Imagine a band from the early 90’s, from Boonville, Indiana that never saw the light of success. Also imagine a power trio like RUSH or CREAM and a progressive, and sometimes very well composed and performed rock opus in the likes of FOCUS without the yodeling and with some touches of YNGWIE MALMSTEEN. Sometimes reviewing rock and metal releases you may find some treasures buried a little deeper. Bands that had the potential to happen but never did. With the access to music that we have nowadays, we are able to find good bands from the past that now are retired lawyers, accountants or whatever profession its members decide to take once the music could not keep up with the bills, the family, and sometimes the health. These proud middle aged men and women often revisit their music art from the past and give it a little push with the new modern social tools available, to see if their work could have the recognition they once hoped, even if it is for a little moment.

This is more or less the situation of the band INTENSE CONFESSION with the re-release of their 2 albums. IntoThe Forbidden from 1990, and Whispers Of Fear from 1991. Created by guitar player and singer Brian Hoeche with friends Eric Duke on the Drums, and Scott Burns on the bass, INTENSE CONFESSION never had the recognition at the time. Being labeled as a religious metal band probably did not help much. I really do not see Jesus as a metalhead. He is probably a FRANK SINATRA guy in  my opinion. Into The Forbidden was their first work and you can feel the ruff production from the 90’s when you listen to the tunes. At that time, to be able to record songs for an album was already a great and expensive endeavor. The sound quality I would say is good enough. I believe these albums are re-mastered as it is the usual treatment with these re-releases. The first album has 9 songs and the majority there is no singing. Amongst them you can find some good progressive rock with great arrangements and musical performance. I could live without the tunes with vocals and the slow ones as I believe they are the weakest on this particular album.  It seems that the band has added some fillers. However, the remainder is good for a first album. The band has the seeds of what would later become power and speed metal. “Blind Confusion” is the best tune on this album in my humble opinion. The solo is totally inspired by VAN HALEN.

The second album Whispers Of Fear was released the next year 1991, and despite only one year between albums, the progress is felt not only in  the production, but also in the performance. Clearly inspired by MALMSTEEN in some tunes with good guitar solos, killer bass, and precise drumming despite some disposable ballads. The keyboard is more present and it is clear that they changed the style, getting away from the instrumental as the focus of the majority of songs, to the actual vocal melody. This album has more songs with full vocal performances and I do not know if this is an improvement. I kind of miss the instrumental prog rock side of it. The voice of Brian Hoeche is not the best, but kind of does the job. The instrumental “The Journey Of Balderdash” is my favorite on this album.

Good feeling revisiting this work. Despite being far from perfect, I do applaud the effort to bring this back to the forefront as there are a lot of good things on these  2 albums that are worth exploring. The band may have gotten lost deciding if they would go full instrumental or full vocal melody and we did not have the opportunity to see where this could go unfortunately. I believe if  all members are still in good health, it would be worth giving a third try even if it is 34 years later.