Influential British industrial metal outfit Godflesh have announced “Decay” as their tenth studio album. That effort will be arriving on September 25th via Relapse and is set to serve as the band’s penultimate studio album. This tenth studio outing overall emerges after vocalist/guitarist/programmer Justin Broadrick announced the band’s retirement from touring earlier this year. That decision was forced upon him in the wake of abdominal surgery.
Broadrick newly stated of the record and its ties to its 2023 predecessor “Purge“.
“‘Decay‘ was born from the same sessions as ‘Purge‘. It was one huge pool of songs. I picked what I felt was appropriate for what I wanted to achieve with ‘Purge‘, with the intention of releasing the songs that didn’t fit as a new album within a year of ‘Purge‘ being released. Unfortunately, two years passed whilst considering external labels, so that I didn’t have to self-release Godflesh anymore, but it took an awful lot of time to establish a comfortable home for me. The recordings were done, but as usual for me, I did change a lot of stuff once I came back to it.”
Broadrick further went on to say:
“Fortunately, all of the recordings for ‘Decay‘ were completed long before the surgery, vocals included… although the back end of a couple of songs were recorded with the hernia itself, and that was a struggle. I was already aware that the Godflesh shout, so to speak, was exacerbating the hernia greatly, as was every Godflesh performance in the lead-up to the surgery once the hernia appeared, and the hernia was mostly caused by year upon year of shouting in Godflesh. The album was mixed post-surgery, and while I was still in some pain and considerable discomfort, but fortunately Godflesh is generally me expressing my pain, albeit [usually] mental, philosophical and existential, whereas this was physical pain.”
Broadrick also reflected on the upcoming finality of this release and the one final studio outing that he previously indicated will follow it. Speaking of having Godflesh as a creative outlet, he went on to say:
“It expresses my pain, and I’ve put my body and soul into this expression for the majority of my existence. I feel quite lucky, because Godflesh is now physically impossible for me, rendering it useless. I now wish to move out of its constraints, move on creatively with heavy/ugly music to new ground.”
“Decay track listing:
01 – “Master And Slave“
02 – “Living/Ending“
03 – “Feral Colony“
04 – “Fear Of Man“
05 – “Fodder“
06 – “Consume Me“
Pre-orders are available via orcd.co/godflesh. Below you can check out the stream of the record’s first single, “Living/Ending“. Speaking earlier this year of what still awaits Godflesh outside of “Decay“, Broadrick stated:
“I’ve had the final GODFLESH studio album written, for almost a year and half now, that will
be recorded and completed late 2026.After that there will continue to be GODFLESH dub albums, live albums, and so on,
but no new studio releases nor performances.In the near future, a new solo project will emerge, further exploring the parameters
of heavy/ugly music, featuring my guitars and electronics, and of course vocals, but
NOT shouted vocals!”
