AN INTERVIEW WITH BROKEN HABIT + A BONUS SHORT REVIEW OF THE NIGHTSHADE EP

4-8-26

PHOTO CREDIT: BLUE KID MEDIA

1. Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions! Before we dive in, if you wouldn’t mind introducing yourself and what you do in the band, that would be great!

Hi I’m John O’Reilly, the vocalist of Broken Habit. I’ve been doing music and writing songs for a very long time and I am very lucky to be in this position making music with some fantastic people.

2. Could you give us a little backstory on the band: where you’re from, when and how you formed, that sort of thing?

We are all from Dublin, Ireland, forming first as a cover band for Linkin Park called Breaking the Habit, but as we began to play shows we started to cover more music from that era and that led us into wanting to write our own music, and after we reformed as an original act called Broken Habit, keeping the nod to our roots.

Afterwards and probably heavily through my influence we began to write heavier-sounding tracks as I went to a place I felt most comfortable music-wise, which is this old school metalcore sound with some Nu-Metal crossover.

3. How did you get into heavy music in the first place and what drove you to want to play it?

For me personally it started with Dragon Ball Z AMVs of Linkin Park and that brought me down a long and heavier path. Then after seeing a couple awesome bands like Stray From the Path and While She Sleeps live I was absolutely hooked.

4. I definitely get heavy late-2000s/early 2010s metalcore vibes from you guys—would you say you pull influence from then? Where/what else does the band pull from in addition to the nu metal?

We all pull from different genres I think when it comes to writing and the majority of the songwriting comes from me and our two guitarists.

I (John O’Reilly - Vocals) love bands like Stick to Your Guns, Architects, Parkway Drive and Whitechapel. Their lyrical content and vocal styles heavily influenced me growing up. I love the aura of those bands/vocalists and every time I see one of them it’s like they are just getting better.

I love that old school bands are making these comebacks as well, like Poison The Well just released a new album that’s filled with bangers and all that does is inspire me. We are in this new era of core and I’m all for it.

The main driving force behind me is the performance. When I’m on that stage it’s like all the worries and stress go and I’m just in that moment, the euphoria of people shouting these words back at you shows that music can just transcend so much. I hope fans feel the same in that moment. It’s all a beautiful art form truly and I get to share that with such amazing people.

I’ve had many comparisons to my vocal style but I find I’m a bit eclectic and that every song I do what feels right, whether it’s heavy lows or clean melodies—if it works, it works. When we are demoing, we always say what’s the most John version of this track and eventually I find the voice. I do love a good filthy Blegh and as I’m writing this I realize that I need to add a couple more in the newer songs we are working on.

John Foley (Guitars) is a fan of mid 2000's metalcore like BFMV [Bullet for My Valentine] and Killswitch Engage. But he grew up with Nu-Metal so he likes to merge both together. He’s a very "try to think outside the box" kind of guy when it comes to songwriting and he tries to make sure that his riffs pack a punch but is influenced by a lot of different guitar styles and if he hears something he likes, he will take his own twisted spin on it.

Rob Stone (Guitars): In all honesty, I was a casual listener of metalcore at the time that it was all being released. Bullet for My Valentine is probably one of the few bands of that style that I was a true fan of. At that time in my life I was mainly listening to thrash metal like Metallica, Slayer, Death Angel, Exodus and also punk like Cro-Mags or Bad Religion. My understanding is a lot of the bands that defined that 2000's/2010's era of metalcore would have grown up on that music themselves, so it makes sense that in my guitar journey I ended up developing a similar writing style to them.

In my late teens I started to really love heavier bands like Full of Hell, Whitechapel, Dillinger Escape Plan. The composition of certain songs stuck with me and now I feel that it’s important to create a song that conveys emotion and means it as well. It's not enough for a song to simply tell me how it feels, I want to feel what the songwriter feels. Bands like Cancer Bats, Norma Jean and even some pop artists like Demi Lovato all do that incredibly well.

I've also always had an interest in pop-punk music. It was especially great to listen to that stuff when I started playing because the songs were easy and they had great production and knew how to make a song that stuck in your head. Mixing those elements altogether makes up most of what you hear me create now for the most part.

My personal style could be considered slightly bi-polar. I am often told by my bandmates when something I've written is a little bit jarring or "weird" because I'm used to listening to music on extreme opposite ends of the genre spectrum. I could make something that goes from a deathcore breakdown into a pop-punk chorus and not realise until I've taken a step back just how strange that can sound. Thankfully I get reeled in on some of the ideas that are a bit more odd but I'd like to think all the bands that influenced me have a small stamp somewhere amongst the music I create.

5. Not a question but curious to get your thoughts on this: It’s been fascinating for me to watch nu metal not just make a comeback but permeate all sorts of different genres with its influence. I grew up on it, and given how hated it was in its day, I thought we’d never see it re-emerge. In the early 2010s, bands like Suicide Silence, Years Since the Storm, and Upon a Burning Body started incorporating some nu metal, and I remember how much hate Suicide Silence’s Black Crown, for example,got. I suppose people just weren’t ready yet, or the old tastemakers hadn’t quite aged out, perhaps some combination, but as Bruce Springsteen sings in “Atlantic City”: “Everything dies, baby, that’s a fact / But maybe everything that dies someday comes back.” And here we are.

Black Crown is a great shout. I thought it was a fantastic album when it came out. I believe that nu-metal and metalcore have always kind of had a bad reputation, like it wasn’t cool enough or heavy enough or something.

Like to me Lamb of God is a metalcore band but never let a “True Metalhead” hear you say that cause they would take it as an insult.

There’s a resurgence of this fusion genre I believe. Bad Omens are a great example of this, kind of just doing what they want and blending genres. Landmvrks are really interesting, too, with their song construction.

6. Talk to us about your Nightshade EP: can you walk us through the writing and recording process a bit, as well as the finished product? What was the inspiration behind the tracks, what were you going for, and what has the reception been?

Nightshade was a great experience, it really solidified us as a band and our sound. It was the first time I truly felt like this is what Broken Habit sounds like.

Our process is fairly simple. We write songs, record demos and listen. If we like it, we move to the next step. If not, we scrap it and move on.

We went to a studio in Belfast called JSR Audio, the producer Josh has worked with some awesome Irish bands and really understands the genre, too. I had never realised how important it was having an ear that gets what we are trying to do.

The EP was written before we went to track it, but while we were there we changed some bits and experimented, too. It felt fantastic having someone care about the music and we really appreciate Josh and can’t wait to go back to record our next release.

Nightshade was a collection of songs we have written and it felt like putting them together was the right call. Our previous EP S.E.D.A.T.E was a thematic choice following a story the whole way through. This time we went with 4 strong individual songs each being a singular contained tale, but they follow into each other nicely.

It’s a dark, grim and violent collection, talking about pain, betrayal and love.

My favorite track off the EP is “Forevermore,” which is about ego death, which is something that resonates with me deeply. Sometimes we are just forgotten but I hope to make some mark and that these songs are something that other people can enjoy as much as I do.

I think the EP has been received quite well. Reviews are decent and people always are complimenting it. I am happy with one person enjoying it so once I achieve that goal I'm good. I like to think we make music for the joy of it. I get to hang out with some of my best friends and make music together. If there’s more than that, sure, that’s just an extra win for me.

7. What have been some of the major highlights for the band so far?

There’s been a few, we’ve gotten to do a couple tours, play some festivals and write and record two EPs. We have another on the way, too, so that’s awesome—that’s some insider information for you.

We are planning to tour again this summer and maybe in October, too.

8. When I was doing my previous project, I had the good fortune to interview a few great bands from Ireland, including Worn Out, LaVein, and—this was a huge one for me, as The High Point of New Lows still sounds like the future to me, and I’ve been in love with the release since it came out—Hero In Error. Two part question: 1) Who are some other great Irish bands we should be paying attention to, and 2) For Americans, we usually frame the following as the “Mount Rushmore of…” but that doesn’t always translate. The Big Four of Thrash (Metallica, Anthrax, Slayer, Megadeth) does. Who do you think are the Big Four of Irish Heavy Music?

That’s a loaded question. I think because we have so many awesome bands I’d be hard pressed to name four, but right now we have some real hard working bands.

Let’s start with Hero in Error, a band that’s been a huge influence on me. I listen to The High Point of New Lows at least 3 times a week. “The Trees That Mourn Their Leaves” is one of the greatest songs of all time .

Survivalist and Worn Out are making serious moves right now, really hard working and putting out excellent tracks and touring loads.

Bitter Pill, Dead Memories, Following the Signs, Goon, Carnyx, Hashmaker, Archives, Whitethorrn, Poser, Neon Empire, Shortest Straw, Words That Burn, In Ruins and Cell Games are all bands we love and want to give a shout out to as well.

9. Circling back to nu metal, who would be your Nu Metal Big Four?

Korn, Limp Bizkit. Linkin Park and Deftones would be our top 4 but we have to add on an extra for Slipknot as they are hugely influential.

10. Any last words for the reader?

We can’t wait to show everyone what we have been working on this year. The EP we are working on has taken us to a gloomy place but we hope everyone enjoys this darkness.

But the most important thing I could say is the world we live in is a tough one, so don’t make it harder by being a dickhead. Show respect and kindness as much as you can, love beats hate.

Author/Interviewer Mini-Review of Nightshade

A four-song EP released on December 12th, 2025, Broken Habit’s Nightshade is a release that immediately took me back to the late-2000s, early-2010s “core blogosphere” (if you know, you know), not just in terms of the sonic touchstones of the songs themselves but with the production, which recalled Structures’ All of the Above, late-2000s hoppy Chicago deathcore, and the early Legend material. The first song on the EP, “Reign,” finds the band doing their best Bury Your Dead impression with a little sprinkling of This or the Apocalypse’s “Hell Praiser,” with an ending that can best be described as “crushing.” Reinforcing the time capsule feeling (and this is meant in the most complimentary of senses), the title track follows with some prime Mediaskare metalcore and a clean chorus before the unique fusion that is “World Eater”: it oscillates between an early Architects influence, particularly with the guitars, on the verse and a Cancer Bats-esque chorus twice before the band breaks into some serious nu metalling infused with deathcore. The chorus returns to reverse the oscillation before some finely-calibrated “pit science” closes the track out. Finally, we get “Forevermore,” the most overtly nu metal/hard rock song, albeit one with the ghost of Lancaster County metalcore haunting its edges.

Nightshade is an interesting mix of sounds, particularly from the aforementioned era, but it isn’t some stale nostalgia trip, nor is it derivative. Broken Habit’s got something here, and I’m eager to hear where they go next!