By: Asherra

For today’s generation, Goth is, was, and always will be something that has existed. For us it’s a way of life, a means for kids who are segregated from traditional society to become part of a larger and accepting group. They wear black, look dreary, and are into weird and satirical humor that involves dark references juxtaposed with tacos. Comics about little dead girls and homicidal maniacs were the required reading in school and television shows about horribly misguided invaders from other planets acted as our teachers. Everyone in this generation can quote ‘The Nightmare Before Christmas’ and a viewing of ‘Edward Scissorhands’ is sacred. Tim Burton is their Savior. They are a weird conglomerate of freakish teens and young adults who never outgrew Halloween as a kid and spend too much money on Wet ‘N’ Wild black eyeliner. They are united by their eclectic music choice, enjoying bands like VNV Nation, Covenant, and K.M.F.D.M.

I am part of this generation. Growing up, I never questioned where Goth came from or what its motives in society were. I just knew that I was different from the mainstream and that somehow, with this group, I fit in. It wasn’t until I had graduated from high school and fell in with my current crowd of friends that I found the history of this culture into which I had been adopted.

I remember exactly when my eyes were opened. We were driving up to Club Blue in Los Angeles for a club called ‘Stigmata’. It was one of the only 18+ Goth clubs that we knew of within driving distance of San Diego. A few of my older friends had tagged along and one of them announced that he was going to put in his freshly made ‘old school goth mix’ for our gleeful listening pleasure. He began to rattle off some of the bands that were on the CD and to my surprise, one of the bands was the Cure.

Now, hindsight being 20/20 I realize what a crime my subsequent actions were against the Goth community, however in my young naiveté I did not realize that the Cure was a Goth band. In my head, the Cure was one of those bands that Punk kids would display the insignia of on their jean jackets along with the Dead Kennedy’s and the Misfits. I had associated it with the Punk scene and thusly it was NOT Goth. I expressed this view point to my companions and was immediately greeted with a raucous round of “What the fuck?!?” “What the hell are you smoking?!” and “Get out of my car this instant you BLASPHEME!” It was at that point I realized I had obviously missed something.

Um… teacher…. question…. Where in the large repertoire of music that was spun at a Goth club did bands like the Cure fit in?

A relatively short history of Goth:

The First Generation

Goth began as an offshoot in the late 1970’s from the newly formed Punk genre. Instead of directing their anger outward, infantile ‘Goth’ bands directed it inward. To quote Voltaire “Instead of being angry that they live in a sad world, Goths are sad that they live in an angry world.” Proto-Goth bands like Joy Division and Souxsie & the Banshees were similar in musical style to Punk bands of the era however with more dark and dramatic lyrics. The opening of the Batcave in London gave the early Goth scene its first stomping ground (hehe.. I made a funny, stomping ground… get it?) With the integration of synthesizers and drum machines into the common musical repertoire, Goth music took on a life…er…un-life of its own.

The Second Generation

By the mid ‘80’s it was clear that Goth had become its own independent grouping. Bands mutated and changed styles. However, the one consistent thread was their gloomy nature. The gothic sound melded with New Romantic and early Industrial styles from artists like Depech Mode and Skinny Puppy, incorporating them into what would become the archetypal gothic style. Aesthetically, goth artists leaned more toward the vintage and Victorian styles as a rebellion from the progressive styles of the ‘80’s. In a way, this was a re-resurgence of the ‘gothic literature’ movement from the late 1800’s. However instead of literature, artists were using lyrics. There was an obvious connection to the ‘spooky’ and the link between horror and vampire films and the Goth scene was realized with the 1983 vampire movie “The Hunger” Staring David Bowie with a soundtrack by Bauhaus.

The Third Generation

Fast forward to the present. In order to keep up with the new dance club genre of night clubs, the Goth dance music has co-evolved with the industrial movement creating new sounds of Synthpop and EBM (Electro Body Music). Both styles have a futuristic and harsh mix of techno with New Romantic style lyrics (appropriately dark and spooky lyrics, of course). We in the third generation have taken from the many eclectic groups of the past subculture scenes and created the lifestyle that we now regard as Goth.