The wait is finally over for Bring Me The Horizon fans, the British metalcore monsters turned bonafide modern rock sensation have released their new album POST HUMAN: NeX GEn.
Surprise dropped overnight after years of waiting, NeX GEn is the latest chapter in the series to be revealed and sees the band expanding both musically and conceptually. Following on from 2020’s POST HUMAN: Survival Horror – which featured collaborations with YUNGBLUD, Nova Twins, BABYMETAL and Evanescence’s Amy Lee, and includes the huge hit singles Teardrops and Obey. Sonically the album hits heavy, whilst frontman Oli’s vocals are his most melodic to date.
Bring Me The Horizon entered 2024 with an explosive start having played to over 140,000 fans in the UK & Ireland on their biggest UK arena tour to date, winning the BRIT Award for Best Alternative/Rock Act, selling out their biggest Australian headline tour in April, announcing their first stadium show in São Paulo, Brazil and now the surprise release of their new album, which has already caused a global frenzy since appearing online last night.
The first part of the POST-HUMAN Series, Survival Horror was recorded during the first COVID lockdowns, almost entirely remotely, and leaned into the band’s heavy side to express its feelings of anger, fear, emptiness and despair. Of NeX GEn, singer Oli Sykes says that it’s searching for something more hopeful, if not entirely positive in and of itself. Fittingly, the music this time – already previewed in huge singles Kool Aid, DiE4u , AmEN! and DArkSide – has an even more euphonic, post-hardcore-inflected stripe, while still bursting with the band’s unique, forward-thinking creativity.
Oli adds the album took “ages to write”. Partly, this is down to the band thinking that lockdown would last much longer than it did. When it lifted, they quickly found their schedules full with touring the world and headlining festivals such as Reading & Leeds (where they were joined by Ed Sheeran for their collaborative hit Bad Habits), hosting and headlining NEX FEST in Japan, Download Festival in the UK, Good Things in Australia and When We Were Young and Sick New World in Las Vegas.
But it’s also down to the concept quickly growing into something bigger than its creators originally imagined. POST-HUMAN: Survival Horror became far more of an event than the band had envisioned upon release, and crafting its follow-up required much bigger thinking than first anticipated.
There is so much to unwrap under the surface of the album for those who can spot it. “It's a real concept album, with a full narrative that connects to the first record, but the concept is hidden and buried,” he says. “Some people aren’t going to be interested, but for some people it could be like a self-help book. There’s a lot of things in there, some of it’s quite clear, but a lot of it cryptic and hidden. People are gonna have to work it out.”
The genre-hopping record does have one noticeable absentee on the guest list, with the rumoured Billie Eilish feature not appearing to eventuate, with the track fans speculated would feature Eilish, the Deftones influenced Limousine instead featuring Norwegian alt-pop star AURORA. Notable names to feature on the record are Underoath on a bulleT w/my namE On and Lil Uzi Vert & Daryl Palumbo (Glassjaw) on AmEN!.
POST HUMAN: NeX GEn TRACK LISTING
01. [ost] dreamseeker
02. YOUtopia
03. Kool-Aid
04. Top 10 staTues tHat CriEd bloOd
05. liMOusIne ft AURORA
06. DArkSide
07. a bulleT w/my namE On ft Underoath
08. [ost] (spi)ritual
09. n/A
10. LosT
11. sTraNgeRs
12. R.i.p (duskCOre RemIx)
13. AmEN! (feat. Lil Uzi Vert & Daryl Palumbo of Glassjaw)
14. [ost] puss-e
15. DiE4u
16. DIg It
Listen to POSTHUMAN: NeX GEn
