French progressive melo Death Metal act TEMNEIN was formed in 2009, and ever since they have been gaining a fair amount of attention for themselves, especially in their home territory France. TEMNEIN pretty much mix all kinds of influences on their debut "404 B.C.", but the melo Death is however that element in their sound where they have built up their solid musical foundation on. Modern and groovy are some of the synonyms for their stuff too – and despite I never get too excited about modern sounds especially in Metal music nowadays, TEMNEIN do make a positive colored exception to that rule. At times, they even remind me of AT THE GATES but with a more modernized and way more groovy approach to their stuff, which is also good because I wouldn’t like to blame them on sheer plagiarism either. There’s otherwise some sort of ‘Sweden-ized’ vibe incorporated into this record. For some strange reason they resemble the times when the Swedish cult labels like No Fashion Records or Black Sun Records produced many simply ass-kicking melo Death / Black Metal acts for the whole world. But then again, the band’s more progressive and experimental approach sets them apart from that gone Swedish pack pretty much, which can be counted as a definite plus for them, too. Yoann "Sub" Sachot on vocals, doesn’t really bring anything extra on the table with his well done death grunts but despite of that his growls still fit quite well into TEMNEIN’s merciless sonic assaults, I think. A song like ‘Bright Knife’ is quite a mishmash of technical instrumental wankery, making it extremely hard to follow the song that accurately. Did someone already say DREAM THEATER of modern Death Metal? Well, I guess I did. Plus, despite the guys’ clear abilities to keep their stuff varied with a good number of rhythm changes, non-symmetric riff rolls and stuff, I believe 40 – 45 minutes of this type of stuff squeezed into one disc, would have served the purpose a bit better – just to keep listeners’ focus up for longer. 52 or so minutes, unfortunately tend to kill a listener’s sharpest focus – second by second, the further the disc develops, I am afraid. "404 B.C." is a somewhat challenging record to digest to, having its ups and downs but admittedly it definitely has its exuberant and capturing moments too. TEMNEIN: www.facebook.com/temnein, label: www.mightymusic.dk