Bring Me the Horizon: Heaven and Hell

Originally published in Guitar World, November 2010

Bring Me the Horizon find a middle ground on their upcoming album.

The members of England’s Bring Me the Horizon are young enough that they probably still get carded trying to enter some of the venues where the popular metalcore band plays. Even so, guitarist Lee Malia says he’s already learned a lesson that many players take most of their careers to absorb.

“I was 17 when we wrote Count Your Blessings,” he explains, referring to BMtH’s 2006 debut. “Back then I was trying to be as technical as I could. Now I know you don’t have to throw a breakdown into every song, and you don’t have to sweep pick to play a good solo.” Asked who’s been inspiring him lately, Malia mentions two pillars of restraint: David Gilmour and Mark Knopfler.

None of which is to suggest that Bring Me the Horizon’s upcoming disc skimps on the balls-out fury that’s earned the five-piece a rabid fanbase. Titled There Is a Hell, Believe Me I’ve Seen It. There Is a Heaven, Let’s Keep It a Secret, the album even features a song called “Fuck.” But you can hear evidence of Malia’s fresh outlook in a cut like “It Never Ends,” where he and co-guitarist Jona Weinhofen complement the stop-start chugging with a series of elegant lead lines.

Weinhofen joined the outfit last year following his departure from California’s Bleeding Through, and quickly felt right at home with his new bandmates. “We pretty much hit it off instantly,” he says of his partnership with Malia. “I’ll ad lib a part and he knows exactly what I’m gonna do.” Reportedly, Weinhofen’s speciality is to provide the finishing touch. “Lee wrote the majority of the music on this record, but sometimes he’ll have three-fourths of a song, then hit a wall,” he says. “That’s when I’m like, ‘I’ve got this thing I came up with last night…’ ”