I spent some time gathering my thoughts about the Evanescence concert. It was the 4th time I was seeing the band. I had mixed feelings about going to the concert, because while I do still live those 5 songs I used to listen to back in my gothic teenage years, is that enough for a good concert? We’ll see.
Opening for Evanescence was British band Yonaka. A friend described them as “they didn’t seem to figure out what genre they wanna play”. It’s obviously rock, but they have some more rap-y angsty parts in there as well. I gotta say they won me over until the end.
Interesting combo. I must definitely say that they won the public over, as well, to a degree I did not expect. When you come see a well established band, usually people gather late and don’t really care for new opening acts, but they sure got the public fired up.
But now it’s time for Evanescence. This was a concert soon after they let Jen Majura go, being the second show with with Tim McCord on guitar and Emma Anzai on bass. The band was still promoting their latest album (2019), The Bitter Truth. I cannot say I enjoy the album that much, and I do understand they gotta play stuff from there if they don’t want to get stuck with the greatest hits from 15 years ago… however, the setlist felt a bit eh. Remember how I said those 5 songs from teenage years? I knew exactly 5 songs from the setlist :)) Okay, I had heard some of them probably but really know, it was 5 indeed: Going Under, Lithium, Call Me When You’re Sober, Bring Me To Life, and My Immortal.
I mean sure, everyone was here to listen to Bring Me To Life, so that was definitely the highlight of the show and the only moment the public really got fired up. It was the last song before the encore, so that ended the show on a high note. Strange to have My Immortal for encore. You’d expect something with a bit more of a kick.
I knew from the previous 4 shows that there isn’t much public interaction when it comes to an Evanescence show. Amy has her very unique style of moving and dancing, you just know it’s her. But there’s not much in terms of hyping the public and I kind of want more gimmicks if they play new songs. Get the public to jump and scream and move and have fun. Talk to them. Get the other band members to say a few words. It became clear now that it’s really a show to sit down and enjoy and wait for the nostalgia to hit you, but that’s about it.
I do gotta give credit that the production was much better than it used to be. They had some stairs now, giving a different flow to the stage, very good lights, and generally felt like an improvement. They brought a big screen behind the stage where they were legit projecting something that looked like Windows Music Player animations. If we’re talking 2000s nostalgia here, I guess that works… It’s such a shame because they could have done so much more with it. At least show bits from the music videos if you have them. I would say get someone to film and show live footage of the members of the band or the public, but that takes money. But they could have done way more with it. At this point it was a distraction more than anything.
I also need to praise Amy because vocally she was 100/100. Didn’t miss a note there. Or she hid it well. Absolutely beyond reproach.
All in all, Nostalgia is the key word for an Evanescence show. They don’t give you a show to remember on the new songs and don’t embrace their cult status fully to really pull all the stops on the classics.
