Godflesh, Jesu, and Phoebe Bridgers Mark a Strong Year for Post-Metal

The great Jon Wurster (The Mountain Goats, The Bob Mould Band, Superchunk, The Best Show with Tom Scharpling) is a prolific drummer and one of the funniest people on earth. One of my favorite Wursterisms™ is that he utilizes the hashtag #rocknrollweirdness on Instagram when posting images of incongruous moments in rock n’ roll. Whether it’s a picture of The Who holding their Who Are You release party on the Hollywood set of the TV show Battlestar Galactica , Oasis hanging with Wesley Willis, or Motörhead drummer Philthy Animal Taylor and W.A.S.P. guitarist Chris Holmes having ice cream on a nice day, Wurster is a master curator of singular images of #rocknrollweirdness.

It’s rare for an instance of #rocknrollweirdness to land so profoundly with me that it gives me the energy to take finger-to-keyboard for the first time in years. Yet it recently came to my attention that master of heviosity Justin K. Broadrick was recently tapped by mainstream indie icon Phoebe Bridgers to play guitar on two tracks of her August 14, 2026 release Lost Weekend. Justin performs on track #5, “Bobby,” as well as on the ‘hidden’ track “Best Dressed” (track D17 on the vinyl and Track 00 on CD). Broadrick is involved with many different personal projects, each with their own particular signature sonic qualities, so it is important to note that he performs on these tracks under his Jesu moniker. And although I find his contributions to be buried under too many layers of over-production, the Broadrick aficionado can immediately recognize Jesu’s signature guitar sound in the first 15-seconds of “Bobby.” Lost Weekend was the Number 1 album in the UK and debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200. This is almost definitely the first time Justin has been that high in the charts.

But there was more! Phoebe Bridgers then released “On Video,” her song from the new A24 film Primetime . You can listen to it below. Oh and guess what? Justin Broadrick played bass and guitar on that song. As you probably know by now, Phoebe is also in the movie, and has been playing the song on tour.

These aren’t the first instances that Justin and Phoebe’s careers have intersected. Back in 2021, again under the Jesu moniker, Justin remixed Phoebe’s Boygenius bandmate Julien Baker’s track “Favor.” Justin not only executed the remix, but he also played guitars on the track which also features Phoebe Bridgers (and Lucy Dacus) on backing vocals. Check that track out below.

In other Justin K. Broadrick news, we’ve had a few months to let it sink in that the mighty Godflesh has retired from touring due to ongoing health issues plaguing Justin. The good news is that prior to his tour-ending surgery, Justin and Benny had an entire new Godflesh album pretty much already in the can. The album, entitled Decay , dropped on September 25 via Relapse Records and is available in all the formats, including vinyl in all kinds of colors and patterns.

> 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.

You can listen to “Living/Ending” below and do some heavy duty ordering of the vinyl .

I interviewed Justin back in 2014 and would love to interview him again someday to discuss all of his projects BUT Godflesh. Until that happens, both Guitar World and The Guardian have published very good interviews with him that do a great job bringing fans up to speed with the current state of Justin’s world.

See also: it’s been a great year for post-metal .

_Originally reported by [Brooklyn Vegan](https://www.brooklynvegan.com/new-godflesh-jesu-with-phoebe-too/)._