Evanescence & Within Temptation at the Birmingham Utilita Arena

Well, it’s been 3 years and several re-schedules for these 2 bands to get to play here tonight. The fans were up for it and boy did they get it, these 2 bands are the biggest around in what goes by the listing as Symphonic Rock, although Evanescence are the band who the most non-rock public would know, due to them achieving a few hit singles on UK mainstream charts.

Co-headlining on this tour, taking it in turns to go on last, Evanescence was on first with Amy Lee on fire and in great voice. After the enforced lay off they released the album ‘The Bitter Truth’, which had a very favourable reviews and reached number 11 on the Billboard top 200, and supporting some mega names in the USA. To see Amy Lee striding around the stage and in full flow is impressive, vocals strong with a band at the top of their game, the crowd were in awe. Featuring 6 tunes from ‘Bitter Truth’, but it was of course the classics that the crowd that had the biggest reaction, as you would expect, like ‘My Immortal’, ‘Going Under’, ‘Call Me When Your Sober’ and the sublime ‘Bring Me To Life’, wow! Amy Lee shows that she’s not just a big voice, when sitting at the piano singing, the single ‘Better Without You’, proving just how good a singer she really is, and what a phenomenal light show behind as she did it. If Evanescence were on stage tonight on their own, believe me the audience would go home very, very happy.

After the brilliant set by Evanescence, there are not a lot of bands who could follow it, but if one band can, Within Temptation can and Sharon Del Adel and the boys don’t disappoint, but then again, they never do. As usual Del Adel is in superb voice, kicking off with ‘Our Solemn Hour’, straight into ‘Faster’ and ‘Paradise (What About Us?)’, this was mesmerising. Going at full throttle with little breath between, songs and the staging as usual, the bigger the venue, the bigger the show, it was unbelievable. A nice salute to Ukraine was when Adel came on waving the Ukraine flag, singing ‘Raise Your Banner’, very emotional, the crowd were loving this, and the only little downtime was when Adel stopped ‘Entertain You’ mid song as she spotted an audience member needing help. Starting over and thanking everyone for their help, and just to ring the last bit of energy out of the audience, finishing off with ‘Ice Queen’ and ‘Mother Earth’. You don’t get many nights as good as this with both bands on fire, great sound and two fantastic stage & light shows. Anyone who attended tonight will talk about this for many a year to come, sublime!!

Photos by Geoff Griffe
Review by Jenny Griffe