Broken Empire – Fractures
Review by; John Latimer

 

Broken Empire were formed in 2017 on the web and started out as a three piece instrumental project by Matt Stevens, Ricky Hill and Marco Arenea but they soon realised that they wanted to put some vocals to the great music they were creating and recruited Leuan Owen on lead vocals to complete the line up.

 

The band say they have a mutual love for the likes of Alter Bridge and Five Finger Death Punch, and certainly you can hear some of their influences in the songs, but I can't help thinking there is a hint of Metallica influence in there too, certainly in the first track of the new EP Fractures anyway. I'm not talking the early thrash Metallica, more the St Anger era of Metallica.

 

The first song on the EP, Icy Veins, has that sound to it in my opinion anyway, it's a great start to the EP. There are plenty of heavy guitar riffs and impressive drumming as well in this fast paced opener. Broken Empire spent much of 2018 gigging and played with the likes of In Search Of The Sun, From Inside, Ryders Creed and Hollowstar. If you are the type of person who likes to turn up early to a gig and catch the support act, you would've been well rewarded with these guys.

 

After all the gigging, the band worked hard to bring out their first EP Fractures, and the hard work has been paying off with good reviews so far. The second track Hearts Of Damaged Men continues the fast pace, again the guitar and drums standing out for me, I can just imagine myself rocking out to this at a live gig. The third song Watch It Burn starts off with another great guitar riff before surprising you with some heavier vocals which gives this song a completely different vibe from the first two.

 

The next track on the EP, Can't Speak, is the one most influenced by Alter Bridge. Much of the vocals are very Miles Kennedy for me, no bad thing as well, and there is more of the heavier vocals involved in this track as well, which I love.

 

The good thing about this EP is there are five songs on it, so we get an added bonus here if you like with the last track, No More Light. The vocals in this one kinda sound a bit System Of A Down, and towards the end of the song get very shouty. Which is a good thing, who doesn't like a bit of shouty vocals in their metal?

 

Overall, I am very impressed with this EP. If this is the quality they can produce in the first EP then who knows what we can expect in the future. I for one can't wait to find out.

 

This gets a solid 4 out of 5 stars from me.