amanda palmer's open poem to jonathan chait (and other crimes)

"If I sleep on friends couches" does not compute with "my album cost $250K"

The mystery vortex of her new car and house. Seriously though, emil.y otm.

suddenly a contendo appears and he's otm. that kickstarter is mostly expenses without profits.

"7"s cost $100 a unit" is absolutely the most insane thing I've ever heard. Gold-foil stamped 180-gram 2 x vinyl with full bleed full colour silkscreened fold-out packages and Swarovski crystal inserts will not run you $100 a unit.

Just someone explain how it costs $250k to prepare for a kickstarter?

she's getting her fans to pay for the manufacture of goods and provision of services that they will then re-buy! quite an amazing scheme/scam, tbh.

Not really. Because the fans that contribute to the kickstarter automatically get the goods she is producing when their done, they don't have to rebuy them.

re: 250k to run kickstarter, there are professional kickstarter firms that handle and promote your kickstarter projects now...

embarrassed at my egregious misuse of "they're"

BTW just incidentally, do they pay sales tax on on all this? THAT aspect of it does seem like a scheme.

Not really. Because the fans that contribute to the kickstarter automatically get the goods she is producing when their done, they don't have to rebuy them.

― heated debate over derpy hooves (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Thursday, September 13, 2012 4:48 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Right -- kickstarter "donations" include a pre-order of the album, and more in some cases.

you guys should check out http://yourkickstartersucks.tumblr.com as it makes it clear how amazing some things getting funding really are

Yeah, the Kickstarter isn't just a donation system, it's a pre-ordering goods system. But she will have surplus sales after that.

(A few xposts where others point out the same thing)

I like that ILMers feel qualified to decide what a fair wage is for a performing artist.

you wouldn't want to know what we think fair wages for lawyers are :)

fair point on the pre-order business, but not everyone who contributed to that 1.2 mil (or whatever) gets everything she's gonna use it to make/do, right? as i understand it, she's still using the money to make and do a lot of stuff that isn't pre-sold. i may have missed something crucial, though...

xxpost -- Given the number of ILMers posting who are performing artists one way or another, yeah, I'd say they do feel qualified for good reason.

Anyway I am:

a) totally pro-Kickstarter and Albini's statement is petty and weird

b) totally pro-high incomes for musicians and if Amanda Palmer is not banking $200K+ a year with the amount of fans she has and the amount of talent she possesses (which as far as I'm concerned is considerable) then I have several suggests on where she could trim production costs

c) feel like everything this woman has said on her Kickstarter page reads like she's a grifter. Anybody who's run a label or put out their own record would look at that in disgust.

Owen P wins thread, completely otm on all three counts.

what was the scope of the project when she was only asking for $100k?

xxpost -- Given the number of ILMers posting who are performing artists one way or another, yeah, I'd say they do feel qualified for good reason.

― Ned Raggett, Thursday, September 13, 2012 4:54 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

to set the upper limit?

I defer to Owen P.'s answer just now as making the case very well on all fronts.

7,000+ high-end CD-books & thank you cards cost about $15 a package to manufacture and ship. that’s $105,000.

BS? These guys say it would cost under $8k. Maybe not 'high-end' but still, that sounds about 5x more than it should be.
https://www.unifiedmanufacturing.com/products-page/product-category/cd-jewel-cases-folders-cd-jewel-case-clear-audio-cd-24-page-booklet-replication/

i dunno, albini's statement is more charitable than "she sounds like a grifter"

I guess people respect grifters more?

owen makes fair points (idk about "grifter" but otherwise). I still really don't see the big deal about getting musicians to do voluntarily and under no false pretenses do a couple hours of work (which they consider fun) for free.

She really missed an opportunity to offer "Play onstage with this rockstar!" and sell it for $50 or something.

Geeting musicians who want to go to the show anyway.

A lot of 1099s needed if everyone at every stop got 50 bucks.

No, they don't get 50 bucks, they pay 50 bucks! I was saying she could have put that up on kickstarter, "Pledge $50 for the unique opportunity to share the stage!" Missed out on a good chunk of change.

well, that does seem pretty grifter-y

No one is actually trying to set an upper limit on how much Amanda Palmer is allowed to make...? Unless pointing out that she could have afforded to hire the professional musicians she wanted and still banked a take-home that is 1.5 times the national average salary is being interpreted as "and she should not make a penny more, ever"? I mean, isn't she selling tickets to these shows, and merchandise at them? Does she not expect to sell copies of this album to people who didn't contribute to her Kickstarter?

That's just a stupid, lazy argument that doesn't engage with the actual criticism, which is that the balance sheet displayed does not match the picture of reality AP is attempting to portray, particularly in the face of the "even if I break even, this is a success" rhetoric she wrote on her own damn Kickstarter page.

On one hand, I can dig that musicians should be paid, especially when the person doing the paying had made what some could deem a very public cash grab. This is human nature - ask any lottery winner about their experience and the first thing they list is people asking for loans. And it's also in (most of) our nature to be sympathetic to the plights of musicians who make no money and scrape by despite trying to make something we all love to share for us.

On the other hand (and this is even more relevant thanks to Wayne Coyne coming up earlier) is this a shit-ton different than when the Lips ask people in tour stops to don smelly animal costumes and act as stage props? As far as I know (and I spoke to one person who got to be a bunny or some such shit) they don't get paid, but are expected to perform in their own way.

Would people have the same problem with the Lips if Wayne just publicly raised a shit-ton of money online? Or is the addition of a kazoo or bassoon into the equation what makes it blasphemous?

These are honest questions... I am on the fence of this serious issue.

what was the scope of the project when she was only asking for 100k?

I assume that she was doing what everyone does which is "for $10 you get something that will cost me $5, for $20 you will get something which will cost me $10" and then assume that half of the target will be put into actual construction. Except she's already made the album and racked up $250k in debt?

I suppose she may have shot for a low figure because fan-based stuff like Kickstarter is exactly in her wheelhouse - if she'd asked for $500k and failed that would be a hell of a thing.

my friend has posited that maybe her sleazy cabaret mystique is not, in fact, an act and she is an actual grifter

amanda palmer has always reminded me of smug people who were told, a lot, that they were really creative and intelligent (she is, although I don't personally like like her work) and as a result winds up with a complete inability to admit she made a mistake, or is wrong, or isn't the most special apple in the bin.

On the other hand (and this is even more relevant thanks to Wayne Coyne coming up earlier) is this a shit-ton different than when the Lips ask people in tour stops to don smelly animal costumes and act as stage props?

Depends - is Wayne Coyne looking to see people's Equity cards before they put on the costumes?

Is Wayne Coyne asking people to submit artistic resumes and performance reels before he puts them into an animal costume?

She also didn't, I'm assuming, get professional musicians, she got somewhat skilled amateurs. Which is a difference. She didn't use unpaid musicians as her backing band (afaik), she just used a handful of them on a couple of tunes as a horn section. She had one rehearsal with them. She obviously did not expect the degree of polish and perfection one would get from a paid musician in a touring band. She couldn't fault them for making mistakes (which I'm sure they did).

no, but I think he dances around them and sprinkles them with confetti, which is undoubtedly on-the-job harassment if they were paid

x-p

No no, when I say "she sounds like a grifter", I mean, "she sounds like she is fudging numbers, making up expenses, factoring in personal costs and expenses into her 'production costs'". I am saying "she sounds like she is lying". "This reads like she is lying." Her numbers are off and she makes no assertions, states no facts.

Note that I am not flat-out saying "Amanda Palmer is a liar" because I am couching my words carefully to avoid any assertions, just as Amanda Palmer is careful to say "oh, these art books will cost, say, about $300 a unit".

If she were to assert "this art book will absolutely cost $300 a unit" then somebody might ask her to show her a manufacturing receipt, seeing as they are 200% more expensive than the most expensive book you'd find in any art store at retail price. Then she's be lying and the Musician's Union would come and take her piano away.

Note that I am also avoiding any "I am picking on her specifically because her music sucks" or "how much should musicians make, anyway?" debates because fuck all that.

"One year of perfoming as 'Quacky' at the county fair in junior high doesn't count."

Animal friends at Flaming Lips shows just show up, put on costumes, and dance around. Palmer is requiring these unpaid musician fans to learn the music and show up early for rehearsal. I guess that could still be exciting if you're a fan, and if you're just doing it at one stop. afaik, she's not dragging these same unpaid musicians around on the road for 3 weeks without paying them money.

(don't take the non-judgementalness of my previous post as a blessing on what she's doing. she's totally a grifter and a fucking hack.)

Well, that would cost on travel.

what the flaming lips don't want you to know is they're going to have that bathtub on stage and their shows

i wanted my brother to do a tour of the u.s. and hire homeless people to back him up in each city. because nobody would know the difference! hahaha! ah, i kill me. but i think it would have been a great tour. i did not suggest what he should pay each homeless band though. it would have been a sly commentary on underground art and poverty. hmmmm, kickstarter here i come...

So that $250,000 spent on recording the album....must have been a real kick-ass DIY studio! Power to the people, right?

the future of music iirc

so we're pretty much out of new stuff to say about this now huh

I don't have an issue w/playing for free on principal. I have certainly done it a few times, tho usually just for my friends.

However, my question is if no one agreed to take her up on her "offer", would she scrap the whole orchestral idea...or would she hire musicians? There is a conspicuous "getting something for nothing" flavor to this, which tastes extra bad coming off a huge kickstarter campaign.