new art, at last: “CITY HALL”, a joyful song & patron-sourced video…with jason webley {official Thing}
{public post}
hallo loves!!!!
SHORT VERSION….
greetings from hastings, aotearoa. the work season is grinding to a halt, but we managed to squeeze in this last weird and long-awaited little thing-package under the tree…..right before everybody fecks off for a long, long breather. i’ll have more to tell you about that when i do the year-end wrap up post (the profit from which, as usual, will all go to charity).
my dear friend and long-time music-ally jason webley and i wrote a silly 1.5 minute song called “city hall”, while waiting for our friends lance and kurt to get married at city hall in new york city in The Before Times of 2019. jason recorded it, and then we crowd-sourced a ton of photos from patrons and he lovingly cut together an absolutely joy-filled video. THE SONG AND THE VIDEO ARE OUT TODAY!!! go forth into the word and share….here’s the youtube link to “CITY HALL”:
i hope it makes you smile. it makes me smile every time i re-watch it.
**$3 patrons, we’re about to send you a download code! watch for it.**
………..
LONGER VERSION…..
things are dark out there, and gloomy and weird right now.
i can’t think of a better time to drop this joy-bomb of a song and video on you….especially since so many of you send in the material to actually MAKE IT HAPPEN.
so THANK YOU thank you thank you to all of you beautiful people who sent in photos (here’s the original post where i asked for photos, if you wanna take a walk down memory lane).
we loved every one of them.
we chose this one for the “album cover”.
this is john and jen getting married at city hall in chicago, illinois, on september 21st, 2019. thanks john and jen!!!
(photo by Luz Rodriguez)
here’s a screenshot from the video….
………………
for those of you who just wanna listen or share the audio:
stream on bandcamp:
https://amandapalmer.bandcamp.com/track/city-hall
……………
some words about the whole (long, short) project from my soul-sister, jason webley…
and i have to say, one of the things i love most about my relationship with jason is how we’ve always been able to share the load. i would have told this same story, in amanda-ese, but hearing him write it in his own voice was really nice. i love you jason. thanks for being my Life Artner.
A RATHER LONG HISTORY OF A VERY SHORT SONG, by jason.
‘City Hall’ is the fastest and slowest song project I’ve ever been involved in. We wrote it in just about twenty minutes, recorded it a few days later, and then it drifted into a weird limbo where it has lived for a year and a half.
Back in August 2019, I was in New York visiting Amanda to work on another project. At the end of the trip, we were headed from Woodstock into the city together. I was flying home the next day and Amanda was going to be a witness for Lance Horne’s wedding at City Hall in Manhattan. She asked if I wanted to tag along. I’ve been around Lance a bunch of times and always thought he’s awesome, but I don’t know him super well, and had never met his fiancé, Kurt.
We pulled up to City Hall.
I’m pretty sure we were running late.
We went inside, past the security guards, through the metal detector, and found our little wedding party.
the metal detector….for real….
(photos by amanda)
A couple of Lance and Kurt’s close friends were also there. Everyone was in great spirits and dressed up very sharp. Amanda disappeared and came back in a fancy dress. She was visibly excited by all of the energy in the place. She kept sneaking pictures of the people around us, and the gift shop where you could buy flowers, a bridal veil, or wedding ring.
{here are some of my sneaky pictures, -afp}:
I was in my usual raggedy attire, but especially disheveled and greasy that day. I definitely felt underdressed and slightly out of place. I was fine totally with that, but I know I’m not good at masking my thoughts and I was worried my awkwardness might detract from the otherwise joyful occasion.
Lance and Kurt went to the counter and were given a number, and it looked like we had about fifteen minutes to wait, so I quietly broke off from the group for a bit.
(lance and kurt taking their number, photo by amanda)
I wandered around looking at all the people waiting to get married in this strange setting. Most everyone was jovial, but some looked a bit bored, like they were waiting to get their drivers license renewed. There were big groups, little groups, people dressed in street clothes, and others that looked like they’d stepped out of a bridal catalog. Several people were pregnant. And there was the amazing sight of seeing people in full bridal dresses and veils emptying their purses to go through a metal detector.
The weird mix of jubilance and bureaucracy was so human and beautiful.
Amanda had suggested we write a quick little wedding song as a present for Lance and Kurt. We talked about doing it on the drive, but it didn’t happen. The magic failed to strike. But now that we were surrounded by all these people converging in this room to make the same big step, it felt like a song was right there on the branch waiting to be picked. I took out a notebook and started writing:
“My family’s mean, religious and grumpy,
Yours are all in a different country…”
It came out fast.
I got two and a half verses sketched out before going back to our group and tapping Amanda to show her what I’d been working on. She jumped right in, helping to bang out the ending and chiming in to fix the awkward spots. This is one thing I’ve come to love when working with Amanda. She likes to make quick decisions, whereas I’m happy to let things percolate for a while, figuring that the right line will eventually become apparent. I’ve found my “wait and see” approach has become less and less reliable over the years, and in this case we didn’t have any time to wait; our number was going to be called any minute. I remember one spot I’d been agonizing over, trying to sum up the obligatory and performative but sweet nature of the wedding kiss ritual into a tight, three-syllable spot in the song. I barely started explaining the conundrum when Amanda proposed “DO THE KISS.” So perfect. I would never have come up with that.
In a few minutes we had the song more or less the way you’re hearing it here. Amanda had smuggled in her ukulele, so we took a couple minutes to practice just before they were called in.
(Photo by Austin Ruffer)
After the ceremony, we sang the song to the new grooms in the hall, not far from the metal detector. The room was very resonant, and our voices carried. We got a lot of sideways looks, especially from the “suspiciously pleasant” guards, who seemed especially ready to shut us down as we got louder near the end of the song. There’s a video of this moment that maybe will get shared at some point. When we finished, there was much whooping and cheering from our small party, and absolute silence from everyone else.
I remember Lance saying, “wait… you JUST wrote that?”
It was a proud moment, and I felt my awkwardness had been redeemed.
(Photo by Austin Ruffer)
As we were leaving, Amanda said we should record the song and “thing” it. She suggested we put it out really fast, by the end of the month. This was August 19th. I said, I’d see what I could do. I flew home the next day, and we e-mailed back and forth a few times, finalizing the lyrics (mostly ironing out the long line in the last verse about the judge.) I recorded a quick little demo and after getting Amanda’s thumbs up, I borrowed my girlfriend’s daughter’s ukulele to record the basic track in my houseboat. Somewhere around that time Amanda flew to the U.K. and said she’d find somewhere there to record her vocal part.
While I waited on that, I finished recording the other parts of the song. I had a meeting with friends from the Flotsam River Circus (that’s my main project these days, which will hopefully be hitting the water again if the world gets normal-ish.) After the meeting I gathered a little crowd of folks to add the back up vocals to the song. I was hearing a big fuzzy explosive bass on the song, so I took this as an excuse to buy a cheap electric bass off Craigslist. I sprinkled on some accordion, some bells, and felt like it was all sounding pretty good. Amanda always wants me to document these things with photos, but I’m the worst at remembering to take photos of anything (sorry Amanda!) The pictures of me alone playing stuff would have been pretty boring, but a picture of the gang vocal session would have been good… just imagine a bunch of circus performers and clowns hanging out in a yurt singing “oh oh oh!”
Meanwhile, Amanda recorded her vocal part in London. Her friend Christo recorded her at John and Judith Clute’s magical home in Camden. (Maybe she has a photo of that?) But her vocal part didn’t get sent to me until September 1st, so the plan to release the song by the end of August wasn’t happening.
{hey jason, yep. i have a photo of that…x afp}
Since we had more time, I took the opportunity to invite some friends over to my houseboat and added some more voices to the gang vocals and some whooping at the end. I didn’t take pictures of that one either (sorry, again).
The next time Amanda and I talked, she said she thought we should really make a video for the song. I was a bit grumpy about that, just because I was still attached to the idea of putting it out fast. But I said a video could be good, hoping we could come up with something fun and quick like the song itself.
She had the idea to put together a slide show of photos of people getting married at various city halls. She could ask fans for their pictures and mix them with stock photos. I thought this sounded good, but was skeptical about how much response we might get. Amanda was confident we would get a lot to work with. She said she’d post a call for photos and we could see what came back.
And this is where “City Hall” first slipped into purgatory. Amanda was back to finishing her tour, and releasing other things. Now that there wasn’t the hard fast deadline, I didn’t feel any urgency about this song. Occasionally some of the folks who had helped with the back-up vocals would ask me what happened and where they could hear it. When we did the recording, I had told them all it was being released in a few days, maybe a week (sorry, everybody!)
Time passed.
In December I came to London to see “The Ocean At The End of the Lane” at the National Theater. Jherek had written the music and it seemed a nice excuse to get out of the country and see my friends, since Amanda, Neil and Jherek were all going to be there. At some point, Amanda and I talked about our little song again. We even wrote up the request for photos with the plan to send it out sometime in early 2020. Around that time, Amanda sent a note to her patrons announcing that a new song called “City Hall” was coming soon.
That was a year ago now. An unimaginably long year ago.
The new year came, and that photo request never got sent out. It just didn’t feel like a priority. Amanda was touring Australia. Australia was (literally) on fire. Amanda’s attention turned toward an emergency benefit album. I was busy planning my next river circus trip.
Then Covid-19 came. And stayed.
We went into lockdown. Weeks became months. People kept dying.
As the new reality tightened its grip on everything, nothing seemed less important than a silly little wedding song.
Amanda was in New Zealand where her tour had ended, and I was at home. When we talked on the phone, the song didn’t come up. I did think of it every once in a while, but with so many people dying and so many relationships collapsing under the strain of lockdown, it felt like the wrong thing.
Then there was George Floyd’s murder, and the historic protests. New Zealand moved out of lockdown as the U.S. slowly lurched into a second wave.
Time passed.
And eventually it was late August, a full year from Lance and Kurt’s wedding. On one side of the world, winter was ending, and over here we were moving into fall. The pandemic was far from over, but somehow now that so much time had passed it seemed like maybe the world could use a silly song.
We dug up the call for photos we had written up last year. We were looking for pictures of weddings in city halls, courthouses or any kind of official government setting. I was still worried about how much response we would get. Amanda sent the request out to her Patreon patrons first and after two days, we only had about a dozen responses. So she cast the net a bit wider, putting out the call on Facebook and Twitter. I thought we’d get maybe a couple dozen more, just barely enough to cobble something together. Over the next couple days, a few hundred photos came in.
The photos were great. They came in from all over the world. Some were big gatherings, some were small, some looked very serious, some were awkward and hilarious. Almost all of them somehow captured the joy and freedom that had been palpable in that day in Manhattan a year before. There were even a number of recent photos of masked couples, judges and witnesses managing to hold ceremonies during Covid times.
I spent a few days writing everyone back, downloaded all the photos, and started organizing them and placing them into the video.
And then the song slipped back into limbo, and this time it was completely my fault. I don’t really know why, but I just stopped working on it. My days lately have been full of mundane non-creative things, and a number of people close to me have been going through huge crises, and a lot of my energy has been spent trying to be supportive of them. But those things don’t quite explain it. I know in other times, this is the kind of thing I could knock out in half a day. But for some reason the idea of setting aside a few hours to finish editing this little video seemed incomprehensible.
I kept putting it off, and the weeks kept passing by. And pretty soon the US election was nearly on us, and our toxic political reality began occupying any extra space in my brain. I know it would have been a much better to spend my time sorting through joyful photos of strangers on one of the happiest moments of their lives, rather than constantly fretting over the election and the pandemic response.
Then, a little over a week ago, I brought up the video to Amanda, apologizing and saying I’d really like to finish it up. She said it would be great if we could put it out before her team went on vacation in mid-December. I liked having a deadline, and promised I’d get it done.
There really wasn’t much work left to do. At some point I had made a rough edit and Amanda had sent back her notes. I went through everything again, moved some stuff around, attempted to clean up a few pictures a bit, and tried to squeeze in a few more photos. There was only room for so many. Some choices were easy – many photos were too low resolution, or too tall to fit the format. Others looked a bit too much like normal weddings for this particular video. And there were a bunch of really good older photos that got sent in that somehow didn’t fit in with the newer ones. But tons of unused pictures were just great, but there just wasn’t room. In the end, we were only able to less than half of the photos that were sent in. So if you sent in an awesome picture that isn’t in the video, I’m sorry! I wish we could have used them all. We should have made the song longer…
Again, Amanda asked me to get some pictures of me crouched over the computer doing editing. That didn’t happen either, but here’s a totally not posed, totally not fake picture of me pretending to edit the video taken right now.
(Photo by Becky Clements)
Just as I was finishing this write up, I got a note from Amanda’s team saying we were going to hold off on the song for a bit. Maybe for a long bit. There was concern that putting this video out full of joyful people into the world right now could upset people. That we might look insensitive to the moment, or that we were encouraging people to have big gatherings during the pandemic.
And somehow, that really upset me.
I mean, I get it. We’ve had this song on hold for over a year now, largely because it didn’t feel like the right time. The world is still crazy. Covid is raging. More people are dying than ever before. The president is trying to orchestrate a coup. The vaccine is a light at the end of the tunnel, but it’s still going to be a long tunnel. I’m fried, everyone I know is fried.
But somehow, after all this time, I think we need a few things like this. It’s a little reminder of other happier times, and that love and joy are still out there and they are resilient, powerful, and healing. And at the same time, it’s just a short silly song. And I think that should be fine.
In these last few days, I’ve been writing to a bunch of the folks who sent in their photos to us, just to make sure we have everything right in the credits. It was encouraging when people wrote back excited to hear that this was still coming out. We needed a cover photo for the song, and we picked this lovely photo by Luz Rodriguez. I wrote her to make sure that she and the couple pictured would be ok with us using the image this way, and she wrote right back: “They would be fine with it being the cover for the song!! This is awesome! … It was some much needed exciting news.”
(Photo by Luz Rodriguez)
Amanda and I talked, and she agreed that we should put it out now. I told her that if there’s a big stupid blowback, I won’t let her stand alone.
So if seeing this thing pisses someone off, or somebody thinks we are somehow advocating big gatherings and weddings during Covid, I respectfully suggest they shut up.
And if the internet trolls have the time to ask for our heads over this, they can fuck off.
I stand by this video, and the timing of it. A year ago, this was a fun silly thing. Today, if need be, it’s a cross I’m happy to die on.
So here you have it, weighing in at 1:37 seconds, and 17 months in the making, I’m proud to give you “City Hall” – the fastest, slowest, longest, shortest, least-important, most-meaningful song ever.
To everyone who helped lend your awesome voices and photos to this project, thank you so much for your help and your patience.
I hope it makes a few people smile for a few seconds.
-Jason
PS. Ok. I actually did take a FEW photos. For the little countdown at the start of the video, I got some little wedding cake toppers from a party store. I ended up using the most boring heteronormative pairing, but there were a few other options:
After taking the photos, my girl-friend’s 8-year-old son incorporated them into his pantheon of super hero and dinosaur action figures. He called them “the Gentlemen” and explained their special attack powers to me. They can hypnotize and attack by throwing powerful paper plates. The brides don’t have names, but can overcome enemies by throwing bouquets of flowers that explode into more bouquets of flowers. The other morning I saw how he had assembled them amongst his other action figures, and I took this photo:
Love,
Jason
…….
some more photos from Lance and Kurt’s wedding day (by amanda:)
lance & kurt’s whole wedding party….
lance and kurt outside the little chinese restaurant we went to for food after the city hall wedding…
…….
some words from the couples who sent us the photos…
JULIA & JUAN
Civil Registry in Pradillo Street, Madrid, Spain – October 6th, 2016.
“I’m sending my parents’ city hall wedding photographs. They got married on 10-06-2016, 35 years after they got together. Very simple ceremony as you can see, but at this time is especially significant since my mother passed away five months ago due to cancer and COVID. It was nice to remember her today on that day.”
-Adriana
……
FEDERICO & WENZEL
Standesamt Neukölln, Berlin, Germany – July 10, 2020
“Find attached three pictures from our “covid19” wedding last month here in Berlin (Germany). Originally we planed to have a huge four days and three nights lasting wedding celebration in the country side with family and friends coming from Argentina and all around Europe, but well… But in the end the small size party with 20 very close guests was the best what could have happen to us! We enjoyed it so much and especially in these wired times! We had a fantastic stormy summer day in our beloved city!”
-Wenzel
……
ED & SUZE
City Hall, Oregon City, OR – August 21, 2014 (Photo by Vandy H. Hall)
“City Hall wedding photo of my adopted aunt and uncle, done while he was dying of cancer, so that she wouldn’t have legal problems. She’d been resisting for years and he was delighted that she finally had to go through with it. It makes me both smile and cry.”
-Vandy
……
SHANNA & RICKY
City Hall, Boston, MA – 2015 (Photo by Lena Mirisola)
“Below are a few photos from our wedding in 2015. My husband was active duty in the Navy, visiting me while I was still in college in Boston. He came to visit for a week, we got married at Boston City Hall, and two days later he flew back to Japan. Five years later, we’re still happily together and cherish our small city hall wedding. Boston has always been a magical place to me and I’m happy to have these memories forever.”
-Shanna
……
SARAH & REBECCA
Registry Office, Wellington, NZ – September 24, 2013
A tale of 2 Aussies that travelled to NZ right after they (NZ) passed marriage equality… because Australia was still years from doing the same. My mum handmade our dresses, and our honeymoon was 6 days in a hire Jucy Tarago driving from Wellington to Auckland. Haha, salubrious right? Marriage equality was so new there, they didn’t even have all the right processes in place yet but they were so thrilled to provide the services to same-sex couples. They went above and beyond to accommodate us (especially since we had to travel from Australia to do it). They even waived a bunch of ‘cool down’ rules to meet our flights and stay bookings.
-Sarah
……
MARY & RYAN
Mary & Ryan – Courthouse, St. Petersburg, FL – February 17th, 2020
“We got married at our local courthouse on February 17th, 2020. My mother in law wanted me to submit because she takes care of Helen, Neil’s cousin. I wasn’t sure if any of these would work but here they are! We had no professional photos because we planned this in less than a week because my now husband needed that good healthcare coverage!”
-Mary Greenstreet
……
LIZ & JEN
County Clerk’s Office, Nashville, TN – October 23, 2019
“My name is Liz (they/them) and my wife, Jen (they/them) and I got married at City Hall/County Clerk’s Office in Nashville, Tennessee on October 23, 2019. Unsurprisingly, TN has some pretty backward laws about marriage meant to target queer folks like us. Only ministers who were ordained IN PERSON (not online) and have the “care of souls” (meaning they lead a congregation) may perform marriages. Additionally, the only county clerk in the state who is permitted to perform marriages is the county clerk of Nashville. There is a very long wait for her to perform ceremonies, so we were very fortunate to have a dear friend who knew her personally, so she agreed to add us to her schedule on our chosen day.”
-Liz
……
ELISE & MICHAEL
City Hall, Chicago, IL
“It’s not a very razzle dazzle photo. We were broke. I was five months pregnant. I found the perfect black (because why white at that point?) maternity dress that my mom bought for me and lent me her pearls to accompany. Something new, Something borrowed. My new father-in-law offered to pay the $10 marriage fee as his gift that day. It was very endearing and landed him a kiss on the cheek from his new daughter-in-law. My husband was a pastry chef at the time, so he made me a cake based off of my two biggest pregnancy cravings: applesauce and beef jerky. It was delicious. We honeymooned at Dave and Busters that night, and he won me a new sparkly bracelet from the claw machine. To say it was the perfect wedding is a complete understatement.”
-Elise
……
THE LYRICS:
My family’s mean, religious, and grumpy
Yours are all in a different country
We won’t have to deal with them at all
Meet me in a couple of hours
Bring a ring, I’ll grab some flowers
Let’s get hitched today at City Hall
The guards are all suspiciously pleasant
Half the people in here are pregnant
I’ll put on my tux in the bathroom stall
I’m not joking, let’s just do it
Skip the hassle, I say screw it
Let’s get hitched today at City Hall
I’m on acid, you’ve been drinking
The room is melting, time is shrinking
And the judge is a pulsing, glowing
kindly, sage-like, warm, all-knowing
kaleidoscopic infinite disco ball
I say I do, you say you too
It’s an easy thing to do to –
Put on pants and grab an Uber
Line up at the metal detector
Sign the form, do the kiss
Start our life of wedded bliss
It took six minutes, holy shit,
We just got fucking hitched at City Hall
…….
MUSIC CREDITS:
“City Hall” by Jason Webley and Amanda Palmer
(C)2020 Music That Tears Itself Apart (SESAC) and Eight Foot Music (ASCAP)
Amanda – Vocals
Jason – Vocals, ukulele, accordion, bass, percussion
Oh-oh-ohs: Rebecca Brunelle, Ellie Fog, Caleb Hirsch, Skip Rose Kirk, Eric Kosarot, Karen Kunkle, Drea Lusion, Future T. Man, Saoirse Napier-Ramey, Metia Napier-Ramey, Richard Porter, Christa Porter, David Roberts, Nancy Sosnove, Justin Therrien, Vanessa Vortex
Amanda’s vocals recorded by Christo Squier in London.
Everything else recorded here and there by Jason.
Mixed and mastered by Jason.
Thank you to the Lookout Arts Quarry, Nexus Marine, The Clutes and Becky Clements for providing recording spaces and to Nicaea Madsen for loaning her uke.
…..
VIDEO CREDITS:
Video Concept by Amanda.
Edited by Jason.
Thank you to everyone who sent in so many amazing photos! We weren’t able to use even half of them.
Photos, in order of appearance:
Annie & Oliver – Sparta Municipal Hall, NJ – November 1, 2014
Rebecca & Joe – City Hall, Manhattan, NY – May 5, 2018 (Photo by Sylvie Rosokoff)
Josh & Drew – Tucson, AZ – June, 2019
Matthew & Caitlin – Kunitachi, Tokyo, JAPAN – March 31, 2020
Julia & Juan – Civil Registry, Madrid, SPAIN – October 6, 2016
Vanessa & Kung – City Hall, Oakland, CA – Dec 9, 2013
Betsy & Scott – City Courthouse, Tucson, AZ – January 26, 2016
Emily & Michael – Toms River, NJ – September 19, 2019
Rebecca & Jeffrey – City Hall, Boston, MA – February 4, 2013 (Photo by Noah Britton)
Dawn & Nick – City Hall, Manhattan, NY – July 8, 2010
Brian & Laura – Bürgeramt 1 Lichtenberg, Berlin, GERMANY – March 20, 2020
Federico & Wenzel – Standesamt Neukölln, Berlin, GERMANY – July 10, 2020
Caroline & Nicola – Hackney Town Hall, London, UK – July 19, 2018
John & Jen – City Hall, Chicago, IL – September 21, 2019 – Photo by Luz Rodriguez
Liz & Pablo – City Hall, San Francisco, CA – August 25, 2009
Ed & Suze – City Hall, Oregon City, OR – August 21, 2014 (Photo by Vandy H. Hall)
Joe & Lou – Sale Town Hall, Manchester, UK – July 3, 2020 (Photo by Kate McCarthy)
Dalton & Vanessa – Carbon County District Court, PA – June 26, 2019 (Photo by Christopher Wall)
Mora & Damian – Buenos Aires Civil Registry Office, BRAZIL – February 29, 2016
Soph & Jose – City Hall, Manhattan, NY – September 1, 2016
Rebecca & Christopher – Orange County Courthouse, Orlando, FL – August 23, 2017
Andrew & Drew – City Hall, Chicago, IL – June 18, 2014 (Photo by Neilly Edwards)
Matt & Anitra – City Hall, Evansville, IN – December 20, 2018
Marianna & Jimmy – City Hall, New Haven, CT – May 27, 2016
Joyce & Andrew – City Hall, Montclair, NJ – August 11, 2014
Clara & Yasmin – City Hall, San Francisco, CA – May 30th, 2018
Whitney & Loui – City Hall, Oakland, CA – December 1, 2016
Helena & Chloe – Taoyuan, TAIWAN – November, 2019
Kate & Zeke – City Hall, Westminster, CO – August 8, 2017 (Photo by Carol Cooper)
Nicole & Keagen – Chelsea City Hall, MA – October 11, 2011 (Photo by Korie Lawrence)
Shanna & Ricky – City Hall, Boston, MA – 2015 (Photo by Lena Mirisola)
Gregg & Melissa – City Hall, San Francisco, CA – October, 2016
Alle & Vinny – City Hall, Manhattan, NY — October 25, 2019 (Photo by Erin)
Steffi & Schorsch – Standesamt Aschaffenburg, GERMANY – Summer, 1984
Jessie & Dave – City Hall, Toronto, CANADA – March 13, 2020
Linsday – City Hall, New York, NY – May 21, 2007
Sarah & Rebecca – Registry Office, Wellington, NEW ZEALAND – September 24, 2013
Lara & Pablo – City Hall, Soria, Spain – August 29, 2020
Marie & Travis – Registry Office, Melbourne, AUSTRALIA – April 22, 2017
Adam & Aria – Sonoma County Municipal Building – Santa Rosa, CA – November 22 2016
Belinda & Jo – Births, Deaths and Marriages Office, Adelaide, AUSTRALIA – March 26, 2020
Rex & Marc – Courthouse, Seattle, WA – March 6, 2020
Mary & Ryan – St. Petersburg Courthouse, FL – February 17, 2020
John & Darrin – City Hall, Washington, DC – February 19, 2016
Vanessa & Matthew – New York, NY – August 8, 2013
Madlen & Phillip – Leipzig City Hall, GERMANY – August 22, 2020 (Photo by Dad)
Stevi & Brent – City Hall, San Francisco, CA – January 14, 2015
Liz & Jen – County Clerk’s Office, Nashville, TN – October 23, 2019
Marta & Kat – Wandsworth City Hall, London, UK – May 30, 2016
Chris & Hillary – City Hall, San Francisco, CA – February 11, 2020
Ben & Emma – Chesser House, Adelaide, AUSTRALIA – February 8, 2018
Amy & Rog – Brookville, OH – August 28, 2017
Elizabeth & Chris – Woodstock, IL – July 31, 2020
Seth & Jordan – City Hall, Spokane, WA – April 28, 2017
Marisa & Cody – Rathaus Offenburg, GERMANY – October 7, 2016
Elise & Michael – City Hall, Chicago, IL – December 10, 2012
Diane & Gene – Scranton Courthouse, PA – April 28, 2017
Sam & Tracey – Registry Office, UK – October 6, 2018
Collette & Connor – City Hall, Tacoma, WA – October 2018
Lauren & Bryan – Recorder’s Office, St Louis, MO – January 2017
Damian & Arianna – Town Hall, New Windsor, NY – January 6th, 2014
Leah & Angelo – Santa Ana, CA – February 29, 2008
Mike & Toni – Marriage Bureau, NYC – May 19, 2017
Nicole & Brandon – Seattle Courthouse, WA – February 20, 2018
Robert & Esther – City Hall, Houston, TX – December 30, 2019
Tara & Todd – City Hall, Ottawa, CANADA – November 1, 2014
Peter & Beth – Franklin County Courthouse, Columbus, OH – August 22, 1997
Bones & Tegan – Chesser House, Adelaide, AUSTRALIA – July 31, 2018 (Photo by Amanda Lee)
Maya & Hannes – City Hall Marl, GERMANY – December 12, 2018 (Photo by Miss Lawless)
Matylda & Noah – Malmö City Hall, SWEDEN – February 15, 2020
Stef & Adi – Bournemouth Town Hall, UK – October 30, 2017
Dan & Christina – Mount Holly Court House, NJ – March 13, 2020 (Photo by Zona Watson)
Matthew & Rena – City Hall, Burlington, VT – February 21, 2020 (Photo by Sarah Binshadler)
Johnny & Kemberley – Springfield, MO – June 16, 2017
Staiphany & Jack – City Hall, Marseille, FRANCE – February 14, 2015
Sam & Dan – Municipal Courthouse, Seattle, WA – October 26, 2018
Jess & RJ – City Hall, Dallas, TX – November 16, 2018
Trisha & Kira – City Hall, San Francisco, CA – October 18th, 2018
Amy & Lucas – City Hall, Melbourne, AUSTRALIA – January 22, 2011
Alita & Christoph – City Hall, Oberlungwitz, GERMANY – April 18, 2017
Adrienne & Rebecca – City Hall, New York, NY – July 16, 2013
Anna & Julian – Brisbane Registry Office, AUSTRALIA – June 28, 2019
Cathy & John – Bakewell Town Hall, UK – December 31, 2019
Emily & Jon – Coconino Courthouse, Flagstaff, AZ – January 4, 2011
Sebastian & Danielle – City Hall, Cambridge, MA – March 29, 2019 (Photo by Dino Rowan)
Janet & Simon – Islington Town Hall, London, UK – June 12, 2010
Emmie & Evan – Brooklyn City Hall, NY – December 13, 2019
Agatha & Thanos – Acharnae District Town Hall, Athens, GREECE – October 5, 2013
Jeff & Becky – Holland, MI – April 20, 2017
Barbora & Felix – City Hall, Prague, CZECHIA – June 19, 2020
Nico & Rory – Portrush Town Hall, NORTHERN IRELAND – September 1, 2017
Alissa & Josh – City Hall, San Francisco, CA – July 1, 2019
Constance & Felice – City Hall, San Francisco, CA – June, 2008 (Photo by Frances Marsh)
Coco & Tom – City Hall, San Francisco, CA
Matt & Megan – City Hall, Edison, NJ – August 27, 2020
Denise & Alan – Newark, OH – August 21, 2020
Kimiko & Brooke – City Hall, San Francisco, CA – August, 2019
Lance & Kurt – City Hall, Manhattan, NY – August 19, 2019 (Photo by Austin Ruffer)
Erin & Dan – City Hall, San Francisco, CA – November 30, 2018
and this is one of the BEST ones we didn’t use in the video, and a really good one to end on….this is Alison & John, in Asheville, North Caroline, July 8th, 2020.
…..
x
a
——THE NEVER-ENDING AS ALWAYS———
1. if you’re a patron, please click through to comment on this post. at the very least, if you’ve read it, indicate that by using the heart symbol. that’s always nice for me to see, so i know who’s reading.
2. see All the Things (over 100 of them) i’ve made so far on patreon:
http://amandapalmer.net/things
3. JOIN THE SHADOWBOX COMMUNITY FORUM, find your people, and discuss everything: https://forum.theshadowbox.net/
4. new to my music and TOTALLY OVERWHELMED? TAKE A WALK THROUGH AMANDALANDA….we made a basic list of my greatest hits n stuff (at least up until a few years ago, this desperately needs updating) on this lovely page: http://amandalanda.amandapalmer.net/
5. general AFP/patreon-related questions? ask away, someone will answer: patronhelp@amandapalmer.net