Neil Gaiman and Amanda Palmer – An Evening With…

Neil Gaiman and Amanda Palmer – An Evening With…
Released November 18th, 2013 via 8ft Records

This is an evening with… Enchantment, mystery, prose and comedy. It’s a night in with author Neil Gaiman and singer Amanda Palmer, who were married in 2010 after a quick visit to City Hall. In 2011, the couple embarked on a whirlwind singing/reading/Q&A tour of the West Coast of America, and while there, recorded this three-disc live-compendium of their show.

What started as a request from fans soon grew into a crowdsourcing project through Kickstarter. Initially, only the 3873 fans who backed this recording project were delivered copies of An Evening With… but then the questions began to flow. Why should the rest of us be denied this unabashed night of poetry, hilarity, musicality, wordplay, and, undeniable love?

No reason at all. So on the 18th of November 2013, An Evening With…will be released to the general public. It’s two hours and three-discs of pure art, the first comprising of both artists, the second the musical wiles of Palmer, and the third, the poetic genius of Gaiman. The theatrics, ukulele and costumes (namely on Palmer’s part) are left to the imagination, but the banter and commentary are unsurpassable.

Disc one begins with an introduction by Margaret Cho, who designed the costumes for the evening. After preaching of her love of foreskin, a ukulele starts up and Palmer’s acoustic vox beings to play its own version of Ella Fitzgerald’s Makin’ Whoppee. Gaiman pipes in and the truth is revealed, not only does the wordsmith posses good comical timing, he also has a decent set of pipes. Which he carries into the following track,The Problem With Saints, a rousing theatrical piece with a strong, resounding vocal and a stomping beat.

This swapping of roles isn’t lost on Gaiman. Palmer delivers a very hippie-inspired poetry reading, with electronic ‘bongos’ and allusions to “broken heart stew” included. In the middle of disc one, they read love poems to one another. These read like vows and are an intricate and romantic insight into the inner workings of this oddball relationship.

It’s all Amanda fucking Palmer and her brand of musical comedy on the second disc. Her raw voice is stripped to acoustic, thus enabling clear and firm drippings of feminism to slip through the lyrical cracks. The hilariously doting I Want You But I Don’t Need You is a waltz that toys with the idea of wanting to be wanted but not needing to be needed.

Gaga, Palmer, Madonna: A Polemic is miles less confusing, though no less entertaining, Palmer proving that age really doesn’t matter – especially if talking about it fits well in her song.

The final disc is all Neil a.k.a. shy author, stunning romantic and awkward Hollywood-type. Slightly off-putting, there’s no introductory track, just a straight jump into his first piece of prose, which is a poem about a landlady and of life in Brighton – with an exceptional explanation of the seaside town for the unversed American audience. His diction is perfect throughout and his comical innuendo, a testament to his success in the literary world.

Through his bit, Neil reminisces of everything from his night with enchantment inside a brothel to the niggling aspects of assembling a working chair. He repeats, sweetly “I love her” to his wife throughout, while also revealing that he sometimes imagines he would “love his ashes scattered in a library, or possibly in a fun fair.” He speaks of flying saucers, and the day the zombie apocalypse came. Poetry rolls of his tongue like suicidal raindrops. It is Spoken Word ala Neil Gaiman.

Like everything else on this disc, he has the listener hanging on every word, smile plastered on face, and wishing they could experience the whole (Amanda) fucking (Palmer) thing in person.

Originally published on 13th November 2013 for Kemptation