Welcome to Patch Notes V.666, your weekly system update straight from the depths of Hell
Every Friday, we wade through the carnage so you don’t have to—separating the world-ending riffs from the glitch-ridden duds, the blast-beat assaults from the uninspired filler. Whether it’s blackened, brutal, or bugged beyond repair, we’ll tell you what’s forged in fire and what deserves a permanent rage-quit. So equip your best armor, chug a stamina potion, and step into the pit this week with albums from HORRENDA, OBSIDIAN TONGUE, VILDHJARTA, GRACELESS, SARGEIST, and RIVERS OF NIHIL…
HORRENDA – DIOLTAS (FIADH PRODUCTIONS)
Horrenda’s Díoltas (“Revenge” in Irish) is a bone-crushing meld of blackened death metal and Irish ancestral lore. It summons the eldritch decay and otherworldly malevolence that permeate the world of a game like Elden Ring. The tracks ‘Balor’ and ‘Dian’ explore primordial fury, while the title song breathes a spectral Irish dread. Much like the Lands Between (the setting of Elden Ring), Díoltas conjures a world shaped by cursed gods, ruin, and ancestral rage. The Dublin-based band’s evolution into a six-member force culminates in this unrelenting opus, which was first released in 2020 and is now receiving its first U.S. physical release, solidifying Horrenda as a vital voice in extreme metal mythology. [7.5]
OBSIDIAN TONGUE– ECLIPSING WORLDS OF SCORN (PROFOUND LORE)
Obsidian Tongue’s Eclipsing Worlds Of Scorn plays like a side-scrolling fever dream of guilt, ritual, and punishment, channeling religious dread and beautiful suffering. Sixteen years in, the duo deepens their thematic journey through analog mysticism, rejecting modern polish for raw, spiritual force. Recorded entirely to tape with no digital interference, it reveals its secrets like a hidden level in a survival horror game… buried, cursed, and waiting. Obsidian Tongue‘s take on black metal offers transcendence through tension, the core tenets of a frustrating yet satisfying game that has you doing it all over again in New Game +. [7]
VILDHJARTA – DÄR SKOGEN SJUNGER UNDER EVIGHETENS GRANAR (CENTURY MEDIA)
If Vildhjarta‘s down-tuned, chaotic “thall” grooves found on their latest album had a video game counterpart, it would be Control by Remedy Entertainment. Both warp the fabric of time with a dizzying blend of tranquillity and combustive chaos. The game’s atonal soundtrack mirrors Vildhjarta‘s unsettling interludes and crushing riffs. Control drips with surrealism and cosmic dread, much like the cryptic myth woven through + där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar +. It’s a sonic match that shares the experience of distortion and descent. If Control needed a score, it wouldn’t need a composer. It would need Sweden’s Vildhjarta, scoring the chaos, one seismic groove at a time. [7]
GRACELESS – ICONS OF RUIN (LISTENABLE RECORDS)
Graceless rises like a phoenix out of nuclear-ravaged wastelands with Icons Of Ruin, their most brutal offering yet. Forged in the barrens of what conjures a post-apocalyptic survival horror game, the Dutch sonic extremists summon the sounds of old-world death metal (a la early Bolt Thrower, Memoriam, and Asphyx). Bathed in sewage and stinking of excrement, the guys spew ten tracks of bunker-busting groove, crumbling atmosphere, and seismic riffage that channel the soundscapes of ancient, apocalyptic wars. Tracks like ‘Sanctified Slaughter,’ ‘Hardening Of The Heart,’ and ‘Resurrection Of The Graveless’ sound like power armor grinding over bones. [7.5]
SARGEIST – FLAME WITHIN FLAME (W.T.C. PRODUCTIONS)
Sargeist returns with another descent into blackened horror. Like a cursed signal echoing from a rusted radio, their sixth album drags listeners through fire-choked forests and crumbling chapels of rot in search of the accursed transmission. Founding member Shatraug resumes vocal duties, joined by VJS, Spellgoth, and Nur-i-siyah, they once again pull every shadow closer, mirroring the frigid despair of their black metal with the icy dread that lingers in Silent Hill’s fog-bathed streets. Flame Within Flame unfolds like a soundtrack for inner ruin, a resonation of footsteps skulking blood-slick hallways where nothing living remains. [8]
RIVERS OF NIHIL – SELF-TITLED (METAL BLADE RECORDS)
Rivers Of Nihil returns with their self-titled fifth album, a descent that mirrors the looping dread of a game like Returnal. With Adam Biggs on lead vocals and Andy Thomas joining on guitar and vocals, the band fuses the technical brutality of their early works with the atmospheric elements of Where Owls Know My Name. The whole experience feels like exploring a malignant exoplanet, where reality rots in the pale light of alien moons. Tracks like ‘House Of Light’ and ‘Criminals’ reverberate across the universal expanse, while sax and synths desync like a system anomaly in a hostile alien expanse. Rivers Of Nihil is ruthlessly infinite, not unlike a playthrough of a killer rogue-like. [8]
