Today’s choice hails from Boston, Mass in the year of Nomar of 2006.

The Dresden Dolls – Yes Virginia…

Listen to it here: http://grooveshark.com/#!/playlist/Dresden+Dolls+Yes+Virginia/67631909

Read about the duo here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dresden_Dolls#Discography

Fun Facts: The name of the act is at least partially inspired by the fire bombing of the city of the German city of Dresden by the allies during WWII. These attacks claimed the lives of over 25,000 people and has become one of the more controversial and lasting images of the war.

Ali:

Preconceptions:
This was another one of my picks. This is a curiousity pick actually. I haven’t heard the whole album.
To be honest, I wasn’t always a fan of the Dresden Dolls. My whole life I have had this desire to sing on stage, and seeing someone that is doing it in a way that I don’t immediately get… Well I tend to hate on it. My friend Jackie needs super hugs for continuously sneaking their songs into random playlists for me. Warming up to the Dresden Dolls was a lot like trying to get into a pool for the first swim of the season. The initial shock of the water makes way as you submerge more and more of yourself into the water. Of course, once your body adjusts yourself to the temperature you don’t want to leave. That’s how the Dresden Dolls music is for me. I’m not pruney yet. I’m still enjoying the swim.

Mood: Terrible.

After Listening:
Dresden Dolls (and Amanda Palmer) tend to be a very polarizing force when you are first being exposed to the tracks. Regardless of how you feel about the delivery of the words, Palmer is a wordsmith. She is a smith of words. Her piano is her anvil. Viglione’s instruments are like a second skin (which is pretty good because he removes a lot of his clothing during performances). There is a metric f**k-ton of talent in this band, and there are only two people in it.

Favorite track/tracks:
Shores of California – There is such an amazing tempo to this song. They even drop an Aristophanes reference in it. Also, I cannot think of it without thinking of the cameos in the music video.
Me & The Minibar – Nothing touches my heart than a love story about mini bottles.
Sing – Such an emotional song. I will eventually do a cover of this.

Least favorite track/tracks:
Sex Changes – It’s a bold choice for an opening song and it does pay off by grabbing your attention. I picked it as least because it also caught the attention of my coworkers.

Overall (1-5 stars):  4.5

Mike:

After Listening: Piano and drums dominate this record.  And that’s not a bad thing for the theatrical framework of these songs. Certainly a record that makes you wonder if these two are on to something, or if they’re all an act.  Musically it’s a fairly shallow record, the piano is largely poppy, the drums – well they’re in time.  The brief appearances by the other instruments are slight colored pieces better off being back in the mix, than being focused on for any good deal of time.  Vocally, I couldn’t tell Amanda Palmer was a woman at 1st – she has a voice the reminds me at times of some dramatic male voice – like the lead singer of Modest Mouse.  This isn’t to say I don’t enjoy it, it’s got a timbre that sounds very good with sparse arrangements – and works best when she plays the lyrics straight up.  Her voice can lend itself at times to annoyance with mock anger and a sort of smarminess when she’s trying to emote some of her more sarcastic lyrics.   And really, what they’ve done is created a lyrically driven album-and it’s here, and on their delivery that the album is best judged.  A myriad of sexual imagery-and a variety is conjured here, with both success and failure.  Topical wise there’s plenty here to attempt to cause listener discomfort abortion, sex change, alcoholism, masturbation….but also there’s a duality of humor implicit in many of these subjects, and that side is played with skillfully here and there.

Favorite Tracks:  “Backstabber” -  a poppy song with a message of violence both implied and explicitly referred to as already having occurred.  It has a nice backing chorus section, and just generally keeps your attention.  One of the happiest songs with violent overtones I have heard in awhile.

Deliah – I think I mainly enjoy this track, b/c of the general idea. The music presents us with this melancholy tone that you’re just so certain is going to lead to a sad love song in the 1st person.  But as the lyrics unfold you realize that it’s not about the singer’s love (or the singer’s character) at all, and it’s not about a traditional love, but that of an abusive relationship.  And then the final twist, it’s the not the singer mourning over this person’s broken situation…it’s the singer being fed up with the victimization of her friend- and being disappointed and anger at her.  An honest viewpoint that many of us have experienced in our own lives, a frustration that has no good outlet.

Least Favorite:  First Orgasm – Musically it has a disturbingly juvenile (in the gradeschool sense) melody given it’s the backdrop of lyrics about masturbation.  The allusions to church make an incomplete and shallow metaphor that leaves you uncomfortable more at the songwriting-instead of the idea, as was no doubt intended.  And then apart from that, the song just sort of lays there (up to you if you wish to invoke the pun) until it reaches a bizarrely forced ending.

Overall: 3.778 I went from thinking these guys were just another punk band, to thinking they were some type of art rock fronted by a dude, to thinking they were pretty deep, to thinking they were a little formulaic.  And here’s where I settled: I feel like this album is two different diaries kept by a teenage girl. One is the type she censors, that she hopes someone will find to showcase the best sides of her emotions- where she’s generous, empathic, kind, even hurt in romantically bittersweet ways-she’s very proud of this diary, it’s all of her.  Well the all of her she’d like to be anyway.  The 2nd type is the diary with 4 padlocks that even she can’t go back and read too many pages from without putting the thing down.  The type of diary where everything comes out – no conclusions are made, and if they are they’re made with skepticism, sarcasm,  inappropriate humor-and any other part of the human maelstrom that erupts.  Honesty isn’t even a word that has relevance to these writings because the author never stumbles on the breath of thought about it….it just comes out.   And I think when all is said and done on this one we get more of the padlocked diary which is important, interesting, and worth listening to…it’s just in more places than I would like I feel like I’m being lead down a path, instead of arriving there with the artist.