On this day:

Ten years ago

—A full-scale investigation into allegations of hazing in the Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity is under way. Larry Bolles, NIU Judicial Office director, said he has fielded numerous calls from students alleging the fraternity is hazing.

— The School of Nursing ended their national search for a new permanent chair on their own doorstep. The selection committee selected and appointed nursing Professor Marilyn Frank-Stromborg on July 1, according to James Lankford, Health and Human Services dean.

Twenty years ago

— Although former Board of Regents Chancellor William Monat will not be teaching classes at NIU in the spring, he will receive his entire professors' salary for that semester.

— This year it costs about $1 more to eat lunch at Roy Rogers than it did to eat at the Pow Wow Snack Bar last year. It costs about $2.50 to buy a hamburger, small fries, and a small coke. The average price last years for the same meal was $1.60.

— Diversions, located in the lower level of Holmes Student Centers, is in the planning stage to be converted into a dry bar starting next fall.

— Coaches and athletes got their first look at the drug-testing program Monday when NIU administrators presented the proposal that will go into effect in September to the public.

Thirty years ago

— There was not a Northern Star published on this date.

Forty years ago

— There was not a Northern Star published on this date.

Fifty years ago

— There was not a Northern Star published on this date.

Amy Lee has had it pretty rough, between abusive relationships and… well, more abusive relationships.

And yeah, she has an idiosyncratic, pseudo-operatic voice. And the rest of the band cranks out adequate nu-metal sludge that, when augmented with strings, sounds huge and epic and grand and all that.

But it's just not very… good.

The music, were it sung by anyone other than an operatically trained woman with sad eyes, would be laughed at as nu-metal tripe — which, essentially, it is. And when Lee busts out her opera chops like she does toward the end of "Weight of the World," it's almost laughably overdone. Her singing voice just makes a listener uncomfortable — like one of those people who draw complete strangers into conversation and quickly become far too intimate with the information they share.

"Lithium" is the closest thing to a good song on the album, but it's so overproduced it just comes across as campy. "Call Me When You're Sober," the lead single, is decent enough, but sounds too close for comfort to "Bring Me To Life," the breakthrough single from the band's last album. When the band shoots for ballad territory, like the dreadful "Cloud Nine," it becomes actively painful.

So why the overwhelming media buzz surrounding the band?

That is a mystery. It seems so obvious that the same bands ridiculed for sounding generic and overproduced bear more than a passing resemblance to the cookie-cutter down-tuned guitar riffs here. A former member (guitarist Terry Balsamo) of one of those bands (Cold) has even joined Evanescence following original guitarist Ben Moody's departure.

"The Open Door" is not good. That's the bottom line.

This band done nothing new or original or unique, or even particularly interesting. The constant barrage of operatic sad songs grates on the nerves before long, and Lee's vocals are, while technically good, difficult to listen to.

The best advice: open the door, toss this one to the curb.

Evan Thorne is a music critic for the Northern Star.