Oli Sykes on future BMTH music: “I feel like we can do whatever we want”

Oli Sykes has told Kerrang! that, following Bring Me The Horizon’s new album POST HUMAN: NeX GEn, the band “feel like we can do whatever we want” with their future material.

In this week’s exclusive Cover Story, the frontman teases that Horizon have got “bits and bobs” already in the bag for the third instalment in their four-part POST HUMAN series, and he knows the plan for this next record after NeX GEn.

He also believes that this newest LP has given them more freedom, and that they were able to itch certain creatives scratches that previously they didn’t feel able to.

“[Some things in the past were] very straight-laced and stern-faced,” Oli explains of what NeX GEn has done for them. “You wouldn’t be getting those tongue-in-cheek lyrics like you do on maybe Dear Diary [from Survival Horror], where it’s this more satirical look at things. I remember clearly when we were writing That’s The Spirit and really struggling with wanting to go there, but the music wasn’t feeling right. Not in a bad way, but it was all more polished, more stadium rock, it didn’t lend itself to a nod and a wink, you know?”

Now, though, the singer says Bring Me The Horizon “can do whatever we want”.

“In terms of what we do creatively, musically, whether it’s the heaviest thing you’ve ever heard, or the poppiest thing you’ve ever heard, or the most left-wing or avant-garde pop thing we do, nothing feels off the table,” he enthuses. “And nothing feels wanky, or like we’re doing it to appease some kind of weird, creative thing, and it’s not going to do anything for anyone else. It feels like for the first time in our career we can do all this stuff. And we can make sense of it as well.”

NeX GEn is out now. Bring Me The Horizon headline Rock For People on June 13 (get your tickets here) and Electric Castle on July 19 (get your tickets here).

Read this: Bring Me The Horizon: “The way we’re doing stuff now, it feels like I’m making art again, for art’s sake”