Digital cover: How Evanescence reinvented themselves for a new generation | Talent

More than two decades on from releasing their million-selling debut album Fallen, Evanescence are enjoying a surge of interest from a new generation of fans. The multi-platinum US rock giants are back with a brand new album, Sanctuary, which arrives off the back of star collaborations with Halsey, Bring Me The Horizon and more. To celebrate their return, and dig deeper into the business behind one of the planet’s biggest heavy bands, Music Week meets Evanescence’s inimitable leader Amy Lee, alongside Jordan Berliant of Revelation Management and Julie Weir of Music For Nations. What follows is a rip-roaring tale of reinvention, revolution and rewriting rock history…

WORDS: JAMES HICKIE
PHOTOS: TRAVIS SHINN

Ask Amy Lee about her work with younger artists bolstering Evanescence’s considerable fanbase, and she pivots the conversation to discuss community first, then commerce. 

“That’s really cool but that feels like a side product to the heart of it all,” Lee says of the additions to her band’s now 26 million monthly Spotify listeners. It’s a figure helped by the continued popularity of 2003’s Bring Me To Life, which has 2 billion streams on the platform, not to mention 2,583,856 UK sales, according to the Official Charts Company. My Immortal, also from 2003, has 1,060,398 sales, while debut album Fallen has 1,353,676.

Over the past two decades, Bring Me To Life has become a gateway streamer for young listeners in the same way as songs such as Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit and Green Day’s American Idiot. Evanescence are looking to boost their presence on DSPs further still with the release of their sixth album, Sanctuary, out now via Music For Nations/Sony. 

“For me, the reason for all the collaboration is that it has been so life-giving,” continues Lee, having taken a moment’s break to get her son’s dinner out of the oven. “The need to collaborate is something that started churning during pandemic times, when we were all separated and seeking connection. I found so much joy and release and inspiration through connecting with other artists. It’s great to be able to reach out to an artist I’m a fan of, or for them to reach out to me, and combine our spiritual forces.”

These exercises in combining spiritual forces, as Lee puts it, have been numerous. In May/June of last year, the soundtrack to the film Ballerina – a spin-off from the John Wick franchise starring Ana de Armas – featured Lee’s collaboration with Halsey on Hand That Feeds [11.3 million streams] and Evanescence’s Fight Like A Girl [6.75m], featuring singer-rapper K.Flay. And just a few months later, in September, Lee joined forces with Poppy and Spiritbox’s Courtney LaPlante on End Of You [33.5m]. 

“When we earn new fans at this stage, hearing new music we make and getting into us that way, that really feels like the goal,” suggests Lee.

According to Jordan Berliant, Evanescence’s manager, Sanctuary will also give the band cause to fulfil other, more altruistic goals. 

“If you listen to the lyrics on this new album, they reflect something that is very authentic and very specific to what’s going on in the world right now – and not only what we as Americans have to live with every day, but how it affects people across the globe,” Berliant says. “From that standpoint, this album is called Sanctuary for a very specific reason.” 

He adds that one of the ways the band is actively trying to do good, is raising money for people who can’t afford healthcare. 

“On this tour, $1 from every ticket is going to support entities and organisations that provide healthcare for people that don’t have insurance or whose subsidies were cruelly taken away from them,” he explains.

One of the things I’ve been a proponent of for a long time is for a band to own their own rights

John Berliant, Revelation Management

Berliant became Evanescence’s manager in 2015 after co-founding Revelation Management Group, and speaks to Music Week from an office adorned with pictures of the executive in the company of various presidents and popes. When he and Amy Lee first crossed paths, she was seeking new representation, having stepped away from music to start a family, although she wasn’t sure whether she wanted to restart the Evanescence machine or do something else. 

Lee started out with an EP of covers under her own name, called Recover Vol. 1, which featured her take on Led Zeppelin’s Going To California. The cover was a suggestion by Berliant – also a musician – who had recorded his own version and ended up playing guitar on the track. This was followed by Lee’s album for children, 2016’s Dream Too Much, featuring a handful of covers but predominantly comprising songs written with members of her immediate family.

“One of Amy’s great skills as a writer is her ability to write for situations,” suggests Berliant. “She has explored that a lot in the recent past, doing collaborations with artists outside of her core genre, including [violinist and songwriter] Lindsey Stirling [on the 2019 track Love Goes On And On], whose music is clearly not rock. And then there are the artists who are closer to her core genre, like Bring Me The Horizon.”

Lee appeared on One Day The Only Butterflies Left Will Be In Your Chest As You March Towards Death [42.6 million], the final track from BMTH’s 2020 release, Post Human: Survival Horror. The collaboration led to her joining the Sheffield band on stage during their headline slot at Download Festival 2023, where Jordan Fish, then a member of the band, first met her.

“We spent some time backstage chatting and got on really well,” recalls Fish, who exited the band later in 2023. “I remember Amy saying back then that she felt we’d work together one day and that it would be something special; it just took a few years for the timing to line up.”

That moment arrived with the co-writing and production of Hand That Feeds and, later, End Of You, before teaming up with Zakk Cervini [Bad Omens, Machine Gun Kelly, Yungblud] to work on Sanctuary. Production duties on the latter were also handled by Nick Raskulinecz, who helmed two of Evanescence’s previous albums, 2011’s Evanescence and 2021’s The Bitter Truth, as well as records by Foo Fighters, Ghost, Deftones, Korn and Halestorm.

“Amy is an incredible writer and producer in her own right; she records all of her own vocals at her studio herself,” says Fish. “I think she appreciated my perspective, taste and ideas, but when we’re all in the room together it feels very equal. For me, Evanescence have never felt like a trend-chasing band. Amy’s voice and passion are such a defining part of their identity. I think that’s why new generations continue to connect with it.” 

That connection is being facilitated by the label put in place for the release of Sanctuary. 

“One of the things I’ve been a proponent of for a long time is for a band to own their own rights rather than signing a global deal with a label where the label owns it and releases it globally,” explains Berliant. “I’ve wanted to try to make our clients domestic artists in as many places as possible, because the economics of the industry are such that if you sign a global deal with one company, there isn’t one territory outside of the home territory to which you sign that isn’t more financially incentivised to work its own roster and repertoire than its cousins.” 

The result is multiple different record deals, including a licensing deal with BMG in North and South America, a licensing deal with Sony in Germany, and working with Music For Nations (which is part of Sony) in the UK. 

“We’ve always worked with Sony Germany on the more rock and alternative artists, so it’s a logical fit for us,” says Julie Weir, director of Music For Nations. “And it works. It does mean that there’s probably three times as many people as would normally be involved in these equations, and we’re working with Global on merch as well, which is another huge entity.”

Berliant agrees on the workload. 

“It’s five times the amount of work because we have to work directly with all of these companies,” he admits. “But I believe you get five times the benefit for the artist.”

Those logistics are further complicated by Sanctuary having two releases – on digital and CD release today (June 5) to coincide with the band’s US tour, then on vinyl on September 4 to align with their UK tour – including vinyl variants for Amazon, HMV, indies, and a deluxe version including a poster and a booklet. 

“Luckily, the US will create a wave of press as the record will be out and the band will be touring,” explains Weir of the reciprocal effect these two bites of the cherry will have. “And then we’ll feed back to the US in September.”

Meanwhile, there’s newer terrain to be explored. Last March, Evanescence released the song Afterlife [89 million] for the soundtrack to Devil May Cry, the Netflix animated series based on the game franchise of the same name. They also performed it at The Game Awards, which was seen by an audience of more than 100 million people globally.

“We’ve generally jumped at the chance to do things for video games or franchises related to games as we get a lot of requests for licensing the catalogue,” explains Berliant. “These are opportunities to reach people, because we know from a study we did when we assumed management of the band that, in every country, gaming is the number one or number two activity.”

Luckily, the US will create a wave of press as the record will be out and the band will be touring, then we’ll feed that back in September

Julie Weir, Music For Nations

It helps that Lee herself is an avid gamer. 

“I spend plenty of time, often fruitlessly, chasing around gaming franchises I hear are making movies, saying, ‘Oh, let me write the song for this,’ and they say, ‘Oh, we already have that all planned,’” she says. “But it’s beautiful when something just organically happens, like Devil May Cry, which has been happening more often in the past couple of years.”

Clearly, life for Amy Lee and Evanescence has scarcely been busier. With that in mind, we dive into a discussion that takes in aggressive deadlines, working with multiple producers and lessons she’d teach her younger self…

You had to work hard to get Sanctuary completed in order to begin touring the record. Did you welcome the challenges of being taken out of your comfort zone, scheduling-wise?

“I like being taken out of my comfort zone, but rushing is something I try to avoid. Part of my method when we make an album is to leave things open and clear, as far as the delivery date. I always do my best, for as long as possible, not to have one until we really can see the end. We live in a world where you really need to book your tour, if you’re a bigger act, at least a year in advance. Last year when we booked this, we thought, ‘Let’s get all our favourite bands: Spiritbox, Poppy, K.Flay, Nova Twins – and I’m sure we’ll be done with our album by then.’ And we would have been, but then you have deadlines around finishing things like the artwork and the final masters. We had to say, ‘These are our deadlines to get things done, or we won’t have new music on tour.’ That wasn’t an option for me.”

In 2023, Evanescence celebrated the 20th anniversary of your debut album, Fallen. That presented a chance to acknowledge a record that provided a gateway for young listeners into heavy music. How did revisiting that period tee up this new chapter?

“And this year is another 20-year anniversary, for [2006’s second album] The Open Door. It always comes at a time when I think, ‘Oh, I have other stuff to think about. I don’t want to think about the old music – I want to think about the next music.’ I really put a lot into [the Fallen] anniversary. Fallen is our big first record and we’ve come so far since, so I felt it deserved as much attention as I could give it. I was going through the vault for anything I could find we hadn’t released that was worth sharing – cool old demos and voice recordings. I have these tapes of me writing vocals for songs like Going Under, and you’re hearing the cat meowing in the background. I’ve never fully disconnected from Fallen because we play those songs every time we play a show – Bring Me To Life, Going Under, Imaginary – those songs haven’t left my sphere. But then there are the deeper tracks I don’t particularly listen to that much anymore, as well as footage and pictures from that period, which helped me to remember living the life I was when we made that music. There’s a song on [Sanctuary] called Forever Without You that came out of going through old stuff, feeling old feelings, and looking at it through a new lens.”

Having never shied away from the challenges in the music industry, what advice would the Amy Lee of today give to the Amy Lee of 2003?

“Even in 2003, I was in a pickle with labels and management. You have to make your way out of that mess, and I see the fact that we as a band made it out as nothing short of a miracle. I think the advice [to my younger self] would therefore be to be strong, to trust my intuition and not to second-guess myself. Because at least you know what you need and what the right thing is. Then, when you have people supporting you and you know what you want to do with your life, you can move forward with strength and courage knowing that it’s going to work out. It wasn’t easy. It was messy. But you can’t just say, ‘Oh, I’m an artist, I don’t want to deal with it, I want to go hide under a rock.’ That’s not going to help you if you care about your art.”

Another big difference between 20 years ago and now, certainly in rock and metal, is the fact that bands working with multiple producers on a record has become a norm. How was that experience of working with several producers, including Jordan Fish?

“More and more, I’ve loved the idea of working on one song at a time. The standard method is: you get your songs, you figure out the ones you’re going to do, then you go into the studio with a producer, record the drums, bass and guitars, and then you put all the things on top. That makes sense if you have a certain amount of time, but it’s also really overwhelming. Working one song at a time is better for the creative spirit: to be able to work on the thing you’re obsessed with until it’s done. So we went into the studio with Nick Raskulinecz and made these three awesome songs, only focusing on that for a while. Then, we make this incredible connection with Zakk Cervini and Jordan Fish, and we have a little experiment, which goes amazingly. The first day that Troy [McLawhorn, Evanescence guitarist] and I went into the studio with Zakk and Jordan, we were open-hearted, just seeing what would happen when the four of us got together. It became apparent that Zakk and Jordan get Evanescence from the outside looking in as fans. For them to give me those glasses and let me see through those eyes brought back some love for things I’d forgotten about.”

Many of your peers are into double figures in terms of albums released now, but if you include 2017’s Synthesis, Sanctuary is Evanescence’s sixth album. Do you think taking your time is the band’s superpower?

“All I know is, that’s my way. Some people can just crank out ideas fast, but I’m not that way. I need time to ponder and think. The longest spaces we’ve had in between albums were times when I didn’t necessarily feel really passionate – I needed to wait for the music to call me in. So I’d go do some other things, like live my life separate from ‘the entity of Amy Lee’ or whatever. I would go away and allow myself to imagine that that was it, like maybe that was the last time and now it was time to move on. I’d ask myself, ‘What do you want to do? What other dreams do you have?’ And every time, it’s music. I’ve done things that don’t sound like Evanescence, but it still ends up coming from a desire to make music. I’m doing what I’m doing for the art, for the passion – not for striking while the iron is hot, or pleasing the fans or anybody else.”

How does that unhurried creativity work with regards to your relationship with your manager? What’s your dynamic like?

“Jordan never sees things as impossible to do. [For example] since the beginning of my career, I’d wanted to do something with a full orchestra, but I just thought that that was an unachievable thing. I spoke to Jordan about reimagining some of our music –  going back in with [arranger/composer] David Campbell and making this Vespertine-esque electronic and orchestral version of some of our songs, along with a couple of new ones. Jordan said, ‘That sounds amazing – and we’ve got to do a tour.’ I told him I didn’t see how that would be possible, and he responded, ‘Of course it is – you just get the conductor, but you don’t take the whole orchestra on tour. We get different people in every place.’ He understood the whole process and how to make it work, like it was no big deal. That blew my mind. Jordan is a creative; he’s not coming at it like a businessman. He’s savvy with business and knows how to handle that, of course, but he’s also looking at it like a fan, [focusing] on how we make these amazing ideas come to life in new ways for people.”

You’ve pulled no punches on the topic of misogyny in the music industry, so how much closer have things got to your vision of a truly equal playing field?

“I don’t want to be the best female-fronted rock band; I want to be the best rock band, period. When we were starting out, most of the time I was the only woman I’d see all day at festivals, besides anyone I had with me in my crew. On the one hand, that made things intimidating. But on the other hand, [it was] powerful because we were different and I had something to say. Over the last 20 years, hell yeah, I’ve watched things change. When I go to festivals now, there are always other women on stage, so we have seen progress, especially in heavy music. That being said, it’s [ultimately] about being great at what you do. Whether you’re male or female, whatever colour you are, or wherever you come from, none of that should matter. What should matter is that you’re great at what you do. And all the women that I lift up, all the women we’re taking on tour – they all rock. That’s why they’re coming on tour with us.”