Bring Me the Horizon: 'We're Not Going to Become a Full-Blown Pop Band'

Having engaged in collaborations with Masked Wolf, Ed Sheeran and Sigrid and busted out stadiumcore breakdowns on the nine-song EP, Post Human: Survival Horror, Bring Me the Horizon have been prolific as ever in the pandemic era. The UK band will have three years’ worth of new material to play for Aussie fans when they touch down in December to headline the 2022 Good Things festival.

Music Feeds caught up with the band’s in-house programming and electronics wiz, Jordan Fish, who was en route to a writing session with vocalist Oli Sykes. Fish was initially apologetic: “You were meant to have Oli Sykes but you have me – sorry if you’re disappointed,” he laughed.

We didn’t care though. Having gone from a touring band member to Sykes’ primary co-writer, arranger and producer, recruiting Fish is arguably the most important move the Sheffield deathcore-come-stadium rock powerhouse has made. With a landmark headline performance at the Reading and Leeds festivals coming up and new music on the way, there’s no lack of things to pick Fish’s brains on.

Bring Me the Horizon – ‘sTraNgeRs’

Music Feeds: The band has become so much more prolific, in tandem with pop, hip hop and parts of guitar music too. Is that a conscious move?

Jordan Fish: I don’t feel like we’ve done that much. We’ve only released two originals in the last year and a half, but granted, we’ve done loads of collaborations. It’s less, “write, record, tour,” for us. We try to make an effort to release more when we feel like it – as soon as the music is done – and then just tour constantly, albeit not quite as much. We don’t cane it for a year and a half any more.

We’ve all got families now so going away five-to-six weeks at a time is harder. The way we’ve done it has been really good for us because we can capture where we’re at and tap into what our feeling is in the moment.

MF: Grimes, Ed Sheeran, Masked Wolf – there’s a broad range of artists that the band collaborates with now. How does that impact the new BMTH material?

JF: All the way up until amo, we wrote and produced the stuff ourselves, so it’s been a different way of working for us over these last couple of years. I’ve just turned 36 so I feel like an old man, but I also want to be influenced by new artists that have a different approach.

The best artists are the ones that stay relevant and keep collaborating. If I work with a 21-year-old artist, that’s a generational difference, but it gives me an opportunity to tap into a whole new slew of influences.

We still produce all our own work, so our sound doesn’t get changed at all by artists. We just pick up new tools to add in. Survival Horror is a perfect example. I integrated so many new synths into that from working alongside different people. I was learning to do shit that I can’t normally do.

MF: That release was almost like what Linkin Park would’ve been if they’d continued on a heavier route. Will that be a sound that the band will always circle back to?

JF: That last record, for me, is the most archetypal BMTH record. It covers the bases of what we sound like – that, right there, is what we sound like. Linkin Park is always going to be our biggest influence, in my opinion. They just did it right, especially on those first two records.

We’ll always be around that ballpark. I’m pretty sure at this point, though, we’re never going to become a full-blown pop band. We might dabble in it, but we love rock music, we love electronic stuff – it’ll never change too much.

Bring Me the Horizon – ‘Ludens’

MF: It’s been ten years in the band now for you. You joined and the band released Sempiternal, BMTH’s major break-out. It’s hard to divorce you from that. Thoughts?

JF: I think having a producer in the band initially really helped Oli be able to express all his ideas. He has a constant flow of ideas, so it enabled him to get all of his creativity out. I’m hesitant to take credit for that because it was us collectively doing it. When I first joined, I was just a live member, too; I went along with what the rest of the guys wanted to do. I think I had a hand in it, though.

Oli has singing lessons now, but I helped him with that at the beginning, as well as the songwriting and arrangements. We started working more in a studio environment then, as opposed to a room, so that changed things as well.

MF: You mentioned on Robb Flynn’s No F’n Regrets podcast that you joined BMTH after Oli heard a song you produced when he was at house party. You had no control over that situation, and suddenly you’re in one of the biggest rock bands in the world. Ten years on, what are your thoughts on that, and what advice would you give to other musicians trying to get their break?

JF: When I joined the band, I was 25 and was obsessed with music. I’d been working exclusively on it as well as a producer, recording local bands in my town. All the skills and work I’d done over the years, I felt like it was for nothing. I knew I was good at a bunch of things but was predominantly working with locals, and at the time I felt like I was wasting my ambition and skills.

Suddenly though, when the Bring Me the Horizon thing happened, I was in a position where all that work I’d done that felt for nothing was suddenly super-relevant. I knew how to record drums, I was influenced by the same music and knew how to produce it. All that groundwork was really important.

I’d tell people to put their all into everything they do. It might feel like a waste of time, but things lead to other things always. My old band, it felt like it went nowhere, but if I hadn’t been in it, I would never have come to the attention of the Bring Me the Horizon guys. You look back and realise, if you hadn’t put the work in, you might never have progressed. It’s all one big long journey.

MF: You’ve got massive headline shows coming up for Reading and Leeds before coming to Australia for Good Things in December. How’s the Bring Me camp feeling?

JF: We feel like we’re ready for it. We’ve been talking to Reading and Leeds and getting close to this point for a few years now. We’ve had to work for it to get to the point that we can headline, but now it feels like we’re tighter than we’ve ever been. We’ve got a good setlist that a chunk of people at these festivals should know. And I also live in Reading, so that’s a bonus for me.

The last time we played Reading I was shaking, so it’ll be good to play it in a better mindset. And hopefully, we don’t fuck it up.