"My Immortal" is a song by
American rock band Evanescence from their debut studio album Fallen (2003).
It was released by Wind-up Records on
December 8, 2003 as the third single from the album. The song was entirely
written by guitarist Ben Moody, with the
exception of the bridge, which was
later written by lead singer Amy Lee, and it was
produced by Dave Fortman.
"My Immortal" was included on their EP releases Evanescence(1997) and Mystary (2003)
and on the demo CD Origin (2000).
The version originally from Origin was later included on Fallen.
The single version of the song was called "band version" because of
the additional band performing the bridge and final chorus of the song.
"My Immortal" is a piano rock song written in slow and free tempo.
Moody was inspired to write it after the death of his grandfather. Lyrically,
it talks about "a spirit staying with you after its death and haunting you
until you actually wish that the spirit were gone because it won't leave you
alone."[1]Critical reception towards the song
was positive, with critics complimenting its piano melody. In 2005 it received
a nomination for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals at
the 47th Grammy Awards.
The song was also commercially successful, peaking within the top ten in more
than ten countries. It also peaked at number seven on the US Billboard Hot 100 and
topped the charts in Canada, Greece and the US Adult Pop Songs chart. The single was
certified gold in the US, and platinum in Australia.
An accompanying music video directed by David Mould was
filmed entirely in black-and-white in Gothic Quarter, Barcelona on October 10, 2003. The video
shows Lee sitting and singing on various locations, but never touching the
ground. Shots of Moody are also shown but he is never together with his band or
Lee. The video was nominated in the category for Best
Rock Video at the 2004 MTV Video
Music Awards. The song was performed by the band during their Fallen
Tour and The Open Door Tour.
It was also performed live during some of their television appearances and
award ceremonies such as the Billboard Music Awards. 10.4 Certifications
·
Background
"That's the
difference between us, Ben [Moody] tends to write like a storyteller, and it's
not necessarily from any kind of personal experience. I can't bring myself to
write about anything I don't understand completely. For me, writing is always
about some specific thing that's happened, so sometimes I feel a little
distanced singing the song, but I still love it."
The song was written by Ben Moody and produced by Dave Fortman; it was the fourth song to be
written for Evanescence.[1] Amy Lee's vocals and the piano parts of the
song were recorded in NRG Recording Studios, California.[3] "My Immortal" was
mixed atConway Recording
Studios in North Hollywood while it was mastered by Ted Jensen at Sterling Sound in New York City.[3] The orchestral parts in the
song were arranged by the composer Graeme Revell.[3]
The first known recording of "My
Immortal" was made for the band's self-titled EP, which solely featured Lee's vocals
accompanied by an acoustic guitar and
a piano, and slightly different lyrics. The song was cut from the EP before it
was released.[4] In 2000, the song was
re-recorded for the band's demo album, Origin,
which contains a rearranged piano melody and lyrics, including the bridgeadded by Lee.[5] It was again recorded for the
band's debut full-length debut studio album, Fallen where
the vocals of the demo version (that were recorded by Lee at 18 years old) were
accompanied by slightly different instrumentation.[1] It is also featured on the band's
2003 EP, Mystary, which is much similar to the band version.[6] Wind-up Records preferred the Origin version,
which is why the exact vocals recorded from 2000 are again included in the
song's album version.[2] The version that was recorded
and released as a single is moderately alternative to that of the album
version, and is often referred to as the "band version" because of
the additional band performing the bridge and final chorus of the song. The later pressings
of Fallen contain the single version (or "band version") of
"My Immortal" as a hidden track.[7] Lee expressed some
dissatisfaction with the early versions of the song saying, "It's not even
a real piano. And the sound quality is bad because we had to break into the
studio to record it late at night when no one was around because we couldn't
afford a real session."[2]
Composition
"My Immortal" is a piano[8][9] and power ballad[10] written in the key of A major.[11] It was described as a
"goth-meets-pop" song.[12] According to the sheet music
published by Alfred Music
Publishing on the website Musicnotes.com, the song is set in common time and performed in slow and
free tempo of 80 beats per minute. Lee's vocal
range for the song runs from the musical note of A3 to C♯5.[13] Her vocals are accompanied by
a simple piano.[10] Adrien Begrand of PopMatters concluded that in "My Immortal",
Lee is "doing her McLachlan/Tori Amos schtick".[14] The song was also compared
with some of Enya's material.[15]
The lyrics of the song refer to a
spirit that haunts the memory of a grieving loved one.[2] Similar to several other songs
written by Moody, the lyrics of the song are based on a short story he had
previously written.[1] According to Lee, it was
"Ben [Moody]'s song."[16] Moody said that the song talks
about "a spirit staying with you after its death and haunting you until
you actually wish that the spirit were gone because it won't leave you
alone."[1] He also stated in the booklet
of Fallen that he dedicated the song to his grandfather, Bill
Holcomb.[1] In "My Immortal", Lee
expresses her feelings through the line, "Though you're still with me /
I've been alone all along."[17] A writer for IGN said
that "'My Immortal' is a song of pain and despair caused by the loss of a
family member or very close friend and how it drove her [Lee] to the edge of
insanity."[17] Talking about the composition
and the meaning of the song, Tom Reynolds of The Guardian said, "['My Immortal'
is] A whimpering post-breakup tune in which lead singer Amy Lee pitifully
mourns the end of a relationship over a piano accompaniment that sounds like Pachelbel after the Prozac wore off. My
Immortal closely follows the 'quantum tragedy paradigm': the shorter the time
two people spent together as a couple, the more overwrought the song is that
describes their break-up. Judging by the lorry-load of anguish Lee spews out,
she split from someone she dated for about an hour (if her lyrics are to be
believed, the guy was a real freak, too)."[18]
Critical reception
While reviewing the band's second
studio album The Open Door (2006),
Alex Nunn of the website musicOMH showed
incredulity that the "angelic-vocalled woman who wrote the
moving/emotive/whatever My Immortal" could "churn out such dross as
Call Me When You're Sober."[19] Kirk Miller of Rolling Stone said that "'My
Immortal' lets Lee wail about her personal demons over simple piano and some
symphonic dressings — it's a power ballad that P.O.D. and Tori Amos fans could both appreciate."[10] Chris Harris of the same
publication found it to be a "song that's become something of an Alanis Morissette-like battle hymn for
her [Lee's] goth disciples over the last few years."[20] Richard Harrington of The Washington Post called
"My Immortal" a "majestic" song that helped the band win a
Grammy Award.[21] Blair R. Fischer from MTV News described the song as a
"delicate, heartfelt ballad".[15] IGN's Ed Thompson concluded
that "My Immortal" was "one of the first and best songs
Evanescence ever wrote".[22] Jordan Reimer, a writer of The Daily
Princetonian found a "haunting beauty" in the song.[23] Bill Lamb of About.com put the song at number 61 on
his list of "Top 100 Pop Songs of 2004".[24] Tom Reynolds of The
Guardian put the song at number 24 on his list "Sad songs say so
much".[18] In 2005 the band was nominated
in the category for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals at
the 47th Grammy Awards for
the song.[25][26][27]
Chart performance[edit]
The song is considered the band's
second most successful single of all time, generally peaking within the top 20
of more than 10 countries internationally. On the chart issue dated April 10,
2004, "My Immortal" peaked at number seven on the Billboard Hot 100,[28] while on the Pop Songs chart
it peaked at number two on March 27, 2004.[29] It has peaked at number
nineteen on the Adult
Contemporary chart as well.[30] On February 17, 2009, "My
Immortal" was certified Gold
by the Recording
Industry Association of America (RIAA) for selling more than
500,000 copies in the United States.[31] The song managed to top the
charts of Canada, Greece and Billboard's Adult Pop Songs in the United States.[32][33][34] It also helped Fallen to
move from number nine to number three on the Billboard 200 chart,
selling another 69.000 copies.[35][36] On the Billboard's Radio Songs chart,
the song peaked at number seven on April 10, 2004.[37] Nielsen
Broadcast Data Systems placed the song at number six on the
list of most played radio songs in 2004 with 317,577 spins.[38]
On the Australian Singles
Chart, "My Immortal" debuted at number four on January 25,
2004 which later became its peak position.[39] The next eleven weeks, it
remained in the top ten of the chart,[40] and it was seen on the chart
at number forty-four for the week ending June 13, 2004.[41] The single was certified
platinum by the Australian
Recording Industry Association (ARIA).[42] On December 20, 2003, "My
Immortal" debuted at number seven on the UK Singles Chart which later became its
peak position.[43] On February 14, 2004 the song
dropped out of the chart, and it later re-entered at number eighty-four on July
18, 2008.[44] After spending several weeks
on different positions on the UK Rock Chart, on August 27, 2011, it peaked
at number one.[45] The next week, "My
Immortal" moved to number two being replaced by the band's single "What You
Want" (2011),[45] and one week later it returned
at number one on the chart.[45] That achievement helped the
song to re-enter on the UK Singles Chart at number eighty-one on August 27,
2011 and at number eighty-nine on October 22, 2011.[44]
Music video
The music video for
"My Immortal" was filmed in Barri Gòtic, Barcelona.
A music video directed by David Mould was
filmed entirely in black-and-white in
Plaça de Sant Felip Neri, Gothic Quarter (Barri Gòtic), Barcelona on October 10, 2003.[2][46] Lee described the place of the
filming during an interview with MTV News: "We did it in a cool, old area
of town.[...] We shot some of it at this scenic point, and there was a rooftop
where you could see Barcelona below. It was really neat."[2] The version of the song used on
the video is different than the one off the record, with the band entering the
song at the end of the bridge and a string arrangement by David Campbell.
Evanescence wanted the band version to be on the album as well, but "the
label was stuck on the demo and wouldn't let us use the version we really
wanted.[...] We fought back and forth about it and finally we gave in, but we
were all so angry about it."[2] The video was filmed two weeks
before Ben Moody's departure from the band.[46] Amy Lee admitted that the
visuals in the video were "striking in retrospect", but added that
the similarities between what was filmed and Moody's departure were coincidental:
"We shot it in Barcelona about a week before Ben left the band
unexpectedly. I think none of us knew, including him, that he was going
anywhere. And when we got the video back and watched it, it was right after he
had left. And it's bizarre how much the video is about that. We all sat there
with goose bumps, like, 'Holy crap. We've got to watch that again.'"[47] In an interview with the
British magazine Rock Sound, Lee
further explained the concept which was related with his departure:
"You know
what? When you see the video it's really amazing. Obviously we filmed it before
this [Ben Moody's departure] happened and it's amazing irony, how much it makes
sense. We're all separated and wandering the streets looking like it's the day after
a funeral, with Ben in a suit and bare feet, and I'm never touching the ground.
I'm sitting on a phone booth or lying on a car, to hint that I'm dead, that I'm
singing from the dead. It's all about separation. It's almost like the director
knew what was going to happen, but he can't have known. It's just one of those
fate things."[48]
The music video for "My
Immortal" begins with Lee next to a fountain. Her legs and arms are covered with bandage, and she puts them in the water. She's
wearing a long white dress. While she walks around the fountain, behind her are
shown children jumping on a skipping rope and playing soccer. Shots of Moody follow, who appears to be sullen and
withdrawn. He is wearing a suit and his feet are bare. His shoulders
sag and his head slumps forward as he delicately plays piano, and later he
picks up his jacket as if he's about to leave. When the bridge starts, the band
is shot performing in one room while Moody is in another, with only his piano.
Throughout the video, Lee is never filmed on ground level. She walks along the
ledge of a fountain, sits in a tree and sings lying on top of a building. She
also lies atop scaffolding and
on the hood of a car surrounded with leaves.
The video for the song was nominated
in the category for Best
Rock Video at the 2004 MTV Video
Music Awards.[49][50][51] According to Jon Wiederhorn
from MTV News, the shots of the video are
"evocative and artistic, resembling a cross between a foreign film and a
Chanel advertisement."[2] Joe D'Angelo of MTV News said
that Lee's disconnection in the video shows a "distressed and emotionally
wrought heroine."[52] Rob Sheffield of Rolling
Stone praised the video saying that Lee looked like a "teen-misery
titan" and that she "tiptoed through a marble castle of pain".[53] He also concluded that she
could have borrowed the dress from Stevie Nicks.[53] During an interview with Spin in 2011 Lee said that it was weird
for her to watch the old videos of the band including the one for "My
Immortal". She explaind, "Just watching our oldest videos, it's
weird. I definitely remember watching 'My Immortal,' like, 'That was not some
dream where it was really somebody else.' I've totally had a couple of those
moments. It's cool."[54]
Live performances
Amy Lee performing
during a concert in 2009.
Evanescence performed the song at the 2004 Billboard Music Awards on
December 8, 2004.[55] The band was joined by an
eight-piece string section during the performance and a stage backdrop of
knotted, decaying trees were placed on stage in order to showcase the
"powerful vocals" by Amy Lee as stated by a writer of Billboard.[55] The band additionally
performed the song at Late Show
with David Letterman in March, 2004.[56]
The band performed "My
Immortal" on August 13, 2003 in Chicago during the Nintendo Fusion Tour.[15][57] It was also part of the set
list on the band's first Fallen Tour.[58] Evanescence also performed the
song at the Webster Hall in Manhattan, New York City in September, 2003.
"My Immortal" was the closing song of the concert, and Lee performed
it after asking the fans "Just promise not to fall asleep."[57] During the performance, she
wore an Alice in
Wonderland dress covered with scrawled words, including the
words "dirty, useless, psycho and slut."[57] She explained that there was a
story behind the dress. The last time she had come to New York, she had met a
D.J. from the radio station K-Rock, who had made what
she described as horrible comments about exactly how much pleasure he had
derived from the picture of her face on theFallen album cover.[57] She had felt too ashamed to
say anything, she went on, so she decided to respond through the dress, which
represented something innocent that's been tainted.[57]
"My Immortal" was also part
of the set list during the band's second tour, called The Open Door Tour in
support of their second studio album The Open Door (2006).[59][60][61] Evanescence also played the
song live at their secret New York gig which
took place on November 4, 2009.[20] They also performed the song
during the 2011 Rock in Rio festival
on October 2, 2011.[62] The song was later added on
the set list of their third worldwide tour in support of their third
self-titled studio album Evanescence (2011).[63][64] A live version of the song
from Le Zénith, Paris is
featured on their first live album, Anywhere but Home (2004).[65][66][67] Johnny Loftus of Allmusic praised the live version saying
that Lee takes a "softer approach" while performing "My
Immortal" and added that it "becomes a singalong moment for 5,000
souls."[68]
Covers and usage in media
"My Immortal" was featured
on the soundtrack Daredevil: The Album from
the movie Daredevil (2003)
along with "Bring Me to Life".[14][69] It was also heavily used in
promos for the series finale ofFriends.[citation needed]
The song has been used during several
television episodes. It featured during the Smallville season three episode
"Memoria". It was used in the first episode, "No Such Thing as
Vampires", of the American series Moonlight.[70] Lucy Walsh, a contestant of the show Rock the Cradle, covered the song during the
fifth episode, "Judge's Picks".[71] Dancer Hampton Williams
performed to this song during his audition for the Season 9 premiere of So You Think You
Can Dance which aired on May 24, 2012, where he received a
standing ovation.[72][73]
In 2013, Andrea Begley covered "My
Immortal" for her debut studio album The Message. Robert Copsey of Digital Spy wrote that the cover
"range[s] from the excruciating to the offensively inoffensive".[74]
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