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Very helpful video! I'm making some synthwave-adjacent music and trying to figure out how else to tag it...

I agree totally with your list but think you missed Dead Can Dance ,first album is gothic classic

Twin tribes and midnight darkwave are great bands

Do instrumental artists like Perturbator, Carpenter Brut, and Dance with the Dead count as darkwave?

Another direct link between Punk and Goth is The Cure who were basically a Punk band in their "Killing An Arab" era. Also, The Stooges are from the 1960s and much more of a Proto-Punk band, along with the MC5 and Jonathan Richman.

You got good taste. Rosetta stone are superb.

What would you categorise Molchat Doma?

Dark wave is also characterized by goth crossing over with 90s alternative movements such as shoegaze or with other post punk variants like coldwave or no wave.

First, i loved this vid! Very informative and a great example of how to build a good scene with good intentions. Thank you all! Has there been a revisiting of this podcast? So much has changed with the attitude and approach with building a scene. In San Diego, the more prominent events are riddled with sex/drug trafficking, predatory/exploiting, cliques/favoritism, and a lack of amazing bands. There are also a lot of sabotaging and hypocrisy with putting out an image vs being about good music. If you ever revisit this subject, id love to join. I have a lot of testimonies from people who no longer participate in the scene and former employees of corrupt event promoters.

OMG my favorite band and album Medusa from Clan Of Xymox........she nailed it.

Not my usual genres, i grew up on rock and metal, some rap, but two bands i have been enjoying are She Past Away and DIonnysuss

1. Closer 2. Pornography 3. Elizium 4. Disintegration 5. In the flat field

There was a record album that came out in 1968 that sounded very different from the music that was out at the time. It had a dark ominous organ with heavy guitars and a vocalist with a spooky baritone. The album was a psychedelic rock piece by the band IRON BUTTERFLY and was titled HEAVY. The album art was blue and yellow featuring a butterfly made out of iron, a giant ear made out of stone on a lunar landscape with a starry night sky. The band was pictured performing on this planet around the giant ear. The songs were very commanding and heavy as molasses with titles like, "Possession", "Unconscious Power" & "fields of the Sun" I'm suggesting that this may be one of the first, if not the first, Gothic rock albums. Have you ever heard it? If not, look it up and listen to the songs I mentioned and tell me what you think.

This helps me explain to younger club goers why we didn’t have “genres” in the 80s other than New wave and Industrial and these terms we’re developing as new music was being released back then. I DJ underground 80s music and when I advertise I have ensure I’m labeling my gigs to the terms the younger gen understands. You made a super accurate comments here regarding Clan of Xymox. When their debut record was released in 1985, we didn’t even think what to call it; other than New Wave or a New Music Alternative. Even bands like Ministry were labeled “experimental” before the term industrial was realized. I expected to just swipe through this but it’s educated me and helps me connect the dots for my younger patrons. Thanks!

What do you think of the album 'Mandilion', by the gathering?

Thank you for your interesting Video. I think there is a lot to debate, but at least the love to music, that connects us, is the most important thing 🖤

Really good and compact introduction to the subject. Great work!

Can someone explain to me why deftones has such a cult following among goth heads? Can't put my finger on it?

I love the cure, Depeche mode, bauhaus and grew up listening to this genre of music. I'm also a horror fan with movies and books. I think music is a huge part of goth but it is also art and literature.

Interpol, The Horrors, The Dead Weather 🪐

The problem is that music evolves. So, bands add to the already meaty volume of gothic genres. We used to call it Ethereal.

Great fan play! Touché!

Oh my goth…again…I am ALL THREE of the people you are portraying! It’s like an unholy trinity of my life! It’s like looking in a mirror…if I had a reflection! It is like the gothic Id, Ego and Superego all having a smash down. I am really adoring this video.

Oh no, I have a skater dress like that and like the Killstar look. Will you take my goth card away? I became goth in my teens and I am in my 50s now. :) Those witch hats really protect my skin from the sun!

I can describe all that Bauhaus stuff. :) Had all those tapes and CDs. Even the hard to find imports.

I came into goth via beatnik poetry and gothic literature. The music was secondary until I discovered Bauhaus (and Sex Gang Children and a 100 other bands) in the 80s. So, I wonder if people would call beatniks goth because they have that vibe. I really have not found another goth with a beatnik foundation, but they wear black and berets and were anti-fashion. Goth started as anti-fashion…long formless black garments versus neon 80s tight fitting gear. Though now, I do adore Victorian goth and steampunk clothes and have worked at steampunk cons and gothic events for decades now. I feel the fashion was always in the backseat but I guess not anymore… :/

I LOVE MEDUSA!!!!!!!!!!!! Thank you.

😮😮😅

Where did you get your Siouxsie tee shirt 😍

Wonderful extrapolation on so many valid points; thanks,, Kelly

Fun Fact: Goth and Emo were originally subgenres of Punk, and punk was originally a subgenre of Rock music. It's rather obvious with Rock, Metal and Punk.

This discussion still exists? Gross. It was a 90ies thing, people dressed up in what they believed was Goth fashion and makeup and went to the clubs but didn't like Gothic music at all. They listened to pseudo-medieval, Metal, Futurepop and what later became Aggrotech or bands like HIM but didn't even care for what Gothic or Darkwave was. So Goth became a dying breed in its own clubs!

Recently, I've been getting into Darkwave/Coldwave. There's just something so appealing about the melodies in these songs.

Stooges, Stranglers Banshees , the Damned, Suicide are already Punk or proto-Punk with some "darker moments". Then comes "early Gothic" you know continuous work of the Banshees, darker stuff of the Damned, Joy Division... some of the Cures darker moments this is continued by the Positive Punk and Batcave Bands, y'now Specimen, Alien Sex Fiend, etc. .Sputhern Death Cult, Sex Gang Children, UK Decay. These senes are parallel with US Deathrock on the westcoast. Then come the Sisters of Mercy and Southern Death Cult becomes the Cult and the Mission and Fields of the Nephilim to follow. These bands are "Dark Rock", not really post-punk anymore. These Bands are followed by a host of imitators in the late 80ies early 90ies along with some bands mixing Dark Rock with electronic elements, Clan of Xymox kind of Stuff. This crossover trend somehow also inspires Goth Metal but the Gothic and Wave element becomes less and less and dark crossover bands evolve into Dark Alternative/Synthrock/Electronic Dark rock etc. Not Goth anymore apart of the occasional fashion-mistake (is Synthrock Darkwave? Apop or Cruxshadows or Birthday massacre could be...). You may notice i didn't mention Darkwave. Dark New Wave , apart from the occasional The Cure/Xymox/Sisters Song is largely NOT Goth. It can be darker/melancholic New Wave (cure), darker Synthpop (Visage), darker minimal Electronics/Coldwave, occasional darker more athmospherical industrial dance/post-industrial ( Early Skinny Puppy,,Das Ich and the likes evolved frommhere) but rarely heavy Goth Rock and never Gothic Punk/Deathrock. How people shoehorn Etherial/Heavenly voices Neoclassic or Neofolk into Darkwave actually is a riddle to me. Neofolk arguably comes from Post-Punk like military pop comes from Wave-pop and industrial but few people would call it goth, even if some Goths like to listen to such music. Goths also,often like EBM or New Wave Pop, doesnt't make these goth either. Neoclassic/Medieval wave/heavenly voices arguably comes from Dead can Dance, so it HAS some Goth DNA (Sopor Aeternus arguably is VERY Goth!), but so have Shoegazing and Dreampop (again Cure and Banshees!) And you would't call that Darkwave or Goth either.Arguably also Triphop has Goth/Darkwave influence ("Tripwave" used to be an actual thing with Bands like Switchblade Symphony or Whispers in the Shadow). Three things i mention: Gothic country (Woven Hand etc.) Which is obviously Country/americana with a Nick Cave/Neofolk/Joy Division twist And Gothabilly, which is basically Gothic Punk with rockabilly/Surf/Country/Garage influence and builds largely on the Cramps. Dark Cabaret should be mentioned. Often forgotten it is pretty goth as it builds up on the Cabaret/Artpunk Elements of Sex Gang Children and Virgin Prunes.

I'm a big fan Darkewave and especially a Massive fan of early 90s dark dance music. dark early 90s dance. Eg D.O.P LION, Moon child Variations on a theme (VAOT), Housepimp Take the hook, or Natural high Worp 69 (A track, I beleave is inspired by New order's Blue monday). the Asylum dance club (Dublin 1993-1994) and mixes by Dj Pressure for example. Is a good example of dark or you could define Gothic and somwhat 1980s horror inspired sounding electronic dance music.And listening to Darkwave, you can hear the Dark electronic mood that inspired dark 90s electronic music. R&S records is a good place to start if you like dark rave. Darkwave bands eg... She passed away, T21 and New order with 1980s Horror like electronic elements.

Goth is weird. Originally it was a small british thing and called "Gothic". It referred to the more dark and "bizarre" soundscapes of Joy Division and the Banshees, it wasn't a genre then. "Goth" was a term affiliated with some Sex Gang Children fans. Bands like Brigandage and Blood&Roses were dubbed "Positive Punk". The "Raincoat" scene were a style and a group of Bands too, including early the Cure. Then there was the Batcave scene with Bands like Specimen and Alien Sex Fiend. Later fashions were the "Cureheads" and the "Bonanzas". The Press threw all of this together in one big pot. And strangely suddenly it became synonymous with the Sisters of Mercy who had little to do with those scenes at all and even hated most of it. You won't come far with analyzing the term musically, those bands were ALL extremely different. That was half of the fun at the beginning, and too many Sisters-clones and bands drifting away into Metal and post-industrial was what killed it. Eventually Goth became associated only wirh certain fashions and ways to style and dress...

Genres have different Connotations in every country, or even region! Deathrock was mostly a californian term, Germany had "Depro-Punk", the UK "Positive-Punk" "Batcave" and "Gothic". I always thought "Darkwave" was mostly a german term too... other obscure terms were "Doom and Gloom", "Doom-wave", "Doom punk", "Suicide-Punk", "Scare-Punk" "Depro-pop", "Dark Romantic", "Coldwave" (mostly a french thing). It's kind of weird to make any sense of all these today. I always took "Darkwave" just as "Dark New Wave" stuff, New Wave already being a very broad term. It could be pretty much anything from Visage to the Cure to Depeche Mode Anne Clark or Tuxedomoon. And possibly even Bauhaus, Siouxsie, Jou Division or X-mal depending on who you ask!

Is goth-curious a thing?

I might have missed it but your not mentioning industrial music in your expose. the way i personally see things is "early 80s synth pop" evolved into a harsher and less melodic sound through the 80's, especially in the club scene. Xymox were very much in between the two tendancies (melodic and emphasis on drum machines). I would even consider mid 80's depeche mode to be an industrial-pop crossover as well, for example. The roots of darkwave seem to me very hard to pinpoint though it s clear it s rooted in that time period. When techno/house came in the late 80s , it more or less killed the "dark and moody" trend. Technology was evolving fast around that time thanks to (or because of!!!) computers. and there was still a race between bands for being at the avant-garde of technology. In that context in the 90s, Xymox as a band was very much in limbo. They had a spectacular re-birth in the late 90s focusing on what they did the best (probably the album "medusa") and emulating it , nearly as a nostalgia band. Darkwave is a relatively new term to classify a music that have developped a lot in the last 15 years with the revival of postpunk/goth. I consider it very much as a revival genre, kind of taking back the story in the mid 80s and imagining how the music would have evolved, maybe in a more organic way, focusing more on the mood of the music than the technology ( the only rule of the genre would be to have a good dose of synth and electronic drums). That s why the genre is quite diverse as every band have their own influences. That s the way i see things anyway. Modern in sound, but quite nostalgic in feel.

#CadaverKelly . I have experience Toronto Goth since 1989, when our Goth scene started in 1989. I am one of original Goth subculture in Toronto, my fashion Victorian Goth, when our Toronto Goth scene started there wasn't social media for us at, I was listen Post Punk, Goth Rock, Dark Wave, Cold Wave, Ethereal Wave, Industrial before I came a part of Goth subculture, it was early 80s, I am history of Goth subculture. Thank you to share this with me.

We played a few times with Faith and the Muse (around the time of touring with Eva O and opening for Rozz). Good times

This video is kinda useless w/ no samples.

54yr old 🇬🇧 female here. Fave all era band Sisters of Mercy, LP Floodland. ❤️🖤❤️🖤👍👍👍

Yes! CoX the best <3

I really love your videos. I found your channel a few days ago and you've help me a lot. I realized I started liking goth 2 months ago, but I'm pretty scared of in fact being called a poseur for not knowing everything. I do want to learn and I'm genuinely interested on listening to more music and knowing about the history of the subculture. I'm still scared of calling myself a baby bat tho.

Mareux took darkwave on the next level. Mareux - killer is the best darkwave music i have ever listened too. I feel in love with darkwave and i think the future is very bright and interesting with new artists. I predict darkwave will take over soon.

I created Dubstep back in the 1980s. It came out of Synthwave. But, I am not remembered because my band at the time was not known enough do to many factors at that time.

So where does one go to be properly educated about the Goth subculture? I want my daughter and my assimilation to be as smooth as possible.

and what would Drab Majesty be then? Maybe just synthpop?

How can you talk about darkwave and not mention Faith and the Muse or Strange Boutique