Milan – Crazy people. “I still remember the fans crushed under the stage singing all our songs and me, up there, wondering if behind so much passion there wasn’t also a bit of madness”, he jokes Amy Lee of Evanescence remembering his first time in Milan. At Alcatraz. “The band wasn’t what it is today and every concert was a discovery for us.” Twenty years of “Bring me to life” will be celebrated in 2023, the single on which the rock adventure of the debut album “Fallen” is based (43 weeks in the top 10 of the American charts and over 17 million copies sold worldwide world), the American quintet returns to Rho next Wednesday to launch the program of Fiera Milano Live, a new summer container of high-volume musical passions.
For the general public Amy Lee, born Amy Lynn Lee Hartzlerremains the girl who falls from the ledge of her building in the video of the same “Bring me to life”. Reference female figure in a sea of alpha males like that of nu-metal, the Californian pianist and singer from the second album “The open door” onwards he tried to diversify his artistic activity, to distance himself from “Fallen” and by the artistic-commercial responsibilities that they placed on her shoulders two Grammys and 25 million albums sold. This was achieved by making only five studio albums over twenty-one years, but also by eliminating the band on several occasions and then reshaping it around their own abilities as an interpreter and author. “I once felt unstable, as if at any moment everything was about to explode due to some dramatic event that had nothing to do with me” she confesses, who after saying goodbye to co-founder Ben Moody has always considered Evanescence is its own thing.
The last one Rhythm guitarist Jen Majura ended up out of action and was kicked out in 2022 to give rise to yet another reshuffle which today sees the frontwoman joined by the very blond Tim Hunt on drums, by Troy McLawhorn on lead guitar, by Tim McCord on rhythm guitar and by Emma Anzai on bass. “A formation probably better than all those that preceded it”, admits Amy Lee, diligent a couple of months ago in denying the rumors that she was in contact with the Linkin Park to take the place of the deceased Chester Bennington. “Music as an outlet has always been an important part of my life because it has a healing power which in my case comes from proceeding by subtraction. A continuous challenge that allows me to use songs to face struggles and pain, transforming them into something good” .
This is also why the studio albums created in twenty years of activity are so limited in number and almost all find a place in the live debut made two days ago at the Sweden Rock Festival in Norje, on the Baltic, ranging from “Fallen” to the much more recent “The bitter truth”, released in 2021 and presented at the Forum a year and a half ago. But, as mentioned, the one with Evanescence is only the first appointment of a very varied program which includes the presence at Fiera Milano Live of Salmo & Noyz on June 15th, Gigi D’Agostino on the 21st, a dance marathon with Paul Kalkbrenner, Anfisa Letyago and Meduza on the 22nd, of a mega-Latin party with Mark Anthony and the Cubans Gente De Zona on the 23rd, of a party for teenagers with Brenda Asnicar, Laura Esquivel and Sonohra on the 29th, of Arcade Fire (supporter Levante) on July 2nd, by a highly anticipated Niki Minaj on the 3rd, by Geolier on the 6th, by the Black Eyed Peas’ “Elevation” on the 16th. And, after a month and a half break, grand finale with Emis Killa on September 2nd.
