Band:	Melodic Meltdown
Album:	Second Skin
Style:	Neoclassical, Heavy metal
Release date:	June 2003

01. Changing Skin
02. A New Beginning
03. One Day
04. Memory Lane
05. The Matrix
06. Illusions Of You
07. Dragon´s Teeth
08. Opening Another Door
09. Cold Days To Clear Your Mind
10. Gods Of War
11. Fire And Ice
12. Sleepwalker
13. Sleepwalker [Remix]

"Second Skin" was the first album "with a vocalist" of the Danish guitarist Michael Sobygge. It's not a bad start, at the opposite and I'm actually happy to see that a man who did some instrumental albums first is also able to do a good old powerful and aggressive Heavy Metal. Believe me if the production wasn't so average, this album could be a really good one?

As I said in my introduction I really like the fact that we're in front of a powerful Heavy Metal that flirts with Thrash sonorities sometime. Even if we can find some ballads and mid-tempo songs on this release, this is also possible to find some good old guitars riffs. I mean that some songs are fast and powerful, and I'm not sure that I was waiting something like that from a "guitarist". Of course we have good technical solos but Michael Sobygge didn't have the bad idea to focuses the songs on his guitar play, "Changing Skin" for example is the perfect song with a really dark ambiance and a good old "thrashy" riff and it sounds really good.

Unfortunately, "Second Skin" suffers of a really weak production, the recording is not good and it kills this recording. Plus Lars Binderup is able to do the best like the worst and some of the songs are sometime damaged by his average vocals. Too bad there is a lot of potentiality on this album especially when you know that it is the record of a guitarist who prefers to play a good old powerful Heavy Metal really near of Thrash sometime instead of some pseudo-intellectual music.

"Second Skin" is not a bad start, at the opposite but it's not perfect and let's hope that Michael Sobygge will have the luck to produce his next albums with some better means of recording. Though this is solid and promising and if you're not afraid of average productions and want to listen to great guitars solos, you should check this album.