Design Matters from the Archive: Amanda Palmer

Everyone knows that the business model for musicians isn’t what it used to be. In this internet age you can’t just make a recording and expect all your fans to pay for it when it’s so easy for them to stream it or download it for free. But you can ask them to help out. This has been Amanda Palmer’s approach. The alt-rock singer/songwriter, asked her fans to support her in making an album, which became the world’s most successful music Kickstarter. She writes about the new rules of exchange for artists and their audiences in her book The Art of Asking: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Let People Help.

On this podcast Debbie talks to Amanda about her wild and wandering path to the rock stage, and about how behind her artistic ambition is the drive to feel real. “What I really wanted was to feel like I was doing something that contributed and mattered and that I was in a true conversation with the world and with other people.”