Evanescence's new song.
"Afterlife"
I'm a dinosaur rock-n-roller guitarist/bassist. Every band I have ever been in since high school, has always had someone playing lead guitar. I have played with some monsters over the years. I have met some insane shredders here in Orlando. To me, these are the truest artists. Where did all the shredders go?
There was a time when all rock songs had some kind of a guitar solo.
It was an unwritten law in the music industry that every rock tune must have some kind of space in the song for the lead guitarist to shine in harmony with the lead singer. It was a duality that seemed to work very well in the 1960's, 70's and the 80's.
Something changed in the 1990's with the grunge era. Suddenly, it was "uncool" to have a guitar solo in a rock song. Nobody really knows why this happened or how it became a thing. By the mid 1990's, guitar solo's sort of briefly came back. "Three chord songs" became tiresome after Nirvana disbanded. Even though some solo's made a slight return, they were never the same again.
Then everything changed.
With the turn of the century - the internet, illegal file-sharing, home recording, early versions of social media, and the quickly dissolving music industry, inadvertently sealed the fate of rock music - or at least the type of rock and roll that included guitar solos.
Where did it all disappear to?
Well, even though guitar solos were slowly being phased out of all popular music, some bands still kept a few of them in their songs. There were the diehard bands who insisted that there be guitar solo's in their songs. "Winger" has been banging the drum for real rock and roll since the late 1980's. I see Winger as the most terribly under-rated rock band of all time. Such a shame.
Then there was Evanescence.
Okay, so if you're even a little familiar with Amy Lee, you probably already know how incredible her voice is. I will go so far as to say that her “unique-ness” stands right up there with the likes of Karen Carpenter and Ann Wilson.
In 2003, Evanescence released "Fallen". I absolutely love this album. In fact, I was in a local rock band at the time; and we were working on recording our second album. I listened to and sang the entire "Fallen" album everyday for an entire month, just before we went into the studio. I wanted to be able to hit all of my high harmony notes without any trouble. Singing that album in my car everyday, allowed me to stretch my vocal cords to the point where I sang every note in key. I had never sounded so good in my entire life thanks to that album.
One side note, Amy did a cover version of Led Zeppelin's, "Going to California". I think I've probably listened to that song a few hundred times; and every time I hear her insanely beautiful voice, I still get the chills. Take a listen.
Okay so, Evanescence just released a brand new song from the Netflix "Devil may cry" series, called "Afterlife".
Let me tell you, this song rocks! It is true Evanescence personified. Amy's voice sounds as good as ever. It’s one of those songs you might play loudly in your car a dozen times during rush hour on I-4.
However...(and nobody ever likes to read "however"), I honestly thought for sure that someone in that band would maybe, just maybe play a shredding guitar solo. Oh, but I was disappointed to hear none. As great as this new song is, it could have been multitudes better with a shredding solo. There was all kinds of room for a couple of them.
I guess that I just don't get it. How can you make such a great rock song, with "seemingly competent" guitarist in the band, and not have any guitar solos? In the twenty-three years since "Fallen's” huge success, nothing has really changed in the way Evanescence writes their songs. I see this as yet another chance missed to bring back rock guitars in pop music.