Under My Skin is the second studio album by Canadian singer-songwriter Avril Lavigne. It was released firstly in Europe on May 21, 2004 then it followed the release in the rest of the world on May 25, 2004 by Arista Records and RCA Records. Lavigne wrote most of the album with singer-songwriter Chantal Kreviazuk, who invited her to a Malibu in-house recording studio shared by Kreviazuk and her husband Raine Maida, where Lavigne recorded many of the songs. The album was produced by Maida, Don Gilmore, and Butch Walker. It is Lavigne's second and final studio album to be released on Arista, following Let Go (2002). It was also her first album for RCA.
Under My Skin debuted at number one on the Canadian Albums Chart and on the US Billboard 200. It sold three million copies in the United States, ranking the album number 149 on the Billboard 200 decade-end chart.[1] Because of the album's darker, heavier, more aggressive vibe reminiscent of post-grunge and more melodic rock songs, it received generally positive reception from critics at the point of considering it as one of the classic albums that defined pop-punk music in the early 00s (despite it not being usually classified as such),[2] and also one of the works that anticipated the emotional intensity and theatrical aesthetics of emo pop music in the mainstream.[3][4] On March 18, 2013, Under My Skin was re-released as a double-disc set paired with her debut studio album, Let Go, which was released under Arista Records. To promote the album, Lavigne went on a promotional tour for malls in the United States and Canada. Furthermore, Lavigne embarked on a concert tour, entitled the Bonez Tour, starting on September 26, 2004, and ending one year later on September 26, 2005. The concert at the Budokan arena in Japan was filmed and released on a DVD only available in Japan, entitled Bonez Tour 2005: Live at Budokan. Under My Skin has sold over 10 million copies worldwide and is the fifth best selling album of the 21st century by a Canadian artist.[5]
^Mandel, Leah (October 8, 2019). "Everything old is new: Unpacking the pop punk revival". Mic. Retrieved October 10, 2019. It was at its commercial height in the early aughts; Simple Plan's Still Not Getting Any..., Avril Lavigne's Under My Skin, Paramore's Riot, My Chemical Romance's The Black Parade, and many other classics defined the era.
^Phillips, Marian (May 14, 2020). "20 ESSENTIAL 2004 ALBUMS THAT PROVED THE SCENE WAS HERE TO STAY". Altpress. Retrieved June 12, 2020. In her second album, Under My Skin, Avril Lavigne showed an all new side to her music. Much more complex than her first album, it featured darker concepts of feeling lost and alone, such as "Nobody's Home." With deeper emotional lyrics and a punk-rock sound, Lavigne moved beyond her teenage pop-punk persona and matured into a fully fledged alternative music icon.
^Cox, Jamieson. "Avril Lavigne: Let Go Album Review". Pitchfork. Retrieved December 17, 2018. Lavigne has never struck gold in the same way, veering back and forth between surly post-grunge (2004's sophomore effort Under My Skin
^http://www.erasingclouds.com/wk205yearin5rev.html "Under My Skin is one of the most successful releases of 2004 in any genre, doing exactly what it was supposed to do: be insanely catchy while imitatively grungy, with guitars jingle-jangling..."
^http://www.avclub.com/review/avril-lavigne-emunder-my-skinem-11438 "Under My Skin's fateful habit of falling toward a default doom-and-gloom mode. Mascara-streaked moods dictate an excess of ballads and rockers that trade in sterile nü-metal crunch, leaving Lavigne's pop-punk spunk by the wayside"
^[1] "...songs penned with her guitarist Evan Taubenfeld that sound the most like nü-metal." "...slightly reminiscent of Limp Bizkit, allows a droning guitar to represent despair until a driving chorus smashes through the fog to deliver a rousing punch."
^ abPareles, Jon (2004). "MUSIC; The Solipsisters Sing Out Once Again". NY Times. Retrieved February 6, 2020. In Don't Tell Me, which builds from a folk-rock verse to a hard rock chorus like a Morissette song, she kicks out a guy who pressures her for sex: Don't try to tell me what to do/Don't try to tell me what to say, she sings.