Siam Shade second album (somewhat) bluntly called II is a huge step-up from their debut, and probably the band's best opus to date in my opinion. While some of the band's best ultra melodic song can be found in subsequent albums, no other Siam Shade album is as constant from first track to last. There is no boring song, no boring moment whatsoever on II. If you're a fan of bands like Def Leppard, Bon Jovi, Dare and other bands with great choruses and vocal melodies, then Siam Shade II was made for you.

This album is one of the best album I own guitar wise (I'm not talking technically, but rather melodically and also the sheer variety of the guitar work presented here), the riffs, from cubic to ultra-melodic are some of the best I've heard in a Hard-Rock record. But however majestic and powerful, guitars are not enough on their own to make a masterpiece album. That's were the duo singers of Siam Shade enter the game, to deliver incredible vocal performance and vocal melodies you're not about to forget any day soon. This album is a real demonstration of great hooks, killer choruses, all accompanied by ultra-melodic guitar work, melodic solos, and great overall song-writing. There isn't a single weak track in this album. And having done that for many years, I can tell you that you can actually listen to this album over and over again, and it doesn't ever get boring, even if you give it more than one listen per session (something I did on numerous occasion). Not many albums can do that but listening II is like a walk in the park, you can do it over and over again. Like most Siam Shade albums, most of the songs are in Japanese, with only a few chorus words in English. Lately the band has been re-recording some songs in English, but they sound borderline silly with an almost unbearable accent, and the originals in Japanese are MUCH better in my humble opinion.

Though the entire album is one big Hard-Rock masterpiece there are some songs that stand out of the pack, these are Time's, Sugano no Mama de, Owarai Na Machi & Rain. Rain being my favorite on this album, and one of my all-time favorite Siam Shade song. This album is not a heavy album, on the contrary its mostly AOR / Hard-Rock material, without much punch, but what that album lacks in heaviness it makes up in sheer passion and majesty.

While Siam Shade will write even more over-the-top unforgettable chorus-driven song after this album, NONE have the consistency of this album (but some of the best choruses are coming in their next albums), which flows absolutely perfectly from beginning to end, with no weak moments, and killer songs one after the other, incredible guitar work, amazing vocal melodies and great (while not always Siam Shade's best) choruses. This album is my favorite of the band and probably always will be (the latest stuff not being on par with what they did in the 90's), but actually the best way to enjoy Siam Shade is to take every killer track (trust me Siam Shade have plenty of those!) from every album and make it into a best off, that usually result in a killer compil you can't press stop once you've started playing. Anyway, if you like J-Rock and Hard-Rock, then you definitely need to check out this fantastic album, a true Hard-Rock Masterpiece !