is the only way we will get through this.

You know why.

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And I thought it also might be nice this month to pimp out NIKI MCQUEEN....

You've undoubtedly seen some of Niki's work lately - she's been creating all the artwork for the Dolls touring shows this year...

I asked her to do this artwork after seeing some of her other incredible work online...

All of her work is available to view in her portfolio on her website:

https://nikimcqueen.com/work/

And...... why not treat yourself to a print from her store?

https://www.etsy.com/shop/lifebeyondreason

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ART BEGETTING ART....

James G Watt posted this amazing wood-cut piece in the Official Facebook group:

The test piece is made from oak, not entirely sure what the dark veneer inlay is. I've got my eye on a nice bit of ash for the finished box though.

I rent a little space in a large wood workshop that operates a charity offering wood work therapy and not only do they construct boats, they pick up felled trees and process the wood themselves so there's lots of interesting odds and ends lying around - https://www.galgael.org/

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THE PATRON COMMUNITY BULLETIN BOARD!!!

Marlene Rieck - from Vienna, Austria - sent me a message about an exhibition she's about to put on, and I wanted to share it here because it just sounds so amazing and so, so powerful. GO SEE HER WORK.

WAS BLEIBT

10 years after my stillbirth I brought this heart project to life.

Together with Günter Valda, we illustrate  in 9 photographies what's “STILL THERE” (in german “WAS BLEIBT”) after such an intense experience. Me - the same naked body – almost in the centre, on different, soothing, natural backgrounds, recorded from a bird's eye view. The pictures were taken inside a year—and, viewed from a distance, are of course about breaking taboos: you are allowed to look. Because the sadness is there.

If you lean closer, the images allow a more intimate insight into facing the grief of a lost child: one can look at the body, at the physical and mental scars that change with each wave of grief. Because they are there.

Finally the images also open up an intimate space for your own pain. Your own scars, your own feelings—your own grief. Because they’re all there.

The suffering of a stillbirth permits this intense presence of life and death all at once to become one experience. Which stays.

I want to bring “grief after the loss of pregnancy” (regardless in which phase of pregnancy, with or without decision) on another level in public discourse. I want people to talk about it, because it concerns so many, I know about the silent suffering of so many parents – especially women – and it's still I kind of a taboo. And I want to spread that point that eased my pain: Just as love flows immediately at birth, so does grief flow uncontrollably upon stillbirth. The feeling comes in waves—sometimes lighter, sometimes heavier, sometimes softer—but the feeling stays. Is allowed to stay.

The first exhibition will be from 19.–22. October in Vienna's Semmelweisklinik (it was one of the most famous birthing clinics in Vienna, which was closed some years ago and which is actually an artspace... I can't imagine a better place for our first exhibition.)

I also wrote my story in a small book of 56 pages, where also a psychologist wrote the introduction and I present the whole art project with all pictures and the artists behind.

A stripped-down blues will be also part of the exhibition. The lyrics discribes what we visualized in the photo serie. We recorded it just with a reduced bassline and me on the piano, with my voice.....

Here is the actual crowdfunding link with more infos and some of the pix of WAS BLEIBT startnext.com/was-bleibt-fotokunst

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I love seeing so many of you making such beautiful work.

Keep on going. Keep on supporting all your artists.

Keep the faith, y'all

I love you.

XX

AFP

------THE NEVER-ENDING AS ALWAYS---------

1. if you are a patron and new to my work, don’t forget your patronage allows you access to ALL of my patreon releases to date. HERE is the link to download my latest big solo record, “There Will Be No Intermission”, and HERE is a link to download the PDF of the art/essay book that goes with it.

2. if you’re a patron reading this post via an email notification, please click through to comment on this post. at the very least, if you’ve read it, indicate that by using the heart symbol. that's always nice for me to see, so i know who's reading.

3. see All the Things (over 150 of them) i've made so far on patreon:

http://amandapalmer.net/things

4. JOIN THE SHADOWBOX COMMUNITY FORUM, find your people, and discuss everything: https://forum.theshadowbox.net/

5. new to my music and TOTALLY OVERWHELMED? TAKE A WALK THROUGH AMANDALANDA….we made a basic list of my greatest hits n stuff (at least up until a few years ago, this desperately needs updating) on this lovely page: http://amandalanda.amandapalmer.net/

6. general AFP/patreon-related questions? ask away, someone will answer: patronhelp@amandapalmer.net