Reigning Heavy Metal Kings of Oxford, England, Broken Empire grace us with their presence for the First Edition of Novacaine Magazine and have given us the awesome opportunity to interview them once more.
You guys have been quite busy since we last caught up in 2019, at the time you had just released your debut EPs ‘Fractures’ and ‘Parasite’ which featured tracks such as Hearts of Damaged Men and Time Is Running Out, so its been a while since we’ve caught up with everything Broken Empire.
Can you catch us up with what we may have missed over the last few years?
Ricky Hill: Well we released an album!!
Matt Stevens: Yes, and we've played some awesome gigs with some awesome bands, such as Evil Scarecrow…
RH: Those Damn Crows…
MS: The Fallen State…
Ieuan Owen: Phil Campbell & The Bastard Sons…
MS: Don’t forget some of the festivals, like Breaking Bands in 2022. We got to play with Glamor of the Kill and InVisions. Plus some more local festivals, which are always good fun!
The Those Damn Crows gig must have been good fun. Can you tell us how that went down?
RH: Yeah that was a really good night and a good gig!
MS: It was great to see such a big crowd in Oxford!
RH: A sold out O2 Academy main room no less!! It felt like 90% of the crowd got there early enough to see us and the other support too, which was great.
MS: We got loads of social media activity afterwards which was lovely! Tons of pictures and videos.
IO: Cleared us out of merch too, so that was incredible!
In 2022, you released your debut album ‘Before The Fall’ which featured one of your now staple tracks ‘Disguise’, we’d love to hear more about it!
1. What was the album all about?
2. How did fans react upon release and how was it received when performing live?
IO: Well it wasn’t a ‘concept’ album, so although it is semi designed for all the tracks to work together, they are essentially all individual songs.
MS: We touch on quite a few themes, and we tried to keep the album artwork to suit the general theme of the human and environmental condition. But we are definitely not a political band…
IO: Yeah we vaguely touch on some societal issues.
RH: Which is kind of where the title “Before The Fall” came from, that idea of civilisation as we now know it ending and AI and robots taking over!
MS: But we do have notes of positivity throughout the album, so it's not as dark as it sounds!!
RH: We had our album launch show at The Bullingdon in Oxford and that was really good and went down really well.
MS: That was a really good show!
IO: Well over a hundred people there so that pretty much filled the back room of The Bullingdon.
RH: Yeah that went down really well!
IO: In terms of playing the tracks live, ‘One Last Time’ always goes down really well!
MS: And ‘Valediction’ is always popular with its big chunky riffs!
RH: Let’s not forget that we got asked to play ‘Disguise’ again as an encore the other week!
IO: Yeah it ended up being the first song in the set and the last! Like Limp Bizkit at Download!
So with that being said, it has been 2 years since your last album and single release, we need more Broken Empire in our lives!
1. Do you have any plans to release new music anytime soon?
2. If so, can you tell us anything about this upcoming release?
RH: Well it’s funny you should ask us that!
IO: Yes, we are literally working on the follow up album as we do this interview in the studio!
MS: Album number 2 is in full swing! And we may even be releasing one of the tracks sooner than you think!
RH: ‘Will You Wake Me’ the track is called, and it’s definitely more along the rock side of our usual genre.
MS: We’re tapping more into the sounds of our “Noumenal World” EP, and leaning on that style without losing the heavier Broken Empire sound that people have come to know.
IO: Yeah it still has its heavy moments…
MS: And big riffs!
RH: I think all that is left to do is put some sort of music video together and then it will be good to go!
MS: You may not see us out at as many gigs towards the end of the year, as our big priority right now is getting all of the new tracks finished and recorded.
RH: If you do want to hear ‘Will You Wake Me’ before it comes out, then it will be in the set at our gig in Banbury in December!
Do you have any touring plans in 2025 that you would like to tell us about?
MS: We are certainly looking to tour again next year and that is something we are working on in the background right now.
RH: I guess it’s kind of dictated by the new album,as we are definitely looking to tour off the back of its release next year.
IO: Yeah, right now we are just working out our timeline for 2025 in terms of releasing the album and then gigging/touring with that.
MS: We do have one cool gig in the pipeline for 2025, but you will know more about that very soon…
Follow Broken Empire:
Social Media Links
This is the first time we have caught up with Broken Empire since their last interview with us back in 2020, and we can guarantee you, this will not be the last time you see us working together. Find out more after The Five Hundreds interview at 8PM BST 11/10/24.
Comments