DIS SUCKS!!!
-- by Joe D'Angelo
Few were more shocked than Amy Lee to learn that Ben Moody was not in his hotel room on October 22. Two days before a show in Berlin, Evanescence's manager informed her that her guitarist, co-songwriter and friend for the past eight years would be a no-show at the gig.
"It was like, one in the morning," Lee recalled, "and our manager called and just said, 'What are we going to do? Ben's gone.' "
Although his exodus was swift, tensions between Evanescence's creative pillars had been building for some time. The rock group, whose cornerstone was laid when a 14-year-old Moody spied a 13-year-old Lee playing a Meat Loaf song on a piano at summer camp, was the rock success story of 2003, with Fallen selling more than 2.5 million copies in the U.S. in just seven months. And with that success came increased media coverage, which intensified the conflicts that had begun to simmer long before most people even knew what the word "evanescence" meant.
Fans now know the definition — "vanishing like vapor" — and despite mounting animosity successfully kept hidden from public view, Moody's exit seemed to epitomize the term.
"We didn't have any of the same desires for anything ... "
"By that time, it was just so clear that [Amy and I] have grown into two completely different people," Moody said during a rare break from the assorted projects that have kept him busy since he touched down in his hometown of Little Rock, Arkansas. "We didn't have any of the same desires for anything, especially not pertaining to our careers."
After Germany, the pair did not see or speak to one another until February 8, the day of the Grammy Awards. Moody arrived at the event separately from the rest of the band, which now includes his replacement, former Cold guitarist Terry Balsamo. Sporting a long wig and an extended goatee, wearing a pin-striped black suit and carrying a pimp cane with a crystal knob, he looked like he should be rolling with Snoop Dogg and the Archbishop Don "Magic" Juan rather than with his rocker brethren.
As a co-founder of a band that was up for five awards that night (the group won two — for Best New Artist and Best Hard Rock Performance), pride was what brought him to the show. He donned the attire to show the world that he wasn't emotionally rocked after leaving the band — a gesture that was lost on Lee.
"She didn't get the outfit, let's just say that," Moody said. "But then again, she never did. Nothing against her, but she doesn't get my sense of humor. Like I said, eight years down the road, we're very different people."
Taking the stage to accept the Best New Artist award provided an awkward moment, 50 Cent's bum-rush notwithstanding. Moody and Lee barely made eye contact before she gave the speech while Moody stood stoically behind her.
"Everyone who knows me knows the sh-- I do, and knows I'm always doing something stupid," he explained. "I wanted them to get the message that Ben's OK. He's not off somewhere drinking himself to death because [his time with] Evanescence is over. He's Ben. He's himself and he's having a good time."
NEXT: 'That was the word of the day with Amy, sell-out this and sell-out that, and I'm like, 'Give me a f---in' break.' ' ...
Evanescence had begun to sprout two heads about a year after signing with Wind-Up Records in 2001, before the single "Bring Me to Life" announced the band's presence to the mainstream. Any rift was undetectable in the countless interviews to promote Fallen that focused on how Lee and Moody met as teenagers, worked hard and wound up becoming the Cinderella story of the year.
As songwriters, Lee was the dark-themed lyricist and Moody provided the musical muscle. More than that they were friends — best friends — as it says in Fallen's liner notes, and the two had even dated briefly. But there was always a separation between the two when it came to work.
"Amy and I never wrote together," Moody said. "Maybe two or three times in eight years did we actually sit down and write together in the same room."
A Brief History Of Evanescence:
1994: Ben Moody and Amy Lee meet in Little Rock, Arkansas
2000: Origin released; approximately 50 copies were made
January 2001: Band signs with Wind-Up Records
March 4, 2003: Fallen released
March 12, 2003: Fallen debuts at #7 with more than 141,000 copies sold
May 18, 2003: Fallen certified platinum
October 22, 2003: Ben Moody leaves band during European tour
January 16, 2004: Evanescence name Terry Balsamo as new guitarist
February 8, 2004: Evanescence win two Grammys, including Best New Artist
The song "Catherine," penned in 2000 prior to their self-released debut, Origin, and omitted from the album, was the only example of a joint songwriting session that Moody could cite. Customarily, Moody and Fallen co-writer David Hodges came up with the music and recorded it onto a CD, which Lee would then take so she could write the lyrics.
The process wasn't entirely exclusive. Moody would sometimes help out with a vocal melody and Lee often pitched her musical visions. Whatever the songwriting method — and theirs is used more frequently by bands than most fans assume — it obviously worked. Piling on layers and juxtaposing parts like muddy guitars and soaring vocals, thuggish melodies and soul-baring lyrics made for a fresh addition in the pop-metal genre.
"When we were writing the first songs, which are five or six years old now ... it was more [organic]," Lee said. "Let's say we started off with a piano, then we'd say, 'Let's put guitars all over it,' and then maybe a huge choir in the bridge. It became this ridiculous fun thing. We put stuff in that wouldn't necessarily be anything like what we were hearing at the time. It would just be what we wanted because ... just because. It was never about boundaries or rules or following what somebody else did."
Moody, however, approached songwriting more conservatively, keeping the pop convention of verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus in mind. "When you're trying to create a new thing, it would seem like the doors would be wide open, but they weren't," he said. "I made the rules very strict. It had to fit certain criteria."
Some would call Moody's conformation to pop boundaries classicist. Others have a harsher term for it.
"Just because something's catchy doesn't mean you're selling out, and just because you sell records doesn't mean you're selling out," Moody said. "And that was the word of the day with Amy. Sell-out this and sell-out that, and I'm like, 'Give me a f---in' break.'
"Just because you follow certain rules of songwriting doesn't mean you did something bad," he continued. "It means you're a professional and you know what you're doing."
Moody took his approach outside the studio, too. Where Lee had to overcome some shyness as Evanescence's career began to blossom, Moody was always ready for face time. He was aware that his newfound role as a rock star entailed more than just expressing himself through his art. This was called the music business for a reason, and doing interviews, walking red carpets, rigorous touring and "sleeping when you're dead" were all part of the bargain.
"There are certain things about the music business that, honestly, are not about music, and they're not about art," he explained. "They're about playing the game so that you can continue to stay successful, and Amy didn't want to play those games. I was more about doing what I had to do to be able to play music and do these sorts of things for a living.
"With Amy, it became this obsession with being an artist," he added. "I thought that what people need from the musicians they look up to is a good time, [musicians] who don't take themselves so seriously. That was something we greatly disagreed on."
NEXT: Amy Lee, solo artist? Plus, Lee says that for Moody, 'It's all about shock value.' ...
Since he's been home, Moody's been working almost non-stop. While hashing out new songs with Fallen collaborator Hodges, possibly for an album on Wind-Up later this year, Moody also wrote with Avril Lavigne and Kelly Clarkson for their next albums. He's producing tracks for the band Blank Theory, and, with Godhead singer Jason Miller, new Drowning Pool frontman Jason Jones and Living Sacrifice drummer Lance Garvin, he wrote and recorded "The End Has Come" for the upcoming soundtrack to "The Punisher." He's also working on music for the "Resident Evil: Apocalypse" soundtrack, and has started a production company with that film's actor Zack Ward.
"I'm writing more now than I ever have before," he said. "I'm experimenting and having fun. I've never had this much freedom in writing before."
Moody won't be alone in spending most of this year realizing new ideas. Lee and her bandmates, bassist William Boyd, drummer Rocky Gray, guitarist John LeCompt and the newly appointed Balsamo, will take a few weeks off when their tour wraps up at the end of the month, and then begin work on their new album. Each member will most likely write separately before eventually meeting up to merge the ideas. It will be strange working without Moody, Lee said, but she's also excited about the prospects.
"I love [Fallen], but in some ways I think it's immature," she said. "I feel like we could have gone so much further and I'm dying to [do that] on the next album."
Moody, too, expects great things from Evanescence. "It's going to be interesting to hear, because the only thing that's going to be similar is Amy's voice. ... It's going to be really, really good, because Rocky doesn't do anything unless it's good. Terry is a great writer. And Amy is an amazing vocalist. So you have all of the ingredients necessary."
His optimism and well-wishing are surprising considering turmoil with his old band ended just a few months ago. While he's had minimal interaction with Lee, he routinely hangs out with Balsamo, which usually spurs astonished looks from those who spot them together.
"I know some people leave bands and are bitter about sh--, but I don't stand to gain anything from Evanescence failing," Moody said. "All that does is tarnish the name I helped build. Amy's a great person. I'm a decent person. We're both happier, and that's pretty much the end of it."
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pretty lady! hahaha!
