Bring Me The Horizon might be one of the biggest bands in the world these days, but they’ve not always been this well-respected.
In a new interview with Kerrang!, frontman Oli Sykes recalled the struggles BMTH had with the media when first coming through. “Our band was kind of branded as a Mötley Crüe-esque bunch of fucking dickheads,” he revealed.
“One of the first interviews I did, the guy twisted every single word. Things that were said as a joke were put like I was saying it angrily, and it was just a massive shock to me that we were portrayed as these people.
I thought I was a nice guy, and there were all these magazines that said I wasn’t. It was amazing just how your words could be twisted into something you didn’t mean, and I struggled with that.”
The conflicted reaction extended to Sykes personally. “People either painted me as an idol or I was fucking hated,” the singer said. “You’re the guy on the cover and it’s Photoshopped and put in the best light, but you can never look like that.
“And you’re also not this horrible, evil person, you’re just a regular person that makes mistakes like everyone else – but no one thinks you’re a regular person. You’re either a cunt or a god. It’s quite a headfuck.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Sykes expressed compassion for the new generation of artists forced to overthink about their social media.
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“Most labels want you to do skits for TikTok, or be thinking about your social media presence, and that alone is a full-time gig,” he rued. “I can’t imagine what it would be like to be a new artist and have that responsibility. It’s not just making music, you’ve also got to be an actor, almost. I’m watching it with my wife (Alissic) now, and it’s mad.”
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