Only The Righteous – Hikikomori Album Review

3rd January 2025 0 By Laura Jane

‘Hikikomori’ is a collection of the band’s singles since 2022 and has been collaborated into a full-length debut album. Who from you may ask? Good question as after I wrote that first sentence I’ve sat here thinking “MOMMA DIDN’T RAISE A GOD DAMN QUITTER AND I AIN’T GOING BACK AND PRESSING DELETE…” so here we are at a stalemate of bad writing and not announcing which band we’re fucking talking about.

Starting again, I present to you *ahem* ‘Hikikomori’ the full-length debut album from Manchester metalcore band Only The Righteous.

‘Hikikomori’ released on 3rd January 2025 has a run time of 33 minutes 51 seconds and consists of 9 tracks. I’ll be ‘brutally’ honest here when this was sent over I checked out the video for “Diaphony” and my first thought of feelings was heavily conflicted. I loved the music, loved it, and was like ‘LET’S GO LADS’ Stella started but as it continued I felt that the vocals fell off slightly for the track with the music being the big “OOFT YES” and the vocal sound being a “OOFT, MEH”.

I gave it a chance and then thought you know what give the album a bash, and on it goes… Now I don’t know if it’s the editing quality of that video or if it’s just the harshness of absolute wank that youtube likes to spew out but the album just felt like the video didn’t do the band justice if it had been a first impression. It sounds crazy I know but when listening to the album on Spotify it just all flowed perfectly and there wasn’t this major difference or feeling of the vocals not keeping up with the tone and pace of the music. It was actually a really fucking good listen. I enjoyed it, very much so. I will give credit to the video however as I did like the artistic style and the general flow of the video’s ‘cult-ish’ like narrative. I’m a sucker for that sort of stuff so found it a really ‘nice’ watch.

Personal favorites for me from the album would have to be “Afterall”, “No Saviours, No Saint“, “Modern Hell“ and IRONICALLY even after what I’ve mentioned above “Diaphony“. All stellar tracks that hit the mark. Some of the ‘for fans of’ listed on Only The Righteous social media are bands such as Architects, Invisions, and Blood Youth – I do honestly think this is a fair suggestive recommendation and cross-comparison for people who want to find new music to listen to. As someone who possibly wracked up a good 50,000 plays for Architects in 2024 (maybe a tad over-dramatization there), I do feel if you like those sorts of bands Only The Righteous would definitely appeal to you and is a band that you should not sleep on.

Overall, the album is a solid release and it’s good to see the evolution and adaptation of the music that’s been featured on this album earning it a strong 9/10. It’s got the heavy riffs, it’s got the breakdowns, it’s got the variety in vocals – Yes, it’s got the cliche lyrics about woe is me, struggles, and the general exploration of introspective and reflective themes but hey, it’s what music is. It’s an expression and you know what – It was super. I have checked out a few other things online in regards to Only The Righteous such as their old performance from Satan’s Hollow (Manchester) from the 2nd of April 2022 and would love to see how these guys do in a live show almost 2 – 3 years on. Hopefully be able to catch a local show in the future… stay tuned.
Score 9/10