Bring Me The Horizon's Oli Sykes Sheds Light on Recent Series of Collaborations

Earlier this week, we spoke to lead vocalist Oliver Sykes of Bring Me The Horizon (full interview here) ahead of their Good Things Festival headline slot this December. In the close and personal chat, the frontman shed some light on the influx of collabs we've heard with his, and/or BMTH's name attached recently.

To catch you up, there've been singles with Ed Sheeran on ‘Bad Habits‘, Machine Gun Kelly on ‘Maybe‘, Masked Wolf on ‘Fallout‘, IC3PEAK on 'VAMPIR', Alice Longyu Gao on 'Believe The Hype', daine on 'SALT' and most recently on 'Bad Life' with Sigrid. Many fans have been wondering why so many collabs started to emerge in such a close period, and in our interview, we found out a little more about it.

“A lot of these were in lockdown – obviously I had a lot of spare time and a lot of good stuff came [my way], where I was like ‘you know what? This is sick!’, or I really thought this is my way to support that artist.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4GR7EIL6vg

Beyond his true-to-form altruistic approach, the forced hibernation phase also enabled Sykes to fulfil something that hadn’t quite been translating into his band’s releases, and it was relieving...

“To get out some of my creative urges that I would have otherwise maybe inflicted on our band and everyone would hate me for it [laughs]. I love so many different kinds of music. I love pop music to black metal, to whatever.”

Sykes has had the intention to dabble in some more styles on a Bring Me The Horizon record but appreciates it might be a step too far.

"Sometimes I would love to put all of that stuff into our music, but it’s not possible – and sometimes I just want to be a completely different band and there’ve been moments in our career and on some albums where I’ve tried to do that. It’s almost like taking a step back."

The frontman also has drawn an understanding from what his loyal fans really need and connects with that immensely.

"We are a rock band and I’m not saying that we can’t push the boundaries, because that’s what we’re about. I guess I’ve kind of accepted and also sympathised with fans that we are a rock band, and if we lose that element of us, it’s not what people signed up for.”

This ultimately became the reason why we saw these collabs surface, as a way to separate himself from that confronting dichotomy. Cathartically, Sykes shares:

“The collabs have been a really nice way of getting to do whatever I want and not worrying about the fans, ’cause I’m like ‘if you don’t like it, you literally don’t have to listen to it. And if you don't like it, just be grateful that I’m not imposing it on you in our music.'”

"If you genuinely like a song that's someone put forward to you, or an artist that you want to support, why not? It's a special thing and it's a nice connection. It's just something that I've really been enjoying doing."

Either way, it's great to see Oli showcasing his talent across various projects, proving he really is one of the most diverse vocalists in the industry right now.

What's been your favourite? Listen to the full chat below!

Words by Ricky Aarons (@rickysaul90)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4552tadeuM&feature=emb_title