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Went to the Amanda Palmer solo show this past monday. A very nice night overall. Amanda played for about two hours. Great opening sets by Elizabeth & The Catapult and Boston Typewriter Orchestra.

At one point Brian (the other half of The Dresden Dolls) came out dressed in a white dress along with a grocery bag on his head and Amanda and Brian proceeded to sing They Might Be Giants's song Dead. Along with Amanda's Elliot Smith cover and a song from ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead's new album it made for a fulfilling night of music.

There are a lot of new and new-ish artists on the list this week that are very exiting to me. Also exciting, I'm only about 75 plays from 10,000 listens! Woo hoo :D

1. Humanwine
Number 1 by more than double the listens of #2. And I still can't stop listening to it. It's become a staple of my day, if I don't listen to a little HUMANWINE, it doesn't feel right. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is they are awesome :)

2. The Clock Work Army
So are these guys too, though, and they're only half the listens because there are half the songs. I only own the EP, they don't have a full-length out yet. I can't count how many times I've listened to Read Me A Story. Okay, according to last.fm, 18 times, but that doesn't include waking up to it every morning in my alarm clock. Anyway, it's a great song. And a great band, can't wait for their full-length. It's kind of really just indie pop/rock (and apparently shoegaze-y vocals but I'm still not entirely sure what shoegaze means exactly. …

I just decided to make a list of some of my favorite cover songs...and some that I think SUCK.

The good
Jeff Buckley-Hallelujah
Ben Folds-Bitches ain't shit
Ben Folds-Such Great Heights
Tegan and Sara-Dancing in the dark
Soft Cell-Tainted Love
Rufus Wainwright-Chelsea Hotel No.2

The bad
The White Stripes-Walking with a ghost
Amanda Palmer-On the radio(I usually love everything she does but....this one rubs me the wrong way)

The Ugly
Any Queen cover that isn't by George Michael or Elton John. Especially the My Chemical Romance one....JUST ICK!

3rd November saw me at the Roundhouse for the second consecutive night, this time to see the The Dresden Dolls.

Now, I've been to a few gigs in my time, especially over the last few years, but I can truly say this was one of the oddest. Some of the oddness I can understand, some I still can't get my head around!

I've never been to a gig before where the first thing you see is everyone in the main hall gathered around a huge circle as a man spins himself around in a big hoop! I'd read before the gig that The Dresden Dolls like the show to be more than just the music, and that was certainly my first evidence of that!

The gig was MCed by Margaret Cho, a US comedienne. She introduced a number of support 'acts', some of which were music based, and all were fabulous in their own way!

Roughly in order of appearance;

Cirque-Eloize with a range of different things, musical, dance and visual performances that were very impressive (they popped up several times through the evening (including with the Dolls)
…

Again, if you're here for the pictures, scroll down. If you'd like to read the whole story, you're certainly welcome to. =]

The Dresden Dolls. One of the few acts I was willing to travel six hours for. Took place on October 15th, 2006 at the Crystal Ballroom in Portland, Oregon.

We got in line about 7:45 pm somehow thinking that the concert started at 8:00. Upon glancing at my ticket again, I realized what I'd already known, that it didn't start till 9:00. Not such a bad thing, though- we were near first in line. Security didn't check us out at all, not even a look. If they had security, that is. We walked up about four flights of stairs and finally found the merch tables, where I bought some posters, patches, a t-shirt and some albums. We were only hanging out for probably...twenty minutes when they announced the first act to take the stage, Zen Zen Zo Physical Theatre. I grabbed my brother and off to the front we went. This first group of performers really intrigued me. …

The Dresden Dolls, The Red Paintings, Zen Zen Zo Physical Theatre, Jason Webley
The Arena, Brisbane
September 15, 2006

Seeing The Dresden Dolls. It's a little like going to a masquerade ball. As many punters as not seem to be frocked up. Black lace, top hats and stripy stockings. Masks and feathers. And more kohl and mascara than you’d need for any number of Kiss concerts.

First up, Seattle-born troubadour Jason Webley woos us with his powerful voice and engaging stage manner. With a busker-inspired style, and many a polite tip of his fedora, he cajoles the audience into his act.

A sing-along about aardvarks backed by accordion and cleverly amplified foot stamping for drums is only an initial enticement. By the conclusion of his set he has a good three-quarters of the audience spinning on the spot with their hands in the air (it's a surefire way to get wasted, he tells us) and singing and swaying to The Drinking Song.

The Dresden Dolls' Amanda Palmer makes an unexpected appearance. …

I listened to a lot of stuff over the past week... some of it similar to the week before so I'll try just to talk about the important ones.

1. Rilo Kiley (107 plays)
I truly thought my obsession with them had died down a bit, but looking at these numbers, it obviously hasn't. I listened mostly to Initial Friend-era stuff along with some Take Offs and Landings and a few random tracks thrown in. I played a lot of songs of theirs on repeat often which explains why a whopping five are in my top ten for the week. Most notably, "Somebody Else's Clothes" which I played 22 times - yikes! And those really only happened in the span of a day or two. In second place is "85" with 17 plays. The first few times I listened to it I didn't care for it much and only rated it three stars. (I'm a bit lenient when it comes to rating - the lowest I'll give is three because really, if it's any lower than that it doesn't even deserve to be in my library. …

I went to The Dresden Dolls' "Fuck the Backrow U.K" at the Devonshire arms, my favourite place in Camden, on the sunday of the Bank holiday to watch the films there.

Everyone was dressed in Punk Cabaret style clothing and were seriously dedicated fans, as some of them as come as far as France, or had left Reading festival early to come to the wonderful evening.

Songs such as [track] Me & The Minibar [/track] ,off the new album, were covered and there were Burlesque performances! Many of the films used The Dresden Dolls' songs and all of them were in true Punk Cabaret style! Even though Amanda Palmer didnt close the show, (she had been at Leeds and Reading performing The Dresden Dolls stuff) it was amazing!

I never thought i'd get to see this event as it had been sceduled for America only on their website, but i managed to get to this one and will definitely be going to the next "Fuck The Backrow U.K" which is coming up soon.

See you all there!