Although my love for music did not begin from Evanescence, as I was fond of the 90s music - Alternative Rock, Pop and Eurodance - the spark was indeed ignited by Bring Me To Life. The haunting melody and the dark lyrics managed to captivate my taste and I became obsessed with their music. I remember their first album released in 2003 "Fallen" by heart. Led by the vocal powerhouse that is Amy Lee, the band achieved monumental success in the 2000s and the band also laid the foundation for many more successful rock bands with a female lead.
1. Going under
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| Fallen |
2. Bring me to life
3. Everybody's fool
4. My immortal
5. Haunted
6. Tourniquet
7. Imaginary
8. Taking over me
9. Hello
10. My last breath
11. Whisper
This album was a monumental success for the band topping the charts in several countries and being certified Platinum by the RIAA. The band received 5 nominations for the album at the 46th Grammy Awards and won for Best New Artist and Best Hard Rock Performance.
It is hard to define the genre that the band belongs to for its roots although are in Hard Rock, they tend to incorporate certain aspects of Celtic Metal, Gothic Rock, Symphonic Rock, Alternative Rock and even Soft Metal and Soft Rock. It is probably the most successful rock bands of all time with a female lead, although we can see bands such as Within Temptation and Nightwish making progress in that area.
When success thrives musicians fall apart, and just like this Evanescence too fell apart at the seams with co-founder Ben Moody leaving in 2003 due to "creative differences". Amy Lee stayed and gathered the pieces when three other members of the original band left as well.
But in 2004 a live album titled "Anywhere But Home" was released with another set of awesome songs such as
1. Farther away
2. Missing
3. Breathe No More
and this included the songs from Fallen as well.
Before all of this however Evanescence had done a demo CD title "Origin" in 2000 which had songs such as
 |
| Origin |
1. Anywhere
2. Field of innocence
3. Where will you go
4. Even in death
5. Away from me
6. Lies
7. Eternal (instrumental)
In 2006 the band released their second album "The Open Door" which although did not achieve the same success as Fallen did manage to capture the No.1 spot on the Billboard 200 and No.2 on the UK Albums Chart.
1. Sweet Sacrifice
 |
| The Open Door |
2. Call me when you're sober
3. Weight of the World
4. Lithium
5. Cloud Nine
6. Snow White Queen
7. Lacrymosa
8. Like you
9. Lose Control
10. The Only One
11. Your Star
12. All that I'm living for
13. Good enough
These songs were more or less leaning towards Alternative Metal and Gothic Rock. Nor do we see the elements of Symphonic Rock or Celtic Metal in this album other than in Lacrymosa. However this album did manage to get one nomination for the band at the 50th Grammy Awards. Other than Lacrymosa some other good songs are Weight of the world, Sweet Sacrifice and Call me when you're sober, The Only One, All That I'm living for and Cloud Nine.
After this album it took the band nearly five years to return to the scene. Their third studio album was the self-titled Evanescence released in 2011. Although it topped the Billboard 200, the album was the band's least successful. While the band had returned with Celtic Metal elements, it was more rooted in Hard Rock and more dark and dreary than ever.
1. What you want
2. Made of stone
3. The Change
4. My Heart is Broken
5. The Other Side
6. Erase this
7. Lost in paradise
8. Sick
9. End of the dream
10. Oceans
11. Never go back
12. Swimming home
13. A New way to bleed
14. The Last Song I'm wasting on you
Other than What you want and My heart is broken, the other songs in the album lack uniqueness and creativity which may be owing to the lack of the original line-up of the band. Moreover, the rock scene has shifted from being a hard rock oriented one to that of symphonic metal and celtic metal. If Evanescence wants to remain competitive they would have to go up against the likes of Within Temptation and Nightwish for even rock bands such as Nickelback and Linkin Park are slowly losing ground in the charts which used to adore them.
Other great songs by Evanescence which have not appeared in their official albums in no particular order are:
1. Forever gone, forever you
2. Untitled (I must be dreaming)
3. Before the dawn
4. You
5. Forgive me
6. Anything for you
7. Together again
Imaginary by Evanescence remains my go-to song when I need to be either inspired or cheered up. I discovered the band when I was going through a really rough and tough time in my life. Each song of the first album managed to cater to the different emotions I felt at that time. Then of course I went in search of their other songs. From that period onwards I became an ardent music lover and my passion never ends with rock or metal but flows into almost all other genres.
However, Evanescence needs to get its act together in order to survive at this point time. They need to go back to their origins and find out where they went wrong and not who left when. As long as Amy Lee is there which I believe is the heart and soul of the band, they will manage, but to be successful as they were once before, they seriously need to consider making changes to their current style of music and choice of songs.
Therefore it is evident that Evanescence is an awesome band with a great array of unique songs. I obviously recommend their earlier songs, but we will have to wait and see what they will come up with next.
Til the next symphony...
At ease!!!
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