Evanescence are back—again. Six years since their last album, 2011’s Evanescence, and 14 since their Grammy-winning breakthrough Fallen, the Southern gothic stalwarts are set to return with their most unusual project to date: Synthesis, an album featuring orchestral arrangements of some of their best-known and most-loved songs, with Amy Lee’s unmistakable voice out front as always.
Evanescence—now comprising Lee, drummer Will Hunt, guitarist/background vocalist Jen Majura, bassist Tim McCord and lead guitarist Troy McLawhorn—have always thrived on a deliciously dissonant sound, a potion of gothic imagery, metal guitars and pop craftsmanship that produced early hits like “My Immortal” (from 2000 demo Origin) and “Bring Me to Life,” the Fallen smash that would solidify the group’s signature recipe. The relationship between organic and electronic has always been at the core of Evanescence’s music, and on the sprawling Synthesis, Lee has brought it to its most dramatic form.
“That is the basic idea of the title of everything: Synthesis,” said Lee, who joined Paste at Steinway Hall in Manhattan recently for an exclusive listen to Synthesis, out Nov. 10. “Those two seemingly opposite things married together in a very beautiful way, where it’s not about contrast, but about them actually working together.”
The record will also include two new songs, “Hi-Lo” and “Imperfection.” Lee explained that the converging of old and new also echoes the project’s vision, noting, “That’s the other point of that word ‘synthesis’—past and present. Revisiting songs like ‘My Immortal,’ but in a place of now. Also, tying the new music into it and creating this thing that all flows together into one moment, but it’s actually going back and into the future.”
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