The Dresden Dolls

Cabaret punk duo The Dresden Dolls are Amanda Palmer on piano and vocals and Brian Viglione on drums. In late January they return for two New Zealand shows.

This will be their third visit since their sold out tours of 2004 and 2006 where they won over New Zealanders with their electrifying ‘Brechtian punk cabaret’. Performing local hits such as ‘Girl Anachronism’, ‘Coin Operated Boy’ and ‘Good Day’ with jaw-dropping renditions of ‘War Pigs’ and our own Peter Jeffries’ ‘Electricity’, New Zealand audiences were floored and feverishly took to the Boston duo’s high energy theatre. Blending punk attitude and energy with Amanda’s provocative lyrics and melodramatic piano stylings, powered by the dexterity and dynamite charge of Brian Viglione, The Dresden Dolls evoke the feeling of a smoky Berlin club of the 1930s taken to a modern day stage.

Since the Dresden Dolls took a hiatus, Amanda Palmer has performed solo in New Zealand on a number of occasions. Earlier this year she was in Christchurch on Feb 22 when the BIG quake hit and unable to perform when the scheduled venue, Al’s Bar, was left in isolation.

Formed in hometown Boston in 2000, the Dresden Dolls have released three albums — A Is For Accident (live) and The Dresden Dolls in 2003, and Yes Virginia in 2006.

According to Palmer the name came from a combination of references including the firebombing of Dresden, Germany and the porcelain dolls that were a hallmark of pre-war Dresden industry, an early song of the same name by The Fall, and a reference to the V. C. Andrews novel Flowers in the Attic, where the classically blond-haired and blue-eyed protagonists are called “the Dresden dolls”. The name also evokes Weimar Germany and its cabaret culture. Additionally, Palmer “liked the parallel between Dresden (destruction) and Dolls (innocence, delicacy), because it is very much in keeping with the dynamics of the music, which sometimes goes from a childlike whisper to a banshee scream within a few seconds.”