It's amazing that in such a long period of time they released only 3 albums(Synthesis not count) :
8.5/10

I don't understand why Evanescence is not featured here. Although some songs by them are not even rock (like "Imperfection" and "Together Again"), it's kind of a consensus that what is now Amy Lee's solo band has opened a lot of doors to the popularity of bands like Nightwish, Within Temptation, Lacuna Coil, Epica and many other smaller acts.

Written by [user id=208843] on 21.02.2021 at 07:42

[...] it's kind of a consensus that what is now Amy Lee's solo band has opened a lot of doors to the popularity of bands like Nightwish, Within Temptation, Lacuna Coil, Epica and many other smaller acts.

Ehh, no? I'd say it was exactly the other way around.
Because nobody even knew Evanescence prior to the releases of their 2003 debut album and the Daredevil OST that included the breakthrough singles "Bring Me To Life" and "My Immortal".
Whereas by 2003, albums like Oceanborn (selling Platinum in Finland), Wishmaster (top spot in the Finnish album charts), Century Child (double Platinum), Mother Earth (800.000 sold units) and Comalies (best-selling album in the history of Century Media) were already considered as classics of the genre.
I wouldn't even say that Evanescence ever played for a similar audience, the only obvious common feature is that they are female fronted.

Written by [user id=208843] on 21.02.2021 at 07:42

I don't understand why Evanescence is not featured here. Although some songs by them are not even rock (like "Imperfection" and "Together Again"), it's kind of a consensus that what is now Amy Lee's solo band has opened a lot of doors to the popularity of bands like Nightwish, Within Temptation, Lacuna Coil, Epica and many other smaller acts.

Do you really think Toumas Holopainen ever knew Evaesence, Same goes to those other bands, I dont think they opened, they were one hit album whit song My Immortal. Lacuna maybe because they are more away what I call true metal. Maybe in Italy yes, but definitely not in Finland. NW came out as own, I would say more power metal, maybe doom metal, black metal since few members has limks to Darkwood My Bothered. (and they new album be out) so....

Words from Tarja Turunen herself (when she still was in Nightwish, by the time of the release of Once):

https://youtu.be/xJDAlWX2Vw8

There are many other interviews in which Sharon den Adel and many other metal bands frontwomen and even some legendary figures, like Aaron Strainhorpe, say the same. Evanescence is very far from being an one-hit-album band. Fallen sold a lot because of its sound linked to Linkin Park and Korn, which were having a big success that time, but The Open Door also sold millions (physical) copies, much less because of piracy. The self-titled album also sold over million copies.

Many relevant metal artists have recognized the importance of Evanescence to the heavy metal community, because they are one of few bands that are able to connect mainstream and metal audiences in a very naturally effective way. Lemmy (Mötorhead), Tilo (Lacrimosa) and a lot of others have pointed that out countless times.

It happens that there's this prejudice against them, and I don't really understand what reasons for. It sounds kind of childish, like teenagers making angry faces and saying "don't touch my heavy metal with your poppy melodies" that suffer from old school and underground syndromes. Amaranthe faces the same discrimination while such bands are like an injection of fresh air into the metal scene, which has been stuck in the same narrow-minded notion of music in many of its subgenres for decades.

Written by Starvynth on 21.02.2021 at 12:07

Written by [user id=208843] on 21.02.2021 at 07:42

[...] it's kind of a consensus that what is now Amy Lee's solo band has opened a lot of doors to the popularity of bands like Nightwish, Within Temptation, Lacuna Coil, Epica and many other smaller acts.

Ehh, no? I'd say it was exactly the other way around.
Because nobody even knew Evanescence prior to the releases of their 2003 debut album and the Daredevil OST that included the breakthrough singles "Bring Me To Life" and "My Immortal".
Whereas by 2003, albums like Oceanborn (selling Platinum in Finland), Wishmaster (top spot in the Finnish album charts), Century Child (double Platinum), Mother Earth (800.000 sold units) and Comalies (best-selling album in the history of Century Media) were already considered as classics of the genre.
I wouldn't even say that Evanescence ever played for a similar audience, the only obvious common feature is that they are female fronted.

Your argument falls deep down when you measure the bands' success by considering only their original market at that time: the European one. Evanescence's success played a huge role in making the American market more receptive to those bands, what made them achieve commercial success in many others that are linked to USA music industry: Latin-American, Asian, Australian and New Zealander. Of course, Evanescence also took advantage of this process: they achieved big success in Europe because of the interconnected fan bases.

Written by [user id=302641] on 21.02.2021 at 17:38

Your argument falls deep down when you measure the bands' success by considering only their original market at that time: the European one. Evanescence's success played a huge role in making the American market more receptive to those bands, what made them achieve commercial success in many others that are linked to USA music industry: Latin-American, Asian, Australian and New Zealander. Of course, Evanescence also took advantage of this process: they achieved big success in Europe because of the interconnected fan bases.

But are you really sure about the non-European commercial success of the aforementioned bands?
In my book, album sales and chart positions are the most significant indicators of success.
Let's have a closer look at Nightwish for they are the most successful entity of the bunch.

By 2003, they already had a major deal with Spikefarm in their pockets and several gold and platinum albums, a couple of top 10 singles, numerous TV appearances and a Europe tour and two world tours under their belt. It doesn't really matter what Tarja feels or what she wants to believe, because all of this happened long before Evanescence's debut album had seen the light of day. And it is without any doubt already a pretty impressive success story.

So far, their albums have reached gold and platinum status around 50 times, taking first place in the national charts of countries such as Finland, Germany, Norway, Greece, Slovakia, Croatia, Hungary, Switzerland, Austria and the Czech Republic. Apparently, North America, Latin America, Asia and Australia are missing in this list.
Feel free to review the album sales from Within Temptation, Epica and Lacuna Coil as well, but I'm pretty sure that you will come to similar conclusions.

It's perfectly fine that you think Evanescence are underrated. Maybe they are.
But I simply can't see a close linkage between the success of a European symphonic metal band and the alleged fore-runner role of an alternative rock band from the US that didn't even exist when the "follower" had already sold 1,000,000 units in good old Europe. That logic is far beyond my imagination.

On the other hand, you're from Brazil and I don't know shit about your individual perception of each band's development. It's different than mine, but that's just logical. The truth, if there even is a universal truth, probably lies somewhere in between.


By the way: welcome back!
(I hope you don't mind that I replaced your old user user ID by the new one. It's a dirty hack but it works.)

Once again, you desconsider how big the American (here included North, Central and South), African, Asian and Oceania markets are altogether. It doesn't matter if they didn't achieve #1 in these markets, only the USA alone is half the Europe's potential worth, if population is used as a variable. I don't think Evanescence is underrated. They are rated here in a way that I agree in a great extent. I just don't understand what is the point to have them listed here but not featured in the site, once their success has been linked to the metal scene ever since their debut. That's all.

Thanks for the welcome back!

Tbh guys...this is so boring.