In 1995 Amy Lee (vocals, piano) and Ben Moody (lead guitar) formed Evanescence in Little Rock, Arkansas. The number of member changes (7) nearly equals the number of released singles (8) up to now. This includes Ben Moody, which makes Amy Lee the only remaining founder of Evanescence.

I find them to be too rocky to be labelled Goth Metal and too metal to be classed as Goth Rock. I think they're somewhere in-between.

In 2003 John LeCompt (guitar), Rocky Gray (drums) and Will Boyd (bass) joined the band and Fallen, their debut album, was released shortly afterwards.
Fallen reached Platinum multiple times as well as top spot in most country's charts. Overall it sold approximately 15 million times.

Four singles were released, Bring Me To Life, Going Under, My Immortal and Everybody's Fool.

Their first single Bring Me To Life was extremely successful. Not only did it reach top spot in most major charts, it reached silver and platinum as well as winning a Grammy Award.
Going Under was released five months later but never got anywhere near the success of their first single.
My Immortal achieved #1 in a few charts. Everybody's Fool's success was very slim.

This album is what I call a masterstroke. While Evanescence is not Mainstream they became known amongst admirers of all different kinds of music.

Amy Lee clearly is the star, accompanied by powerful yet monotonous guitar chords and very basic drums. Occasionally it seems as if vocals and instruments don’t play well together and sound like two different songs in one.

The four singles are tracks one to four on the album. The remaining songs, though still very good are not as good as the singles and sound a bit alike.

I consider it a very good album but if you have the singles you have virtually all you need.

At the end of 2003 Ben Moody left the band. One theory states that he and Amy Lee had different plans with Evanescence. While he wanted to make as much money as possible Amy Lee wanted to develop artistically. Moody was replaced by Terry Balsamo.

In this formation they released their second and current album The Open Door in 2006. This album reached Platinum, too and sold approximately four million times. It peaked at #1 in the USA, Australia, Germany, Greece and Switzerland.

Four singles were released, Call Me When You’re Sober, Lithium, Sweet Sacrifice and Good Enough. Weight Of The World was only released in Columbia.

The first two singles had a somewhat modest success and the success – or the lack of it – of the other two singles isn’t even worth mentioning.

If you hadn’t already guessed but tracks one to four on The Open Door are four of the five singles. Good Enough is the last track on The Open Door. 

As soon as the album was in the shops I asked some of my friends whether they like the album. I just couldn’t imagine that Evanescence was able to make another album as good as Fallen. And I was right. The singles, well Call Me When You’re Sober, Lithium, Sweet Sacrifice and Weight Of The World are the best songs by a mile. Musically they’d fit on the album Fallen but as additions rather than potential singles. After that the songs become slow, depressing and increasingly similar.

Before The Open Door was released Will Boyd left the band and was replaced by Tim McCord, a guitarist who switched to bass. Not much fuss was made about this but the departures of John LeCompt and Rocky Gray leave a lot of questions unanswered. It is rumoured that Amy Lee, who has a reputation as a spoilt diva, is behind all this.

The current band members are Amy Lee, Terry Balsamo and Tim McCord.

I believe that Evanescence are very talented musicians but it has never been about Evanescence. More suitable would be something like Amy Lee & Co. Look at all the videos. They are 97% Amy Lee and 3% the rest of the band. I would not be surprised if Amy Lee went – or had to go for that matter – solo.

On The Open Door Amy Lee’s voice is wasted. Her voice is so strong and powerful it is not well suited for slow ballads (My Immortal on Fallen is the exception). Her voice has to dominate like it does on Bring Me To Life or Going Under.

I like their music. I really do but if their next album is like the other two, meaning songs one to four are good and songs five to last are less good and sound alike, then I will just download the singles for free and spare me the other 2/3 of the album.

    
http://www.evanescence.com

21-09-2008, 13:23 Geschreven door music_critic