Evanescence is an American rock group with female vocalism, established in 1998 by vocalist Amy Lee and guitarist Ben Moody. The band achieved great popularity in the early 2003 with the album “Fallen”.
The style of Evanescence is defined as alternative metal or alternative rock.
The band founders, vocalist Amy Lee and guitarist Ben Moody are natives of a small town Little Rock, AR, USA. They met in a summer Christian youth camp in 1994 being 13 and 14 years old correspondingly. Ben Moody recalls that he noticed Amy when she played the song Meat Loaf - I Would Do Anything for Love on piano.
First demo records of the duet appeared in 1998 - mini albums Evanescence and Sound Asleep. Few songs including “Give Unto Me” appeared in the rotation of local radio station having gained some popularity for the group long before the band started doing concerts. The band name was invented after musicians turned down the variants “Childish Intentions” and “Striken”. Early creations of Evanescence were much less “heavy” then their further albums, presenting some gothic elements.
In 1999, a keyboard player and back vocalist David Hodges joined the band. He helped to record the first full-size album of the band, Origin (2000). All parts of instruments, aside from vocalism and keyboard play, were recorded for the album by Moody himself, including percussion. The disk was released under local label as limited edition of 2500 copies, and all of them were sold during concerts of the band. There are hardly any records of the album on offer, for all of them have turned into rarities. Afterwards, Evanescence perceived the album as a demo, and gave permit for non-commercial distribution hereof via Internet.
In 2002, Evanescence concluded a contract with popular label Wind-Up Records, hereunder even Creed, P.O.D., 12 Stones, Seether are released. The team was filled with guitarist John LeCompt, percussionist Rocky Gray and bass guitarist Will Boyd. In this composition, they recorded the album Fallen in Los Angeles, where Paul McCoy, a vocalist of 12 Stones took part as a guest singer.
Producers of Wind-Up began promoting the band in the “Christian rock” market, and “Tourniquet” became the leader of Christian radio stations charts. The KLAL-FM station was first to broadcast the song “Bring Me to Life”. However, such a reputation evoked discrepancies within the band. David Hodges, tending to religious concept, left Evanescence on December 19, 2002. Soon, Ben Moody refused in an interview to have anything to do with religious music. However, this aroused boycott of the part of radio stations having pure religious format.