Use My Voice

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General Information

Written by: A. Lee, J. Majura, T. McCord, T. McLawhorn, W. Hunt and D. Jakoub

Use My Voice is the third single from Evanescence's fifth studio album, The Bitter Truth, that was released on August 14, 2020. The title was originally published on the music repertoire website, ASCAP, before the band confirmed its release. It's one of the four songs the band worked on with Nick Raskulinecz in early 2020. The song features backing vocals from Lzzy Hale, Deena Jakoub, Lindsey Stirling, Taylor Momsen, Sharon den Adel, Amy McLawhorn (Troy's wife), Jen Majura, and Amy's sisters, Lori and Carrie. They lent their voices to create the tidal wave of girl power on the track.

The song was originally planned to be the first single from The Bitter Truth, but Wasted on You was released instead due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Amy explained the song:

This is an era of awakening and full of powerful beauty. I hope to inspire others to seek truth, find their own voices and use them as I step up to use mine. Don’t let anybody speak for you. Only you can do that.

Amy told MTV News that the song was inspired by how she’s been “feeling about the state of our country”:

“As we were recording it, I was listening back to my own words and started asking myself, ‘What can I do to use my voice? How can we use our platform for good and empower people?’ I believe that this is a very important, revolutionary time,” she shares. “Things are messed up. I’ve never been political publicly — I’ve kept that part of myself private because I see music as a place to get away from our differences and find unity. We need to be unified now more than ever, but I finally feel in my heart that if I’m going to be true to my word. It’s time to use my voice to help promote our future.”

She told Rolling Stone:

That song has been bubbling in the background for me for a couple of years. As life went on and as the state of our country and world went on, over that course of time, just every once in a while I’d have another line and something else that I needed to say, and it just kept being a place where I would pour that into. And then finally, when we got it all wrapped up and we got to come together as a band, right before everything shut down [due to COVID-19], it just became this beautifully empowering and seemingly important moment for me personally and for all of us a band. I’ve never really at all, in any small form, really, spoken politically or made any real statement about what I believe and what’s going on there because I don’t like to divide the fans. I want the music to be our free place where we can all have something in common. But sometimes things are just right and wrong, and you have feelings that can’t be held back, and if I’m gonna be true to myself and my music like I always have been, then I have to say what’s heavy on my heart. We need to empower people to use their voices literally and vote. That’s the amazing privilege that we have living here, the fact that our voices matter, and that can guide and should guide and will guide what comes next. And this year more than ever, I think we’re all just asking, over and over, the question just, “What is next?” And we can be a part of that, and we need to be a part of that. So I feel very grateful. The people at HeadCount are awesome. They are totally non-partisan and all about empowering the voice of the people.

She discussed the recording process of the guest female voices on the song:

“We all live all over the place, so mostly the girls just recorded themselves, sent the audio to me and we piled it all up together. Just to feel their support in a song that is different thematically for me and for us as a band. It’s stepping out and up in a new way – just feeling that support in that music feels so great. I’m so grateful to them.”

Fans who pre-saved the song on Apple, Spotify and Deezer were entered for a chance to attend a Zoom call with Evanescence and hear the song a day before its release.

It is rumored that the song will be used for Eric D. Howell's graphic novel project, The Revolution of Cassandra. Amy Lee worked with Eric before on his movie Voice from the Stone, where she wrote a song for the closing credits called Speak to Me. Veridia frontwoman, Deena Jakoub, also has songwriting credits on this track.

Versions

Studio version

Use My Voice

• Recording date: January - February 2020
• Status: Released, Available
• Released On: August 14, 2020 as the third single from The Bitter Truth

The Bitter Truth (Track TBC)

• Length: 4:02

Lyrics

Cover my ears and close my eyes
Just long enough to stop the noise
Go on take everything and throw it away
But I will use my voice

Drown every truth in an ocean of lies
Label me bitch because I dare to draw my own line
Burn every bridge and build a wall in my way
But I will use my voice

Whether you like it or not, you're gonna take what I got
If we can't talk about it, we'll just keep drowning in it
Give me credit or not
I give and I give a lot
But don't you speak for me

No, don't you speak for me

Never mind me, I'm a waste of your time
Never gonna fit in the box that you need
And I can read between the lines, yeah
Gather your friends and wave your gun in my face
But I will use my voice

Whether you like it or not, you're gonna take what I got
If we can't talk about it, we'll just keep drowning in it
Give me credit or not
I give and I give a lot
But don't you speak for me

But don't you speak for me

Whether you like it or not
Whether you like it or not
Whether you like it or not
Whether you like it or not

One day soon, it's gonna fall back on you
No more lies, we're gonna break right through
Like it or not

If we can't talk about it, we'll just keep drowning in it
Give me credit or not
I give and I give a lot
But don't you speak for me

No, don't you speak for me

Don't you speak for me!

Video

A music video is rumored to have been filmed for the song on the weekend of the 25th and 26th of July, as Eric posted that he was in Nashville filming and used the song title as a hashtag.

Commercial Release

Main article: Use My Voice Single

The digital single was released on August 14, 2020.

Tracks released with the single include:

• "Use My Voice"