OLIVER SYKES

I was trying to prove people wrong who said I wasn't a good guy, and I was trying to be the person that other people thought I was - people who loved our band thought I was a god.

Artists can be the most powerful people in the world because they can use their voice for good. Politicians should be the most powerful people in the world but they aren't going to do anything.

Once you've been painted as something it's very hard, especially when you're young, to wash that off.

You could have the thickest skin but Instagram and Twitter still affect you. It makes you envious, even if you've got everything you could ever want.

You just want so badly to be the best version of what people are saying, you want to look like the covers you're on, but it's hard to do that everyday.

Most of my favourite artists are women.

The key to me recovering from drug addiction was figuring out why I was so upset and why I hated myself so much. I realised it was all to do with the way I was viewed by other people.

With rock and metal, I think a lot of people connect with the lyrics because they feel like they don't fit in.

What puts people off metal is they think it's all nutters and blood. We don't want to be seen that way.

I must have been about 13 when I first heard Linkin Park and, to be honest, music had never played that much of a part in my life to that point.

When you're in a marriage, you can't leave just because you're arguing all the time. But it does stuff to you that you don't realise at first. It damages you, and you start thinking the worst of people.

I think EDM and metal and rock have been together already for a long time. Bands like Nine Inch Nails, Linkin Park, the Prodigy - they all have influences from both.

I found myself reading about this 16-year-old kid inventing a micro-organism to save the ocean. It made me realise that we can do anything if we put our minds to it. Even with all the damage and destruction, things can heal if we let them.

Rock's gone soft, it's gone miserable and boring, there's not really much exciting about it. So it's important that we cross over, because we feel like we belong more in a place where people just like music and it's not about how heavy it is.

You have to ration your creativity over all your songs. You write a really cool pop song then you have to write a heavy song to balance out, then you need to think about singles.

Everything I'd taught myself about screaming is basically a big no-no for singing. Your posture, your airflow - you're just pushing all the air out. When you start out, you're fast, heavy and loud but you're hiding behind it in a way. When you stop screaming, that's when it gets hard.

You can compromise on anything else in your life but love. It's the one time where under no circumstances should you let yourself have second rate.

We try so hard to block out negative or dark thoughts, but sometimes embracing your demons is the most vitalizing thing you can do.

Arctic Monkeys are actually one of my favourite bands going, which is really weird cos I went to school and college with them.

Emotion is a full range of a spectrum, like colours. It's not just anger. How are you going to get that out with just a guitar and screaming? You need to explore everything else.

I'm not a politically-charged person. I don't want to be. I don't want to talk about politics and I don't want to sing about politics, but if you're talking about environmental issues then you can't talk about one without the other.

But I can't stress enough how much talking helps. I was so reluctant at first; I didn't think it would help. But even if there's no answer to your troubles, they will seem so much smaller once they leave your head.

I like how our records go from super poppy to heavy then electronic, and next I'd like to make a bunch of records where each of them has a distinct vibe to it.

When it comes to the grieving process, we all try to ignore that feeling - but it's important to grieve. Even if something's happened for the best, you need to take that moment to feel something.

Happy Song' is a sarcastic open letter to the world about how we use superficial and trivial things to ignore the real problems.