'Never Go Back' Inspired By Japan Tragedy

'We were all just totally glued to paying attention to it, all these incredibly heartbreaking images,' Amy Lee tells MTV News.

By James Montgomery

Last month, Amy Lee invited MTV News down to Nashville, where Evanescence were putting the finishing touches on their first album in nearly five years. While we were down there, she played a handful of tracks for our cameras — including first single "What You Want" and the ethereal "Lost In Paradise" — plus some songs that weren't quite ready for broadcast, chief among them a rather epic bit of rock that was (at the time) called "Orange."

Much like "What You Want," the song was a definite departure for the band: a big, bold ballad that pushed their sound further than it's ever been pushed before (Lee described it as "beautiful [and] epic ... about loss from the perspective of someone losing someone in a tragedy"). Of course, unlike "Want," it wasn't quite finished yet, which was why the band was hesitant to let fans hear it.

Of course, fast-forward roughly a month — to the premiere of "What You Want" — and things have changed. Not only is "Orange" completed, but it's taken on a new name too: "Never Go Back." But the song's message, and the events that inspired it, remain the same, as Lee told MTV News.

"It wasn't about my life so much. ... When we first got into pre-production, the earthquakes and tsunami happened in Japan, and we were all just totally glued to paying attention to it, all these incredibly heartbreaking images, and we just [thought], 'Wow,' " she said. "And I was thinking about it a lot. It was consuming my mind, and we were working on that song at the same time. I was kind of working on lyrics at night; we'd practice all day, and I'd go home at night and be working on lyrics by myself. And I came in the next day and was like, 'Guys, I'm going to make this song about the tsunami.' "

And in writing about the natural disasters in Japan, Lee discovered a depth she didn't know she had — one that not only instills "Never Go Back" with true power, but helped push Evanescence's self-titled album to new heights.

"I was singing it to [my bandmates] in the car, and everyone was like, 'I got goose bumps,' " Lee said. "I'm feeling this human connection with [the Japan tragedy]; obviously, I haven't experienced it, but it was cool to write about something a little bit outside myself, that isn't what I usually do. And I love that song."

Source: mtv.com