This site is in no way affiliated with Evanescence or Amy Lee. This is purely a fan site for the band. All images are copyright to their respective owner.
Former Evanescence guitarist John LeCompt has offered more details about his exit from the group. According to LeCompt, he was fired from the band. He also said drummer Rocky Gray had quit.
In a posting on his blog, LeCompt wrote, “I’ve been getting your messages all morning and figured I would give a little personal insight to this situation. Around 3:30 p.m. yesterday [Friday, May 4] I received a call on my cell from Amy. This call wasn’t from a friend who appreciated me but from an enemy who was prepared to hurt me and my family. Without any warning or negotiotiations for my future, I was fired for no good reason. We have not always seen eye to eye on everything, but who does?
“Our common goal was always the same: To make Evanescence the best rock band it could ever be. I have always given blood, sweat and tears to make that happen but apparently that is not enough. I have now become just another of the people fallen by the wayside on the revolving door of her life. It’s funny how many of us there are now. I guess it’s good for lyrical content, though. Maybe I will be among the blessed to have a song written about me, too. Maybe the song will be ‘Call Me When You’re Broke’.
“Whatever, as of next week my band Machina will be doing major label showcases in New York. There is a big buzz for it and we hope it will go well. I’m not going to sit here and be negative because that is not who I am. What I will say it that I know that many of you think she is some genius or saviour of some kind. I just want you to know that my family and I will forever remember her as being about as deep as the shallow end of a child’s wading pool and her lyrics about as deep as the two-dimensional surface that they were written on. Singing beautifully for the duration of a record or two can move the spirit of the people listening, but the way you treat those around you who you are supposed to care about speaks volumes more than that and I would hope that some of you are listening.
“Well, that’s it. I hope that sheds some light on the current situation for you.
“Thank you all for the good years and being the most incredible fans and friends. Maybe I will see you again.
“I am going to play with my little boy now, peace.”
Evanescence guitarist John LeCompt said Friday he’s been fired from the band, and he also said drummer Rocky Gray has quit, so things aren’t looking good for the multi-platinum, two-time Grammy winning alternative rock act, one of the biggest bands in the world — but apparantly shrinking by the second.
“I’m done, and I’m pretty upset about it,” LeCompt said, calling from Little Rock, Ark., the band’s home town. “(Singer) Amy Lee called and fired me today. There’s absolutely no loyalty in this band.”
Evanescence, touring in support of its second major release “The Open Door,” is on a short break after returning from South Africa. The group has two dates scheduled later this month before plans to tour Europe, beginning in Paris on May 25.
A phone message to the press office at Wind-Up Records in New York seeking comment was not immediately returned.
LeCompt, 34, said he and Gray, 32, plan to pour all their energy into a new band, Machina, managed by Chris Long (Crossfade). Gray wasn’t available for comment.
“Machina is an incredible band — it’s rock and roll,” LeCompt said.
It’s been almost four years since their last mega-selling album. Now, Arkansas’ homegrown “Evanescence” is on a second world tour. Liz Massey goes one-on-one with Amy Lee and Evanescence.
They’ve sold nearly 18 million albums, experienced worldwide fame and their dreams are now reality. It’s a wild ride that began right here in Arkansas. From Little Rock to rock stars, we take you back stage, behind the music with Arkansas’s own Evanescence.
“It’s all very personal and all very real; every song has a real story behind it,” says front woman Amy Lee.
Amy’s story begins in 1981 in California. The oldest of five, Amy’s family eventually settled in Arkansas where her passion for music took center stage.
She recalls, “Music was something I would naturally gravitate towards and love and do all the time, but you realize how obsessed you are with it and you can’t imagine having a real job.”
Her obsession captured the attention of another Little Rock teen, Ben Moody, and in the 90s, Evanescence was born.
Amy says, “I still remember a lot of good things about places like Vino’s for sure and the people that worked there, playing there and getting so nervous before a show and I couldn’t even open my eyes or talk once I got on stage.”
But all that quickly changed. Drummer Rocky Gray and guitarist John LeCompt helped shape Evanescence.
“As soon as I started playing with Ev, I really felt like there was a magic there,” says John.
Alternative rock band Evanescence kept entertainment journalists waiting on Thursday - apparently due to a missing hairpiece belonging to lead vocalist Amy Lee.
But when the strikingly beautiful Amy Lee eventually arrived - in her trademark gothic look - it was clear who the heaviest band would be at Friday’s My Coke Fest gig.
The male members of Evanescence were all dressed in black with boots, dreadlocks and face piercings. Evanescence are the headlining act at the My Coke Fest. The band were presented an award by their record company, Sony BMG, for selling in excess of 150 000 albums for their first two releases.
Amy Lee said that while she had been here before in her personal capacity, performing in South Africa would be “a whole new experience for her”. She had a long relationship with South African musician Shaun Morgan, lead vocalist of world-famous grunge band Seether.
Evanescence will travel for the first time this spring to South Africa, the homeland of singer Amy Lee’s former boyfriend, Seether frontman Shaun Morgan. Despite that connection, Lee told Launch that she hasn’t spoken with Morgan since the couple broke up in late 2005. “You know how relationships are,” she said. “It really is hard to still be friends and talk all the time when there’s hurt feelings there, you know. You open yourself up and there’s a wound there, and even after it heals, it’s sort of like, you can’t heal together. That’s not really healing for the most part. So, no, we’re not really talking or anything, but I hear he’s doing good and they’re working on a new album, so all the best.”
Lee has said that “Call Me When You’re Sober”, from Evanescence’s 2006 album “The Open Door”, was inspired by her two-year relationship with Morgan. The Seether frontman eventually went through rehab last summer and is now working on his group’s third record.
Amy got engaged to boyfriend Josh, a therapist, in January while the band was in Toronto to perform at the Air Canada Centre.
The longtime friends have been dating for about a year. It will be her first marriage.
Evanescence is playing South Africa’s My Coke Festival on April 27 in Johannesburg and May 1 in Cape Town. The band will also perform in South America for the first time later this month.
Amy Lee talks about touring, working with Korn, how the internet is changing the music industry, and much more.
Q. As someone who not only has vocal and piano credit on their album but writes songs too, how do you feel about vehicles like “American Idol” re-inventing the face of popular music?
A. I think so much is changing in the music industry right now for the worse. It’s hard to see far enough into the future that it’s all going to be for good. It’s not just the whole “American Idol” thing, it’s the whole Internet thing. The way things have changed, the mentality of kids today has become about singles and songs as opposed to albums and artists. It’s harder than it’s ever been for artists because you don’t have as many of those die-hard fans who are all about the band and listen to the whole album and know all the b-sides. Most people hear the one song they like on the radio, go to iTunes and download it.
Q. I suppose the whole concept of the b-side has been destroyed.
A. Yeah. You’ve got to put it in a movie or something.
I guess it’s not really about “American Idol” specifically but the whole mentality behind it — “We can make a star.” The fact that everything is so fabricated and ingenuine (sic) just leads kids to believe that nothing is real so why would they buy a whole album anyway?
Q. Rock music, especially harder rock, is still pretty much a boys’ game. How do you break through that kind of glass ceiling?
A. You could look at it like it makes it harder. There have been times where I’ve been angry and I definitely feel that I have to fight for my rights as a woman. But, for the most part, I’ve always seen it as a bonus for us. It makes us different and it gives me an edge because I don’t have to scream or be as hardcore as everyone else. I can actually use my femininity in my art. It makes it more unusual and less common in the rock world. I think that’s a positive thing. I’ve always thought it was pretty cool.
Q. Do you think that it puts pressure on you to be a role model?
Amy Lee had a chip the size of Montana on her shoulder.
Though she was the frontwoman for Evanescence, a band whose first album, “Fallen,” went on to sell about 14 million copies worldwide, Lee believed a lot of people were waiting for her to fail.
Not long after “Fallen” launched Evanescence into the stratosphere on the strength of the singles “My Immortal” and “Bring Me to Life,” Ben Moody, Lee’s longtime creative partner and the band’s co-founder, quit.
Moody, a guitarist, abruptly left the band during a 2003 European tour. It was not an amicable breakup.
“We didn’t miss a single show,” Lee said during a telephone interview. “We played that first show as a four-piece, and John (LeCompt, the band’s rhythm guitarist) learned the solos and we covered it.
“We played all those sold-out European shows, I’m sure much to Ben’s surprise. He was trying to sabotage us.”
Moody’s departure was just the beginning of the turmoil that enveloped Lee between the release of “Fallen” in 2003 and the completion of its follow-up, “The Open Door,” in 2006.
Pressure is an important word in the story of Amy Lee, lead singer for Evanescence, and the reason it’s a success story is that Lee has handled pressure well.
First, she overcame the pressure of being a petite, piano-playing girl in a hard-rock world. “Fallen,” Evanescence’s 2003 national debut album, has sold more than 14 million copies worldwide and camped out on the Billboard 200 album chart for an astounding 104 weeks, spending more than a year in the top 50. But the success of record sales wasn’t what mattered most for Lee when it came time to release a studio
follow-up.
“For me, it was about proving myself as a musician because that is the only thing about being a girl that has been a struggle,” said Lee by phone from a tour stop in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. “No one ever expects that you can be a musician. They just expect that you’re the pretty face that’s fronting the band.”
Lee started Evanescence with friend and guitarist Ben Moody. They were the principal songwriters on their breakout album, which spawned the hits “Bring
Me to Life” and “My Immortal.” Rave reviews were followed by Grammy awards for best new artist and best hard-rock performance (”Bring Me to Life”).
But all was not well within the band. Creative differences between Lee and Moody bubbling beneath the surface finally burst with the pressures of newfound success.
