This is the first comprehensive history of goth music and culture. Across more than 500 pages, John Robb explores the origins and legacy of this enduring scene, drawing on his own experience and interviews with a host of bands, from Siouxsie and the Banshees and The Cure to Throbbing Gristle and Lydia Lunch.
Introduction 1 Floorshow: a night out at the heart of 1980s goth 2 The fall of Rome 3 Deep in the forest: Europe’s Gothic history 4 'Mad, bad and dangerous to know': the Romantics and the Gothic imagination 5 Euro visions 6 The devil has the best tunes 7 Paint it black: the dark heart of the psychedelic sixties 8 All the children are insane, or people are strange: the (un)holy trinity: The Doors/Velvets/Stooges 9 Wham bam thank you glam: the dark side of glam rock 10 Proto post-punk 11 The punk wars 12 'What was once unhealthily fresh is now a clean old hat': post-punk to a very Public Image 13 Spellbound: Siouxsie and the Banshees 14 Feel the pain: The Damned 15 Ridicule is nothing to be scared of: Adam Ant 16 New dawn fades: Manchester and Joy Division 17 'The wreckers of western civilisation...': industrial music 18 'I must fight this sickness... find a cure': The Cure 19 The naughty north and the sexy south 20 All we ever wanted was everything: Bauhaus 21 Lord of chaos: a dark and beautiful playground: Killing Joke 22 Release the bats! Nick Cave 23 'I am not avant-garde I am a deserter': Blixa Bargeld, Einstürzende Neubauten and the reinvention of Berlin 24 Voodoo idols: the ballad of Lux and Ivy 25 First, last and always: how post-punk Leeds created goth and The Sisters of Mercy 26 Vagabonds Bradford: New Model Army and Joolz 27 Flowers in the forest: Southern Death Cult 28 Wanted dead or alive: how Liverpool opened the doors to a new (North) West Coast sound 29 Do you believe in the westworld? Theatre of Hate 30 A new form of beauty: Virgin Prunes, Dublin: how Lypton Village changed a nation 31 'Good poetry can still resonate louder than a thousand guns': Rammstein for grown-ups: Laibach 32 At the gates of silent memory: Field of the Nephilim 33 Darklands: how the dark energy infected indie 34 'We sing to the gods to be free': American Gothic and the dark art of the American dream 35 Trans Europe Express 36 In the flat field, suburbs and satellite towns: the second coming of goth 37 Apocalypse now! Goth's end days Index
This is the first comprehensive history of goth music and culture. Across more than 500 pages, John Robb explores the origins and legacy of this enduring scene, drawing on his own experience and interviews with a host of bands, from Siouxsie and the Banshees and The Cure to Throbbing Gristle and Lydia Lunch.
This is the first comprehensive history of goth music and culture. Across more than 500 pages, John Robb explores the origins and legacy of this enduring scene, which has its roots in the post-punk era.
Drawing on his own experience as a musician and journalist, Robb covers the style, the music and the clubs that spawned the culture, alongside political and social conditions. He also reaches back further to key historic events and movements that frame the ideas of goth, from the fall of Rome to Lord Byron and the romantic poets, European folk tales, Gothic art and the occult. Finally, he considers the current mainstream goth of Instagram influencers, film, literature and music.
The Art of Darkness features interviews with Siouxsie and the Banshees, The Cure, The Damned, Nick Cave, Southern Death Cult, Einstürzende Neubauten, Bauhaus, Killing Joke, Throbbing Gristle, Danielle Dax, Lydia Lunch and many more. It offers a first-hand account of being there at the gigs and clubs that made the scene happen.
John Robb is a journalist, broadcaster and musician. He is the author of Punk Rock: An Oral History (2006) and the founder of culture website louderthanwar.com. He plays bass in the post-punk band The Membranes.
