Songfacts®:

• "Obey" is an ode to how oppression by world leaders and politicians has been so normalized in society's DNA that we can't even see it anymore. The song starts off with Oli Sykes singing from the side of the oppressed.
  
  Another day, another post-traumatic order
  Brainwashed and feeling fine
  I bit off more than I could chew when I looked closer
  So I stabbed a fork in my eye
  
  Sykes has been so desensitized by the stream of tragic statistics governments are producing that he feels nothing.
• The song's chorus is sung from the world leaders' point of view, outlining their indifference towards the people.
  
  There's nothing to see here, it's under control
  We're only gambling with your soul
  Obey, whatever you do
  Just don't wake up and smell the corruption
  
  The world leaders are hoping the common folk don't stir from their indoctrinated minds.
• Sykes and keyboardist Jordan Fish wrote the song during the COVID-19 lockdown in spring 2020 stirred by their beliefs that all that was going on was being controlled. They wanted to stand up to our oppressive leaders who don't want us questioning the way things work. Sykes explained to Forbes:
  
  "I think everyone has been stopped in their tracks, and I think a lot of people are realizing that maybe the people in charge aren't looking out for our best interest. The way that we're fed traumatic and devastating news on a daily basis, I think the powers that be or whatever you want to call them, they've gotten very good at getting us desensitized to this information, and we have been sleepwalking."
• Yungblud joins Bring Me The Horizon on the track. The Sheffield metal pioneers come from the same part of England as the singer-songwriter and have crossed paths at festivals. Sykes sent him their demo of the track and Yungblud added some lines of his own from his studio in LA. He said:
  
  "We are being told to conform to a completely outdated idea that we don't relate to or even understand. They teach us to turn against each other and to fight against our differences rather than embrace and celebrate them. They try to keep us divided because it makes us weaker. Robots follow robots, because they feel nothing at all. But what they don't realize is that to us, to be different is to be free, and a world of f---ing love and equality is a world we want to be part of."
• Sykes and Fish produced the track with additional production from Mick Gordon. The Doom and Doom Eternal composer also worked with the Bring Me The Horizon pair on their "Parasite Eve" single.
• Directed by Sykes and shot in London, the music video finds him and Yungblud battling each other as robots. They dance and fight before eventually realizing that they just want to be together.
• Explaining Bring Me The Horizon's decision to recruit Yungblud for the song, Sykes told Loudwire: "There was an energy to where it felt heavy but then had some slight Britpop influences, which I hear in Yungblud's music."
• Growing up, Yunblud was a big fan of Bring Me The Horizon's music, so when Oli Sykes called him in LA and asked him to collaborate, he immediately hurried to their studio. Yungblud recalled to NME that when Sykes protested that they hadn't finished the song, he told him he'd "been waiting for this call my whole life, got into the studio, turned the mic on and just screamed for seven hours."
• The listeners of Annie Mac's BBC Radio 1 show voted this Hottest Record of the Year in 2020. "The combination of Yungblud's enthusiasm and energy, and Oli's experience and vision makes this track a perfect collaboration," said Mac.
• Yungblud surprised his fans during his August 10, 2021 gig at London's O2 Forum by bringing out Oli Sykes. The two delivered the debut performance of the track, earning a huge reaction from fans in attendance.