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Elly Roberts reviews

CD: Fallen Explosive Evanescence rocked the NEC Birmingham, on their UK debut appearance. With one hit album and three singles successes, they’re rapidly turning the tourniquet on inferior American bands, like Korn and Slipknot. Central to their popularity is their new ‘ Princess of Rock ‘ – Amy Lee. (right) The raven-haired tiny chanteuse, a hybrid of Goth and Grunge, she belts out one hell of a sound. As with many rock singers, the vocal clarity is sadly missing in the din: and it’s a big shame. With consummate easy she fluttered through the lower and upper registers. She is without doubt one of the best female Rock singers on the planet – few of her contemporaries could compete with this level of performance. In addition, she has charisma and presence. Madonna ring a bell? Oh no, she’s way above her in natural talent and in the singing department. Song writing skills are of the highest order, particularly the ballads, which just for the record are hair-raising, eg. My Immortal. Highlights of he show were the three song piano solos, My Immortal, Breathe No More and Thoughtless, as the arena lit up with swaying cigarette lighters. Gentler moods seem to suit her singing better, and they got the biggest applause. This is when she comes from the soul, and not from the head.

The set list.

So, what about the rest of their material ? It’s powerful, and occasionally anthemic, but only occasionally. Rapid chord pounding makes up a great deal of their sound, like Bring Me To Life, Imaginary with little emphasis placed on individual guitar technique and style : and there’s a lot of posturing by a couple of band members. But, when you add the angelic choric background to it, lush with soaring harmonies ; it is quite stunning, and very religious in atmosphere, as found on Tourniquet. Amy Lee, who is the main attraction for the fans, or was it the ’Addams Family Convention ‘, put her heart and soul into every note, as she frenetically strutted her stuff for just over an hour. Yes , it was that short a gig. Nevertheless, they have phenomenal potential. One album in the bag, they are setting the pace, and key to their potential greatness,(and they could be huge one day), is the willingness to evolve at pace as well. Hopefully, their next album will show more maturity, or at least progress, and that evidence is locked away in some of the Fallen CD tracks. There is much to admire about this band, and they are on course to be one of America’s super groups. They have already won two Grammy’s – "Best New Artist" and "Best Hard Rock Performance", and they deserve them, but they’re not the finished article just yet. New single – Everybody’s Fool is out Monday 24 May. More info Evanescence.com

Review & pics copyright © Elly Roberts, 2004.

DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.

PC games reviewed by the editor are on: