Electronic meets Industrial Metal
Godflesh, a two-man industrial metal band from Birmingham, UK, released their newest album “Decay” on September 25, 2026. A total of six songs, each around five to ten minutes. Their melodies and riffs have a similar feeling to Deftones and Metallica, with their aggressive tunes and consistent riffs throughout their songs. There are minimal lyrics to their songs, but Godflesh keeps their music wild but simple with repetitive riffs and hints of electronic synths. For the metalheads out there, give this album a listen and experience a modern trip of hard industrial electronic metal.
“Master and Slave” is the first featured song off the album that introduces the listener to a plethora of musical and instrumental choices. Electronic synths build up to the climax of the song, then turn it into an eerie and sinister environment. The tempo remains the same throughout the song, but there are smaller hidden changes that make the song diverse. The bass tuned down gives it a second act; the key changed halfway through the song immerses the listener into a different vibration with subtle hints of static noise coming from each end of the speaker.
“Living/Ending”, this song was more aggressive and harder than the previous featured song, with vocals that are in a distorted screamo range. This continues on for the remainder of the song; nothing too extreme stands out except the repetitive screamo lyrics, which are difficult to make out.
“Feral Colony”, the third featured song with a combination of minimal EDM and metal. There were synth drum beats that merged with the following instruments in the background: electric guitar and electric bass. It stays to simple instruments, but when played together, Godflesh creates an original subcategorized version of their own metal. Although they capture authentic metal music and have been since 1988, the lyrics in this song become unrecognizable and get drowned out by the boosted bass and heavy synth drums.
While halfway through the album, the impression they give is a combination of “Metallica” and “Deftones”. “Metallica” for their repetitive screaming guitar riffs and “Deftones” for their whiny, heavily influenced bass rhythms and lingering vocals in the background. “Fear of Man”, is the fourth featured song that gave the impression of the two bands combined into one. Once you believe the song is going to continue the same throughout it is when the same grainy guitar riffs pick back up again.
The fifth song, “Fodder”, is interesting with its choice of drums. They become more vigorous as each second goes by, even from the beginning of the song, sounding like someone banging on a door constantly. What I’ve noticed throughout this whole album is the fact that there are repetitive riffs in almost every song. This could be a stylistic choice, but it becomes dull very fast. What caught my attention quickly in this song are the background guitar tunes sounding like wind blowing right into your ears.
The last song, “Consume Me,” was gripping from the beginning with stray sounds that didn’t have a consistent melody, but became extremely creative with the absent layout of a chorus, verse and bridge. The song did feel dragged at a certain point when there were questionable acts of noise for a solid five minutes.
Overall, Godflesh was able to draw in niche audiences with their experimental noise music. With different guitar and bass riffs that sound almost unidentifiable, along with their lyrics, “Decay” seems to be an acquired taste to those in the metal industry and in the music-loving world as a whole. If you’re looking for a different vibe from your original cycle of music, try this one out.
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