By Karen Bliss
Where has Amy Lee been? Enjoying life, her husband, friends, cooking, learning the harp and taking time for herself. The Evanescence leader didn't care if she ever returned to the spotlight. Her rock band had sold 15 million copies of its 2003 debut, "Fallen," and 5 million of the follow-up, 2007's "The Open Door." When that tour cycle was over, she said sayonara for a bit. So the fact that a new album will be out October 11 means she is ready, willing and happy.
"It's awesome to be back here now because it took me running away and going, 'Okay, I'm willing to throw it all away at this point...,' Lee told MSN. "Having that letting-go feeling and that disconnect, I guess, the freedom to be able to let it go, made me love it again... It made me remember Evanescence, the records we've made, the way that we sounded. It wasn't a character that I created. It's really me. But after a while, it starts to feel like this character. [I'm not always] singing about the deepest darkest pit of my soul, you know what I mean? It's all so dramatic, which is real but after a while, I'm like, 'Man, I'm sick of it.'
"This is about the band. I love them. They're great," Lee continues. "And this is the exact same lineup that we had when we finished up on tour before but, in general, when everybody around you all the time is revolving around me, I'm not into the fame. It's cool. It's just not real. It's not quite reality. It's all completely self-centered [and] I'm not that way. I like to do for other people.
Evanescence -- produced by Nick Raskulinecz (Foo Fighters, Rush) and mixed by Canadian Randy Staub (Metallica, Nickelback, Bon Jovi) -- is a big-sounding album ranging from the introductory first single, "What You Want" to the intense ballad "Lost In Paradise." Lee, a classically trained pianist with an outstanding, crystalline rock voice, also plays harp on "Swimming Home" and "A New Way To Bleed."
Lee always wanted to learn a new instrument, but didn't have time after the band became successful. So when Evanescence came off the road in 2007, her husband bought her one that Christmas. "I got hooked up with a really great instructor and she came over once a week and I was practicing like an hour a day and just doing that," she says.
She eventually got back to the piano and writing songs on her own, as well as collaborating with McCord, Balsamo and a programmer friend of hers, also named Will Hunt (not to be confused with Evanescence's drummer). "It was this really cool experimental journey, but it was really like solo music that I was working on," Lee realizes now. At the time, however, she thought it was for Evanescence.
"I didn't give us enough time to really create together to make it an Evanescence album," Lee explains. "So I jumped the gun. That was part of it. Steve [Lillywhite] wasn't the right producer [she originally hired Lillywhite, a veteran producer for U2, Peter Gabriel and 30 Seconds to Mars]. We just weren't ready. At the end of the day, I was like, 'Okay, for whatever reason this isn't working. It's not sounding like I meant for it to sound and I can't put out something I'm not happy with it.' I'm never gonna do that."
By the time Raskulinecz came into the picture, Lee had a clear vision of the direction.
"After going in the studio the first time and not being ready, we just crammed. We spent months at a time together -- Tim, Terry and I -- from last summer on," says Lee. "We'd shack up at my house for a month; we went to a remote place in California for a month; we went and worked with our drummer in Florida for a while and were constantly hammering out sessions and we finally got it.
"I really believe each person in the band brings something unique to the table," adds Lee, who has seen a handful of bandmates leave the lineup since Evanescence formed in 1995, including co-founder Ben Moody.
"It's subtle, but, honestly, I think the biggest difference is with every other album it's just been like one or two people writing the songs and then everybody else kind of comes in last minute, plays their instruments, which is totally normal; there's nothing wrong with that. It doesn't mean we're not a band," she says mockingly, obviously recalling hearing that kind of comment in the past. "A lot of bands do that. There are principal writers. But this time there's invested writing, real spins and created parts by everybody and a lot of the songs were created with us sitting around at our instruments in a live setting just jamming. That's totally new for me. It gives it like this live band, rhythmic energy."
That type of enthusiasm is contagious and rubs off on everyone, making it the perfect timing for Evanescence's return to the marketplace -- break over, well rested and reinvigorated. "Well they're invested," says Lee. "We're a team. It feels more like a team. I am the director, but we're all onboard and invested and if something doesn't work out, we'll all be sad; if things go well, we're all gonna be celebrating. It's more like that."
Source: entertainment.ca.msn.com
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