Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The deepest cut to the psyche is not always done by others, although their actions on occasions define us and how devastating a blow it becomes to us; the longest cut, the simplest straight forward incision into our skin is because we want to know how the pain feels when inflicted by ourselves. The cut is enough to make us grow our Second Skin, the face we wear when the world is against us, that face that can be marked and bruised but never one to bow under the pressure of capitulation, this is reality of putting two fingers up to the detractors and kicking on in style.

We are judged by our actions and the way we handle certain situations, we are pronounced with ceremony or we are denounced with the ritual black ball, either way our Second Skin is there to protect us from an overwhelming ego or the cut we inflict upon ourselves, one deep in the heart when we promise faithfully not to fall in the trap of delusion again.

For Ferruccio Quercetti, Carlo Masu and Gaetano Maria Di Giacinto, the Cut is all inspiring and for the sixth full length album, Second Skin, the music is heartbreakingly beautiful but also has the whisper of anger, the rabid thrust of the bite that leads to infection, that leads to the foaming of dissent and the pacing of a set of musicians fuming at the world.

The influence of Punk, never mind the new inflictions of the genre that have generated a new feel for the explosion of beasts with guitars being rightly heralded as new modern saviours of music, is never far from the doors of Cut; it is though the old feel, classical vintage, a real heartfelt throwback to a point where the song was not trying to be clever but instead being open, honest and direct, it is what makes the album bang with the heart of a warrior with steel for a pelt and a membrane covered in fortified iron.

In tracks such as You Killed Me First, Automatic Heart (Tacoma Time Travel), Holy War and Paralysed, the threesome take the listener deep into a battle that rages, they are protecting but also enlightening the listener, inviting them beyond the shrouded veil of the psyche.

A really good album, one that has everything going for it, Second Skin assigns warmth and gruffness in the same held out loving hands.

Ian D. Hall