Good morning and welcome to The Blogging Goth! I’m currently at BBC Newcastle, in between interviews about a new study highlighting elevated numbers of depression amongst 14-18 year olds identifying as Goth.
I’ll be publishing a proper response later today, in the meantime please follow my Twitter for real-time updates!
Days ahead of the eight year anniversary of the murder of Sophie Lancaster, her mother is repeating her plea for the law to classify subculture crimes as an official strand of hate crime.
Sylvia Lancaster – whose daughter was murdered in 2007 for dressing ‘like a goth’ – is expected to make her appeal during a talk at The University of Manchester on 20th August, 2015.
The Sophie Lancaster Foundation Talk – to be held at The John Rylands Library – will give Sylvia’s personal perspective on Sophie’s murder, the trial and the work of the Foundation which was set up in her daughter’s memory to stamp out hate crimes.
In 2013, Greater Manchester Police began recording attacks on members of subcultures including goths and emos, as hate crimes. They were the first force in the UK to treat the offences in this way. Previously hate crimes were only registered for offences against race, religion, disability, sexual orientation or transgender identity.
In 2014 Sylvia was appointed an OBE for her tireless campaigning – she said her battle against ignorance will continue:
“I am proud of the work we have done over the last eight years raising awareness of the damage hate crime does to our communities.
“I am aware that there is so much more to do and take this opportunity to call upon other police authorities to follow Greater Manchester Police and the seven other forces in adding the strand of ‘Alternative Subcultures’ to their monitored hate crime categories. My aim is to have all alternatives protected under this legislation.”
The talk, which takes place between 5pm and 7pm, is part of the free Darkness and Light: Exploring the Gothic exhibition currently running at The John Rylands Library until 20th December, which celebrates diversity and invites visitors to explore what Gothic means to them.
The John Rylands Library – cited as one of the finest examples of Neo-Gothic architecture in Europe – is displaying Gothic treasures from the Library’s Special Collections. Literary gems of interest to the darkly-inclined include a first edition of the Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson, and a first edition of the 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole – widely regarded as the first novel of ‘Gothic literature’.
The exhibition explores the role of women in the Gothic movement, advances in medical science and classic literature and showcases a gallery of photographic portraits of Goths from the contemporary subculture.
It also reveals how Gothic architecture and anatomy inspired and influenced a literary genre and left a lasting legacy which can be found in art and films.
Sylvia added: “This exciting exhibition that explores the Gothic culture is so relevant to our work at the Sophie Lancaster Foundation as, like us, it celebrates the creativity of ‘difference’ whilst educating people.
The fact that there are sessions for children and young people is so positive and I am delighted to be a part of this here in the heart of Manchester.”
Places are limited for this event but members of the public who wish to book a place can do so through the number 0161 306 0555.
You can read a fantastic history of black lipstick here, that addresses its origins from Pharaoh’s Egypt through Maori culture and Hollywood’s genesis, to the early Punk and Goth scenes where it gained a foothold as a staple of appearance for alternative culture. Kudos to Broadly, a woman-focused division of the sprawling VICE media empire for an interesting and informative article.
What really chimed with me, and inspired this article, was writer Arabelle Sicardi’s closing statements on the appropriation of alternative fashion by the mainstream, repurposing it to serve as some bizarre ‘rebellious’ look.
“That’s the thing with alternative identities: they get adopted and made into something entirely different. Culture eats culture and spits it back out, an undying monster.”
A monster indeed; it allowed me to finally addressing the rising black-tinged tide of news about the Kardashians and their ‘Goth look’ that has been seeping into my inbox. The sentiment, the ideal goal, has always been not to judge people on their appearance, considering how many times such assumptions are inflicted upon us.
However, it is hard to see the ‘socialite’ Kardashian family as doing anything more than holidaying in another culture. Such things occur of course, and we’ve stopped reporting on how – as the seasons turn colder again – fashion ransacks our wardrobes and repurposes all our unfashionable clothes as suddenly haute couture.
It’s that this suddenly renders our look and lifestyle somehow acceptable to trash media, consumed by people who normally hurl insults and even violence at us in the street for the way we look. The irony and insincerity is palpable and offensive.
So, thanks for the informative article, Broadly. And thanks for ending on a corny, dismissive note. Don’t forget, we seem to be the source of new ideas for when mainstream fashion has finished eating its own tail, again and again and again.
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Several articles, interviews and videos have recently appeared around PRAYERS, a duo in San Diego that fuse the diametrically opposed sounds of early Goth and cholo gang culture.
Singer Leafar Seyer cites influences like Joy Division, has handpainted images of David Bowie and Aleister Crowley on the wall, and wears black nail-varnish and customised leather biker jackets.
He’s also fiercely proud of his heritage and his continuing membership in the Sherman Grant Hill Park 27 gang, his entire body tattooed with blood and gang ties. Watch their latest release, an incongruous cover of the Pet Shop Boy’s ‘West End Girls’ and see how proud and aggressive gang culture is mingling with the brooding melancholia of alternative music. This is Cholo Goth.
It’s a mashup even more difficult for the UK Goth community to envisage. Britain simply doesn’t have gang culture on the same level as the US, and what examples we do have are fiercely isolated from even mainstream culture, let alone any of the alternative groups.
Seyer cites legendary LA deathrockers Christian Death as another major influence, one which is visible throughout his work. This is a prime example of how US alternative culture has headed in a similar but notably different direction to the UK.
Whilst we had bands like Siouxsie and the Banshees, Joy Division and UK Decay arise from the ashes of Punk, America conjured up Deathrock, with bands like The Flesh Eaters, Gun Club and Rozz Williams’s Christian Death.
They created music tinged with horror, dark pop culture and religious influences that owed more to American Southwest voodoo than central European reformation Christianity. Their nearest UK equivalents were the original Batcave bands like Specimen and Alien Sex Fiend, embracing tongue-in-cheek horror-movie schlock rather than the ponderous, dirge-like rock of British second-wave Goth bands like The Sisters of Mercy.
Generations of subsequent bands in England would be influenced by Eldritch, but it’s clear that Rozz Williams is one of the guiding lights to PRAYERS music. Once again, America is taking Goth music in a startling new direction – embracing much of the established aesthetics but also encompassing new aspects like the tight-knit, familial bonds of gang and chicano culture.
Personal preference will count for much, but should they continue to ascend and build popularity, PRAYERS – handpicked by Ian Astbury to open for The Cult last year – could signal a major shift for American Goth culture.
All images taken from the PRAYERS facebook page, with thanks.
A few news organisations have run with the story that Belfast City Hall will reopen its doors, permitting the public to tour parts of the building on a weekend, after a ten year ‘blockade’ enforced by Goths.
Well possibly. In reality, nobody can remember exactly why the decision was made a decade ago, but the Councillor who has reversed the decision dredged up this gem;
“They [the goths] apparently behaved in a unruly fashion one day and thereafter the front door was closed…”
“I was told that they’d invaded and some had come in on skateboards, which may or may not be the case because I’m told skateboarders and goths don’t really mix.”
Well, quite. Unfortunately this scenario does seem likely; many city centres have a location where the disparate alternative tribes congregate – in my experience, it was the Corn Exchange in Leeds and Queens Gardens in Kingston-upon-Hull.
Bored teenagers with nothing better to do might well wander into a public building and, being teenagers, cause havoc. This is universal regardless of subcultural affiliation! Friends of The Blogging Goth living in Belfast have expressed surprise at the news however, as they were under the impression there were only four Goths in the whole city, and none of them bothered hanging around City Hall anymore.
We’re pleased to hear the decision to bar the doors against the barbarian invaders has been reversed, and we urge any of the alternatives tribes in the area not to endanger this fragile peace with the custodians of City Hall.
The Blogging Goth 