Review: Evanescence – Evanescence

“Fair is fair, I’ll give my props to Evanescence for this effort…”

Artist Name: Evanescence
Album Name: Evanescence
Year: 2011
Genre: Hard Rock/Symphonic Rock
Label: Wind-Up Records

I don’t know about you, but I didn’t have high hopes for Evanescence’s self-titled new release. As far as I was concerned, they were a one-album-wonder with 2003’s Fallen. The subsequent follow-up to that album, The Open Door (2006), sucked so much that I begged my dog to piss in my ears so I could just wash out the remains of the reverberation with something more acidic.

But I must give credit where it’s due: Evanescence isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. Preserving their goth and symphonic rock undertones as expected (duh), Evanescence have also revisited the harder edge that originally brought them to the ballpark: the guitars are significantly heavier, rhythms far more driving and the overall appeal is more rock than pop. Just take the single ‘What You Want’ and ‘Sick’ as prime examples – both are ridiculously catchy with more hooks than Captain Hook’s cupboard, but they’re ballsy, too (unlike the popular music of a little boy with a bad haircut and more money than talent). Cutting out all the crap, Evanescence is catchy, commercial, melodic hard rock done a little better than the other n00bs in the genre.

Thankfully, the married life has also made Amy Lee less whiney in her delivery (lyrically, it’s debatable). Occasionally, the emo in her raises its ugly head and sends us down a path of “woe is me; let’s slit our wrists because of our suburban problems like owning a BlackBerry and not an iPhone” songs, but overall it’s a far more tolerable effort than the bitchfest of The Open Door. Besides that, you really cannot fault her vocals; the lady has an enviable talent.

Fair is fair, I’ll give my props to Evanescence for this effort. While Evanescence doesn’t reach the heights of Fallen, it is at least aiming in the right direction again.

Best Tracks: ‘What You Want’, ‘Sick’ and ‘Oceans’

71/100

- Frankie Styxx