Was it Coachella or a performance at Sundance where Adam and Kyle first saw the Dresden Dolls? I could probably dredge it from the gray if my right and left hemispheres weren't being divided between NBA playoff action and my desire to do justice to a band that the boys spoke of in the language of zealots returned from the mountain. Duly inspired I purchased their debut, and was similarly impressed by the cabaret clad androgynously inclined duo known as the Dresden Dolls. Comprised of pianist/singer Amanda Palmer and drummer Brian Viglione their debut was an impressive cocktail of Dadaist/Kurt Weill musical motifs mixed with enough raggedy jaggedy punk punch to make them a fit White Stripes doppelganger for the drama-club set.

While both of the albums they've turned loose are undeniably winning efforts their new release Yes, Virginia is an aural treat that will no doubt be high on the best-of lists for 2006. Where their debut suffered from uneven songwriting and production - it boasted a handful of classic songs that heralded the emergence of a more than promising new act from the realm of the indie/college/underground. My favorite "Coin-Operated Boy," along with "Half Jack" and "The Jeep Song" are songs that stand as perhaps stronger than any one track from Yes, Virginia, but the new one is solid from soup to nuts and produced with a meaty visceral bite that shows off their top-drawer chops. Chops which are, at times, so preternaturally tight that it sounds like the product of a single musical mind. Palmer's versatile piano work is more than impressive, but Viglione's drumming is just flat breathtaking.

Beyond the musicianship however, the thing that makes Dresden Dolls exciting and unique is the cheeky intelligence that Amanda Palmer sings into these tracks. Her lyrics are filled with clever witticisms on the topics of sexual politics, sexual identity, sexual dysfunction all woven around a central theme of relationships. In fact a subject that she returns to frequently involves all manner of transgender issues, the album opener "Sex Changes" speaks to the subject of gender reorientation, looking at it from a the perspective of someone who may have had the operation out of fashion without realizing the irreversibility of the decision, "it might be nice to look at/ don't forget you're stuck with it tomorrow."

The duo are certainly apt visual aids for such topicality - Viglione is the quintessential pretty boy and Palmer certainly looks as though she may have at one point been a he. Her voice and face can be particularly mannish - attractive in a garish handsome way from the right angle with the right lighting. I bring this up, because when I was discussing the album's lovely first single "Sing" with Ryan Slack he mentioned that he liked the song, but said the video is tough to watch because of Palmer's appearance. That Slack - what a shallow bastard. I haven't seen the video so I couldn't opine, the cover art presents her in a fairly sexy light.

Palmer comes off as such a canny wordsmith that it's hard not to fall for her. She demonstrates a much wider dynamic range of vocal styles on Yes, Virginia and steers clear of the overwrought angst and shock for the sake of shock that hindered their debut. These character sketches are both sincere and sympathetic in language that pulls no punches but never comes across as condescending or preachy - mainly because there seems to be a good measure of autobiography. Yes, Virginia the world is filled with sweet troubled female souls, On "Delilah," the title character is a friend who can't seem to pull herself out of the viscous cycle of abuse victim known in the chorus as an "unrescuable schizo." On "First Orgasm" we get a sketch of another lonely lovelorn victim who seems to masturbate as a way of making sure she's still alive. Virginia herself makes an appearance on "Mrs. O" (depicted on the back cover in a stained glass church window with a blowdryer on an extension cord pointed heavenward) one might surmise that she is the patron saint of suicide, "there's no Hitler and no Holocaust/ no winter and no Santa Clause/ and yes, Virginia all because the truth won't save you now/ the sky is falling down." Yes, Virginia this album is everything that Fiona Apple's Extraordinary Machine was supposed to be.