Under the Skin is the fourth solo album by American musician and Fleetwood Mac vocalist/guitarist Lindsey Buckingham, released on October 3, 2006. The album, long delayed by Fleetwood Mac's reunion tour in the 1990s and 2003 album Say You Will, was his first solo release in 14 years.[7]Under the Skin peaked at number 80 on the Billboard 200 album chart in October 2006.[8] "Show You How" was also released as a single but failed to chart.
Music
Predominantly an acoustic album, the album does not feature many instruments besides acoustic guitar and percussion. Buckingham sought to forgo the more ornate elements on his previous albums in favor of orienting compositions around vocals and a single guitar.[9] "Down on Rodeo", which was written about Buckingham's brief relationship with Anne Heche,[10] and "Someone's Gotta Change Your Mind" are the only two songs on the record with contributions from outside musicians. Those two songs, along with "To Try for the Sun", were originally recorded ten years prior at Ocean Way Studios in Hollywood and would have appeared on Buckingham's aborted 1990s solo album Gift of Screws.[11] Other songs from this unreleased project appeared on Fleetwood Mac's Say You Will and Buckingham's 2008 solo release Gift of Screws.[12]
Buckingham recalled that the album received a lukewarm response from Warner Brothers, who expressed a lack of interest in promoting the album. "When I turned in Under The Skin, their general response was 'Yeah we'll put it out, but don't expect us to do too much.'"[9] Warner Brothers requested the addition of more conventional rock songs to make the album more marketable.[13]
Critical reception
According to the review aggregator Metacritic, Under the Skin received "generally favorable reviews" based on a weighted average score of 80 out of 100 from 15 critic scores.[1]AllMusic writer Thom Jurek noted how several songs felt autobiographical and described the album as "the most nakedly visible and tender recording he's ever dropped."[2]
Chris Willman of Entertainment Weekly complimented Buckingham's "frantic" guitar fingerpicking and said that his production work enhanced the sound of his nylon-string guitar. Willman added that despite the album's nominally stripped back nature, some of Buckingham's recording techniques, including the use of mulitracked vocals, prevented the album from being truly unplugged.[14] Brian Hiatt of Rolling Stone thought that Buckingham achieved "maximum effect from minimal arrangements" and said that the one song with more expansive production, "Down on Rodeo", resembled a "lost Fleetwood Mac hit."[6]Mat Snow of The Guardian called the album "a small masterpiece of tightly balanced musical contrasts."[4]
Track listing
All songs composed by Lindsey Buckingham except where noted.
Three promotional music videos were shot for Under the Skin, these included "It Was You", "Show You How" and "Shut Us Down". Both "It Was You" and "Show You How" are available for digital download via iTunes, but the video for "Shut Us Down" remains unavailable.
