The second album, or sophomore album, can oftentimes make or break a band. However, when your first major label release sells more than 11 million copies worldwide, chances are good you’re not going to fail.

Meteora, Linkin Park’s second release, while not the genre-changing hit that [Hybrid Theory] was, is still a solid follow-up.

The first single, “Somewhere I Belong,” is a fairly good indicator of the rest of the album. The sound is similar enough to be quickly recognized but different enough that people will be able to tell the difference.

But one of the problems with the whole Linkin Park sound is the fact that unless it does something drastic on each song, the songs tend to just kind of blur together. Hardcore rap-metal usually ends up being its own worst enemy. Thankfully, that’s not much of a problem with Meteora, but some of the songs still blend together.

One of the best songs, and most likely the band’s next single, “Faint,” is one of those unique songs.

While most of the songs focus on the play between Chester Bennington and Mike Shinoda, this song does an excellent job of focusing on the strength of Shinoda’s vocal skills.

“Nobody’s Listening” is an extremely interesting song, which leans heavily on current hip-hop trends, and the strength of Shinoda as a vocalist. The song also features an interesting little twist, with the accompaniment of a Japanese-style flute.

The one major problem this CD could have in comparison to [Hybrid Theory] is fact that it doesn’t really have the strong singles. Before, the group had “One Step Closer,” “Papercut,” “In the End,” and “Closer.”

But the new CD really has only two strong singles, “Somewhere I Belong,” and possibly “Faint.”

Now I’m not saying the CD is crap.

Not by a longshot. Rather, I think this is an incredible CD.

But I can’t really see this being the runaway success that [Hybrid Theory] was.

By all means, if you’re a Linkin Park fan, buy this CD. Even if you’ve never even heard of the group, give it a shot. Although if you haven’t heard of Linkin Park, chances are you live under a rock or something.