A new band from the Netherlands? Hm, what could they play… Death Metal? No. Gothic Metal? Neither. Hm, the two most common styles from the land of the GOD DETHRONEDs and AFTER FOREVERs are ruled out, even though Gothic Metal is not completely out of the loop… No, Progressive Metal it is that this young quintet is playing, yet compared to the majority of bands in this particular category they have a young lady on the microphone, Noortje van de Voort, whose voice does form a connection to the biggest Metal export of the Netherlands.

With “Unbreakable“ they set out with piano and light Prog, before some more complex riffing is added, but without overtaxing the listener, garnished with Noortje's high, almost fragile voice, very fluently arranged, good start. “Dying In My Beauty” also stands more on the quieter side of the Prog, slow-paced, yet raising in intensity every now and then, here it becomes evident that IN-TENSION do not put their emphasis on big complexity or showing off of musical skills, but put flow and dynamics into the foreground.

Altogether “harmonics“ is a good keyword to describe the music of the Dutchies, as “Mind's Illusion” proves or also the very nice instrumental “World Of Illusions”. With “Frozen Memories” they then have a quite big surprise on offer, because here we at first get some spheric keyboards with spacy effects, followed by a mechanical rhythm and some distorted vocals, before they belt out a fast, thrashy rhythm, just to move on into very calm and slow-paced Prog, to close things off fast again.

The production is clear, the performance without big flaws, just that some might accuse Noortje of lacking some power in her voice, I like the whole thing, for die hard proggers it might be too catchy, for Prog Rockers too heavy and for Metallers maybe too light, but that still should not keep you off giving IN-TENSION their well-deserved chance!

Rating: 7.5/10