Why You Gotta Kick Me When I'm Down?

Album: Amo (2019)
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Songfacts®:

  • The writing process for Amo served as therapy for Bring Me the Horizon vocalist Oli Sykes following his very public split with his then-wife Hannah Snowden in 2016. This song finds him talking about his relationship with the band's fans and the hurt caused by them sprouting opinions about his personal life.

    Yeah, I know it's all in good fun, but
    Don't say it's coming from love now
    I see those arms in akimbo
    (They always wanna kick you when you're down)


    Keyboardist Jordan Fish told Kerrang: "It comes from a personal place, from a time when things weren't necessarily going his or our way."
  • Musically, this is the closest that Bring Me the Horizon have come to a grime track. "That came quite late," Fish said. "I made the beat ages ago and we weren't even gonna use it. Then Oli had a meltdown/breakthrough halfway through the writing process and went back to it."
  • The song features Fish's local village's children's choir. He told Kerrang that it reminded him of Pink Floyd's "Another Brick In The Wall" or Jay-Z's "It's a Hard Knock Life."
  • The band weren't sure if the children's choir was going to work out. Oli Sykes explained to Kerrang: "Jordan went and recorded those at a primary school in his village. It was a bit up in the air at one point, because there's some swearing on the song and it's a Catholic school. But in the end the parents were like, 'No it's cool, we'll let 'em do it.' I think we said we'd make a censored version just for them."
  • This is the Bring Me the Horizon song that Jordan Fish is proudest of writing. He explained to Kerrang, April 3, 2019: "It's one of our most adventurous songs, and I'm really pleased with how it came out. I love the lyrical content, the hook is great and it's got a cool vibe."

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