News : Bring Me The Horizon’s Lee Malia says playing “deep-cut Metallica riffs” to six-year-olds and his kid’s school “was more nerve-wracking than playing Reading”

Bring Me The Horizon guitarist Lee Malia has said that he recently performed live for some six-year-olds at his child’s school, and found it more daunting than a headline slot at Reading & Leeds.

The musician shared the anecdote during a new discussion with Andertons, when he sat down for an interview and recalled when he most recently got butterflies before a live performance.

According to Malia, the nerves recently arose when he was invited to his daughter’s school and expected to perform for some of her six-year-old classmates.

“The other day at [my daughter’s] school they had a ‘Rockstar Day’ where they all dressed as rock stars,” he began. “Her head teacher asked me to go in and play for all the kids in the school hall.”

He continued, explaining that although he is used to playing massive Bring Me shows and making huge headline appearances at festivals, the in-school performance ended up being “more nerve-wracking than playing Reading”.

“I just played them, like, deep-cut Metallica riffs,” he added. “To six-year-olds who didn’t have a clue what I [was] playing. It was surreal – but they loved it though!

“They were all, like, jumping about and stuff. So it was pretty fun.”

The interview comes as Bring Me The Horizon are gearing up for their headline appearance at Reading & Leeds 2025, where they top the bill alongside Chappell Roan, Travis Scott, and Hozier.

Although they have played at the twin-site festival several times in the past, their only headline appearance to date was for their epic set back in 2022, when they shared top-billing with but played before fellow Sheffield band Arctic Monkeys. For Reading, they will perform on Saturday August 23, and for Leeds they’ll perform on Sunday August 24.

As well as the headline set at R&L, the band are also going to be heading overseas soon as they recently announced a 2025 North America ‘Ascension’ arena tour, set to kick off this autumn.

They’ll also appear at Louder Than Life festival in the US this September, following slots at Germany’s Rock Am Ring and Rock Im Park in June. Visit here for UK tickets and here for international tickets.

The shows all come in support of their latest album, 2024’s ‘POST HUMAN: NeX GEn’, which was given a four-star review by NME and described them as “a creative force that transcends the personalities of its individuals” and “entirely justifies the four-year wait”. It was later named as one of NME‘s Best Albums Of 2024.

Speaking to NME about their production plans for their tour, frontman Oli Sykes said: “We very recently started taking on what I believe will be the next stage of live entertainment by doing stuff with augmented reality and simulated visuals.”

“So far we’ve done has been really fucking cool, but it’s just the start and I’m pretty certain that even between now and eight months’ time, there will be so many more advancements,” he added. “My imagination has been blown wide open. It’s been like being a kid in a candy store to see the things that could be possible soon. It’s come on leaps and bounds even since our arena tour this year.”

At the start of this month, the frontman got fans talking again when he revealed that he is currently in the recording studio.