It’s not often that a relatively new US project takes the
financial hit of a self-organised European tour, but Detroit-based grunge-goth
duo VAZUM are not your typical darkscene act. Not only innovating musically with
their unique take on the gothic aesthetic they have named “deathgaze”, the band
had also thoughtfully released a ‘greatest hits’ album V- which collated
their best songs in a re-recorded stripped-down style which more faithfully
represents their live sound. Their UK shows had been due to commence the night
before in Glasgow, but major electrical supply issues had resulted in a late cancellation,
meaning that the Edinburgh gig at the legendary Bannerman’s bar last night was
their European debut, and the pair had put together an interesting bill which
included two other bands who (whilst also genre-defying) would be of interest to fans
of guitar-based goth.
Vazum on the Bannerman's stage
Midlothian quartet Voodoo Twins were fresh from a recent
well-received support slot to much-loved tribute band Lizzie and the Banshees, and
their high-tempo new wave sound got proceedings off to an energetic start. With
twin frontmen Jim Threat and Daz Voodoo alternating vocals, they ripped through
songs from last year’s EP and its soon-to-be-recorded follow-up in a well-paced
set. The band describe themselves as post-punk electronica, but their live
sound seemed more anchored in the sweaty yet cultured sound of 1978 (Jam,
Stranglers etc), meaning that they are more likely to receive an invitation to
play Rebellion punk festival than Wave Gotik Treffen.
Voodoo Twins
One band who can effortlessly bestride those two events are the
ubiquitous Twisted Nerve, with the eighties stalwarts back on home ground and
confounding any attempt to pigeonhole their sound. Original bassplayer Norbert
Bassbin can still rock the leather strides and studded belt after 45 years of pounding
out the punky bassline to traditional encore 5 Minutes of Fame, whilst
charismatic frontman Craig Paterson’s initial gothic phase in the band in early/mid
80’s is represented by the classics Medusa, Twisted Nervosis and Séance,
the title track from their seminal 1984 EP which still changes hands for well
over £50 despite a recent (and sold out) blue vinyl re-release, such is its
mythical status amongst worldwide aficionados of the genre.
Norbert
The band also blend
in more recent compositions such as Magik of Trance and Lost Souls,
both of which have an early The Cult goth’n’roll feel and give imaginatively-nicknamed
guitarist “Dunsy” Dunsmore the chance to demonstrate his six-string skills.
Drummer Dave Grave’s starring role in Air-Krasha provides another
example of why Twisted Nerve remain a popular, enjoyable and dynamic staple of
the live gothic scene, with further gigs within the next six weeks supporting
The Doctors of Madness, 1919 and Ghost Dance lined up, as well as a slot at the
Dia de Los Muertos festival in LA at Halloween.
Craig
Headliners VAZUM provide an altogether different live
experience, reaching deeper into the dark soul in a performance of songs
drenched in dramatic tension. Zach Pliska’s love of Smashing Pumpkins is
obvious from the first bludgeoning chords effortlessly coaxed from his guitar
as the duo launch into a coruscating version of Angel, with Emily Sturm’s
strong yet vulnerable vocal the perfect counterpoint to Zach’s more spoken
delivery.
Emily
Zach
For all their horror punk visuals and bludgeoning sound, VAZUM are
charm personified between songs, with Emily’s (dreadful Detroit goth pun ahoy)
sassy chat in particular entertaining the several dozen punters who have braved
the day’s persistent rain for a midweek gig. After sarcastically commenting on
a two very inebriated young attendees whose attempts at dancing invariably ended
in collapse (“those girls need another drink”), she invited the audience to
come out with a name for the band’s drum machine, eventually settling on the
stereotypically Scottish “Jimmy”. After second song and recent single Blush’s
melodic harmonies, Sturm warned the crowd that it would be noise all the way thereafter,
a prophecy which bass-heavy versions of current single Breach and predecessors
Thief and Nightshade soon proved to be true. With further songs
from the forthcoming album Western Violence (including the title track) also
showcased, VAZUM again demonstrated their talent for powerful, angular, grungy
gothic rock, played with an intensity and volume that fellow Detroit legends MC5
and The Stooges would surely approve of. After a well-deserved and somewhat
more subtle encore, VAZUM’s warmly-received European debut came to an all-too-brief
end, with further (and somewhat distant) tour stops in Exeter, Vannes
and Lyon planned. Catch them if you can!
It’s hard to believe that with the unveiling of Trickery
on Metropolis Records this week, Sweden’s gothic darkwave maestros Then Comes
Silence have now released seven albums, gradually rising to the forefront of
the current scene as their reputation and their following increase with each
successive LP.
Many of the bands on the original positive punk scene – Joy
Division, Bauhaus, The Sisters of Mercy and Fields of the Nephilim to name but
four – never made it anywhere near as far as seven albums in terms of studio releases, and
those who did – Siouxsie and The Banshees (Tinderbox, 1986), The Cure (Kiss
Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me, 1987) or Killing Joke (Outside The Gate,
1988), for example – were not only clearly past their creative best by that
point, but had enjoyed some of the trappings of success, along with Top 20
hits, Top 10 albums, sell-out tours, magazine front covers and critical
recognition, which encouraged them to continue the struggle and reach that landmark.
All of which makes the uniformly high standard of Then Comes
Silence’s output - and Trickery
is no exception – all the more remarkable, as founder member Alex Svenson has
coped stoically with multiple line-up changes and the continued relative
indifference of the wider music industry and community, whilst devoting over a decade to developing the
project to the very highest of standards, both as a live act and (visually and
musically) in their recorded output.
Over the past twelve years, Then Comes Silence’s sonic
palette has gradually become more refined, whilst the key elements remain:
solid but varied guitar work containing elements of dark psych, Svenson’s own
lugubrious croon, powerful drumming and a commitment to excellence in all they
undertake.
After a pair of monochromatic self-titled releases creating
their distinctive sound, Then Comes Silence really came to prominence with
2015’s Nyctophilian, the first to feature current sticksman Jonas
Fransson, whilst 2017’s Blood is regarded by many commentators as the
peak of their purely gothic output, and was the first toured by guitarist Hugo
Zombie on his arrival in the band the following year. 2020’s Machine and
2022’s Hunger saw the band adding a more subtle veneer to their sound
across a broad range of styles, with power and dark melody always the
watchwords, and with the core of the band remaining the same despite the
departure of second guitarist Mattias Ruejas Jonson, Trickery continues
in the same vein, a factor emphasised in the album’s cover, the purple
background not too many shades from its predecessor.
Sonically, the album commences with a couple of typical TCS
belters, the full-on Ride Or Die (with its chorus nod to the melody of [Ghost]
Riders in the Sky) and the more commercial Like A Hammer (with very
obvious lyrical steals from the band’s own back catalogue, the sign of a
project comfortable in its own skin), with the Swedes’ instantly recognisable
sound containing many of the elements which made their previous records such
critical successes.
Already hinted at in the opening track, Svenson’s recent
obsession with the analogue synthesiser sound of the Futurist movement of the
early 1980’s (as showcased on his recent solo project Neonpocalypse) is added
to the opening section of Feel The Cold, which broadens out into a more
traditional guitar-based chorus, whilst the experimental side cranks up on the
eerie and discordant opening to the goth’n’roll stomp of Tears and Cries,
which likes tracks on previous albums benefits from a female co-vocal, on this
occasion provided by Emma Nylen of Emmon.
Zombie’s grungy guitar prelude to the up-tempo
Ramones-influenced pop-punk thrash Stay Strange (with current scene
figurehead Dusty Gannon of Vision Video adding additional vocals) introduces
the album’s third phase, and the one most likely to appeal to fans of the
band’s middle period, with the dark psych quotient dialled up significantly on
the magnificent Stiffs. Fransson’s energetic drumming, the spooky
keyboard drones, and the powerful guitar of Bright Eye, maintain the
dark punk feel, with hints of the spectre of a more subtly melodic Killing Joke
permeating through the song.
The Masquerade sees a further shift change, with the
emphasis on a creeping, more dancefloor friendly backbeat, a softer vocal and
the return of the starker synth sounds, and is perhaps the album’s darkest
moment (“There’s no escape..”) whilst Never Change finds Svensson in a
more positive, reflective and unapologetically defiant mood (“We really haven’t changed much, we’re never
gonna change…The light burns bright”), with Zombie’s bouncier riffs matching
the lyric’s uplifting atmosphere. The Blink 182-style blitzkrieg is back for Dead
Friend, which at under two minutes is more reminiscent of the shorter,
punkier sketches on the band’s earliest albums and Zombie’s work with his
previous band, Los Carniceros del Norte.
However, the more cinematic soundscapes of the band’s more recent releases
are back for the album’s more epic pair of closing tracks, the classy dark pop
(think The The) of Runners followed by the slow-building finale Ghost
House which leaves the album on a more hauntingly melancholic note
(“abandoned heart, abandoned soul, abandoned love”).
Trickery stands as a monument to the current gothic
darkwave scene, the sound of a proud band continuing to soldier on together
with their loyal band of followers through the adversity of fate whilst
maintaining a strong belief in the beauty of the dark soul. With this seventh
album, Then Come Silence seem to have nobly accepted that (although hope dies
last…) they will probably never achieve anything like the sales or play to the
size of audiences that their 1980’s predecessors enjoyed, despite the sheer
quality of their ever-growing sequence of excellent albums and the ringing
endorsements of all who have heard their output, but are honourably content to
keep developing their sound for themselves, their fans, and their art.
Aaahh,
the 90’s, the glorious decade when goth finally dared speak its name, but withdrew into
(appropriately) the underworld as the mainstream (and many fans) moved on to
the various delights of the rave, grunge and industrial scenes amongst others.
A decade of fanzine culture, club nights, and a shift in focus from the UK and
California to a more global phenomenon weighed down by musical and stylistic
tropes which arguably stifled some of the creativity which made the genre so
appealing in the first place. Few acts of that era have a canon of work which
is still critically-acclaimed, but France’s Corpus Delicti have an enduring
appeal that makes a small UK tour a viable possibility, particularly when as on
this enterprising Edinburgh triple bill promoted by London’s Reptile club night
they are supported by other outstanding acts, Twisted Nerve and Ash Code.
The
former are always on top form on home turf, and this month sees the fortieth
anniversary of the original release of their seminal Séance mini-LP,
championed at the time by legendary BBC DJ John Peel (who once
divulged on-air that the band were his drinking buddies prior to visits to see
his favourite Scottish football team, Meadowbank Thistle, who were based in the
Scottish capital at that time). It was however criminally ignored by the wider
public, although the 2020 reissue (on blue vinyl) has belatedly brought more
well-overdue credit for a record whose musical content matched its innovative format
(one side played at 45 RPM and the other at 33 1/3), with interest sustained by
the ongoing popularity of the title track in goth clubs around the globe.
Singer Craig Paterson may recently have celebrated a ‘big birthday’, but the
energetic frontman shows no signs of letting up in his on-stage performance, a
key part of the band’s appeal. Delivering a shortened set early
in the evening to an appreciative and diverse crowd, Paterson introduces
undoubted set highlight Twisted Nervosis as a gothic love ballad before
picking up the pace with the inevitable punky set-closer 5 Minutes of Fame. Personally-speaking, I could
watch them every week, which is probably just as well, as they seem to be
billed as support for most of the bands I’m planning to see over the next
couple of months (Vazum, 1919 and Ghost Dance for example).
Ash
Code took to the stage next looking uber-cool as always in black, despite
having flown in that afternoon from their native Italy. The Neapolitan darkwave
trio have been one of the most high-profile acts on the European scene over the
past decade, and their sharp image, consistent musical output, in-demand
remixes and powerful live performances have made them a popular choice in their
own right with promoters across the continent (including festival appearances
at WGT, Amphi, W-Fest and A Murder of Crows amongst others). Twin brothers
Alessandro (vocals) and Adriano Belluccio (bass), along with Claudia Bellanotte
(vocals and “deep and melancholic synths”), create a sound which draws on many of
the genre’s 1980’s roots (from Clan of Xymox through the darker end of Depeche
Mode’s output to the more out-and-out dark club beats of Front 242), with
latest single Tear You Down mastered by another local legend Kill Shelter, who was
in the audience for this gig. After a relatively slow start, classics like Fear
soon had the crowd dancing and Claudia’s impassioned vocal on Betrayed was
another highlight. By the end of their well-paced set, which featured heavier
and truncated versions of many of their best-known songs, they received rapturous
applause for a highly impressive performance, especially when considering that they
were sandwiched between two incredibly powerful guitar-based goth bands.
Corpus
Delicti were returning to Scotland’s capital for the first time in 26 years (a
handful of the audience had been at the previous show!) and they too chose an
understated start to their set, allowing fans time to take in the full range of
their appeal. Whilst, like the classic 80’s bands, each band member makes their
own significant contribution – Chrys’ melodious basslines played high on the
bottom string, the kilt-wearing (cultural appropriation? Moi?) Franck seemingly
effortlessly coaxing wonderfully shimmering shards of guitar noise, Laurent
reimagining Roma’s inventive drum patterns, and Sébastien’s incredibly powerful
and dramatic vocal performance – the overall effect is a scintillating fusion
of magic, music and drama which few other bands of any era can achieve. Corpus Delicti may hail from the sunny Côte d’Azur, but the innovative
dark streak in their classic albums of the early-mid 90’s marked them out from
the competition. Whilst most 90’s goth acts looked no further than First and Last and
Always for their humdrum sonic template, the Nice-based act’s debut set harked back to
the sound of 1981, with Bauhaus’ sophomore set Mask, the Banshees’ Juju
and UK Decay’s For Madmen Only inspiring the somewhat derivative but enchanting first LP Twilight, before the band really found(ed) their own unique and inventive
strand of the gothic aesthetic on the follow-up Sylphes. As expected,
their set soon livens up with a string of classics from these two LPs, Noxious
(Demon’s Game), Dusk of Hallows, Absent Friend, Staring and Still
Patient all still as potent as thirty years ago, not least because of
Sebastien’s stage presence, staring intently at individual audience members on
the more dramatic lines of each multi-sectioned song, before performing Motherland
from third album Obsessions to one clearly-overcome member of the
front-row and then walking through the crowd and singing to individuals in the moshpit during a mesmerising
and lilting middle section of Lorelei. The pure theatre of their music
never made more sense than in this unforgettable and magical scene, uniting
performers and audience, so the following cover of Joy Division’s Atmosphere
was a welcome chance for both the crowd and the band to draw breath before a
final assault of the coruscating new single Chaos and a double encore of
Broken and of course the inevitable finale Saraband. As expected,
an emotionally as well as physically draining gig for both committed musicians
and engaged observers, but overall a thoroughly life-affirming gothic
experience which the band promised would be repeated well before another twenty-six years are up!
Even for a winter Wednesday evening which clashed with
the Edinburgh soccer derby, Reptile would probably still have been a little
disappointed with the size of the crowd which was probably not that far into
three figures, considering the unique three generations of stellar goth talent on
display, but the enthusiastic response of those who were in attendance will
hopefully encourage them to bring more shows to Scotland on the future.
Just ten days into the New Year and already Scotland was
hosting what looks likely to be one of the stand-out gigs of 2024, the very
welcome return of the self-styled “Swedish captains of post-punk”, bringing
their infectious gothic darkwave groove to the capital for the first time since
a pre-pandemic double bill with 1919 in July 2019 in the atmospheric arched vault of Bannerman’s bar in the spooky Old Town.
This year’s gig took place just around the corner at the
equally cool subterranean venue Cabaret Voltaire, with gig-goers having to find
a drizzly path through the patrons of Auld Reekie's Ghost Hunter tours led by
hyperbole-obsessed ‘resting’ actors accompanying their gullible charges to
Edinburgh’s allegedly hidden underground ghost town.
The name of the Cabaret Voltaire venue could hardly be more
appropriate for the other band on an enterprising bill promoted by London’s
Reptile club night, fellow Swedes Agent Side Grinder, whose 80’s influenced electro
post-punk is partially indebted spiritually to the Sheffield band of the same
name, who themselves were named after a short-lived Dadaist cabaret club in
Zurich over a century ago.
Although representing very different musical styles, the two
bands on show have much in common, apart from being based in Stockholm: both
are at the more melodic end of their genre, both have not only survived but
thrived after multiple line-up changes, and recently TCS figurehead Alex
Svenson played bass on ASG’s 2023 album Jack Vegas.
Agent Side Grinder, Edinburgh, 2024. L-R Peter Fristedt, Emanuel Åström, Johan Lange,
On this occasion, both bands were billed to play a full hour
set, with ASG on first, and they won over an initially somewhat hesitant crowd
with a varied set which spanned their career, from earlier hits like Wolf
Hour to tracks from the last album, for which Svenson joined them on what
became a very cramped stage, with the slow-burning Madeleine a highlight
from this section of the set. Traditional crowd-pleaser Giants Fall also
went down well, as the audience slowly warmed to an always eclectic increasingly
EBM dancefloor-oriented retro synthwave set.
Visually, Emanuel Åström remains the focus,
half-Stiv Bators half-Andy McCluskey as he writhes around the mike stand and dances
his way through the set in front of the band’s A/X logo, with founder member Johan Lange providing strong backing vocals and some wonderful old school
analogue synth sounds alongside fellow stalwart Peter Fristedt, looking ever more like
the mad professor, frantically seeking out the right tape loop from his box of
tricks in the sound laboratory and constantly twiddling knobs and dials to
tweak the ASG sound. After a brief encore, the band and their equipment left
the small stage to be replaced by that rarity for darkwave bands, a drumkit,
along with the usual pedalboard, only serving to accentuate the two very
different strands which are pre-eminent in modern gothic culture.
Alex Svenson joins Agent Side Grinder on stage, Edinburgh 2024
With a career stretching back to 2012 and soon to release
their seventh studio album, Then Comes
Silence exude a solid dark professionalism, despite their relatively recent
reduction to a three-piece, from the opening chord of a set which features
songs judiciously selected from their last four albums, but all with the same
energy and melody which has seen them rise to the very top of the current
scene.
Set-opener Tickets To Funerals from the most recent
album Hunger is a strong statement of intent with guitarist Hugo
Zombie’s chugging riffs a perfect counterpoint to Svenson’s dusky vocal, with
behatted drummer Jonas Fransson laying down a powerful beat behind them. Any
sound mix issues were sorted quickly during the next two songs, Flashing Pangs of Love (from 2017’s Blood)
and Apocalypse Flare (on 2020 album Machine), in time for the
first highlight of the set, Good Friday from the former release,
Svenson’s powerful and moving paean to his late father, with Zombie absolutely
nailing the solo after pummelling and pirouetting through the opening sections
of the song in his own unique style, which is typical of the band’s obvious
enjoyment of being back on stage again.
Then Comes Silence on stage in Edinburgh, 2024 L-R Alex Svenson. Jonas Fransson, Hugo Zombie
As a trio, the band now has a raw power and energy in a live
setting which is in contrast with their increasingly sleek critically-acclaimed
studio releases, and the simple, descending dark punk riff of the evening’s next song, She
Loves The Night (from 2015’s Nyctophilian) shows this to full pulverising effect.
Whilst some songs – Strange Kicks, and Dark End,
for example – do lose some of their subtlety with the slimmed-down line-up, others
have gained in effect from the more simplified structure, such as Rise To
The Bait, the first song where the audience really cuts free and the first
half-dozen rows of a very decent turnout for a wet midweek January evening
become a lively two-step throng.
A rare shot of Hugo Zombie standing still enough for a photo
The next song, the “whisper to a scream” classic Mercury
(from Blood) builds slowly to an epic impassioned crescendo from the peerless Svenson, with the
sole guitar again providing a wonderful tonal range and the uplifting finale
echoing round the walls of the subterranean chamber to a rapturous response.
Predictably, the band has saved some of their best-known classics for the end,
with Strangers and Animals from Nyctophilian book-ending a
typically excoriating version of Blood’s The Rest Will Follow,
with Fransson’s frenetic punky drumming dominating once more, leaving crowd and
band exhausted yet fully sated, with the latter promising to return soon. The
double headliner mini-tour now moves on to Manchester, Bristol and London
(Saturday), and anyone within travelling distance is strongly encouraged to
attend.
Reptile’s next Scottish show at the end of next month, also
to be held in Edinburgh, is an even more eclectically impressive bill,
featuring local 80’s goth punk stalwarts Twisted Nerve, now stretching their infamous
Five Minutes Of Fame into a fifth decade, twenty-first century Italian
synthwave darlings Ash Code, with 90’s French gothic legends Corpus Delicti
topping the bill, all for a mere twenty quid. Tickets for the show on Feb 28th
at La Belle Angele are available here.
2023 was finally the year of the Goth Revival, but not in
the way that many of us had hoped for. Rather than being the year the
mainstream rediscovered the genial panoply of new sounds emanating from one of
the most criminally-ignored and under-rated sub-genres, it was instead the year
of Goth Nostalgia, forty years on from the original movement’s annus mirabilis
of 1983 (not that it had yet adopted that sobriquet).
Not one, not two, but three critically-acclaimed histories
of the genre were published in the UK (and garnered many mainstream column
inches), one (which actually had the working title “Post-Punk”) by the drummer
of a band who frequently flirted with the goth sound and culture without ever
really being central to it, one by a then-very-young fan who became a leading
music journalist and author, and the third by an alternative scene veteran and well-regarded alternative media figure whose band was never particularly associated with the scene at the time. All three are worth
tracking down, and place the original 'gothic' music within a social, historical
and cultural context, lending much-needed gravitas to a style of music often
mocked and derided in the media as a whole as cartoonishly lightweight.
This general nostalgia-fest in the media coincided with many
of the original acts creeping back onto the touring circuit as it recovered
from the covid-enforced hiatus, with the unexpected returns of the major league likes of
Siouxsie, ‘Death Cult’ and Bauhaus, in a year that also saw The Rose of
Avalanche, The March Violets, Theatre of Hate/Spear of Destiny, Sex Gang
Children, The Sisters of Mercy, Christian Death and most other acts you can
think of from the original era hitting the road to boost the pension fund.
This should have been the signal for a surge of interest in
the contemporary gothic scene, but my own observation was that current goth
acts struggled to attract a crowd, particularly when the “heritage” acts were
in town the same month. As in recent previous years, the best chance seemed to
be for those bands who managed to get a support slot with one of the more
established bands, with A Cloud of Ravens being particularly successful in this
respect, bagging show-opening rights on tours by The Sisters of Mercy and Clan
of Xymox, but such examples were sadly rare over the year.
Perhaps one of the main reasons for the mainstream failing
to take an interest in newer goth acts, whilst wallowing in the pervading
nostalgia, was the fact that many of the leading lights on the current scene
took a studio sabbatical in 2023: well-established artists with multi-album
careers, such as She Past Away, Then Comes Silence, Kaelan Mikla, Diavol Strain
and Whispering Sons didn’t manage an album between them during 2023, although
most are planning new releases next year.
In their stead, some of the more recent acts of the current
wave took the opportunity to step up a level and stake their claim to higher
status within the scene, as most of the bands featuring in this rundown of the
best LPs of 2023 in the goth genre were not newcomers to the scene, but on
their second or third albums already, and having found their musical feet, now
producing the best music of their careers.
If 2022 had seen the resurgence of trad goth, the highlights
of 2023 feature many bands with a more melodic mainstream-friendly gothic alt-rock sound,
although more batcave/death rock/horror punk acts also fared well. This year’s
list is notable for a renewed dominance of bands from North America and Western
Europe, with fewer new artists of note from other territories than in recent
previous years,
The fifteen selections below are presented in no particular
order, but all have strong artistic merit and integrity and are all highly
recommended!
Husband and wife duo James and Michelle Perry’s goth rock
act released its third album in 2023 which continued the project’s development
from a more rock-based sound to a purer goth/post-punk sonic palette.James Perry’s vocals have become stronger
with each release, and with fewer guitar solos making the cut, the sound is sleeker
and more modern, yet also less formulaic. Lyrically the band has always been
one of the most political with a small “p”, taking on contemporary issues and
championing the underdog in a way that the original goth bands, who grew out of
punk roots, would surely approve of. With anthemic choruses and soaring
melodies, Ashes Fallen are reminiscent of Manic Street Preachers at their polemical
best, and are a breath of fresh air in a genre all-too-quick to regress to the
lowest gothic trope lyrical denominator.
TBS’s William Faith may be one of the senior figures of the
second (90’s) wave of goth, but the project’s 2023 release shows that he has
lost none of his youthful vigour, energy and righteous anger. Building songs
around bludgeoning, syncopated riffs (courtesy of Sarah Rose Faith) and grunge-esque song dynamics, The
Bellwether Syndicate’s Vestige and Vigil was a real guitar goth tour de
force, thanks to Faith’s infallible ear for a catchy chorus and a lyrical bon
mot, the sound of an artist uncompromisingly raging into the dark night.
Brooklyn duo A Cloud of Ravens maintained their reputation
for angsty, earnest, pseudo-Celtic gothic rock with their latest album, which has
the same authenticity and passion that has contributed to the enduring appeal
of the likes of New Model Army or The Levellers. As effective on low-fi
low-tempo reflective pieces as on arms-in-the-air choruses, AcoR confirmed
their position in the new vanguard with another album of well-crafted 100% pure
artisan goth.
Already onto their fifth album in as many years, Matt
Vowles’ Black Angel continued their astonishingly consistent record of
producing high quality albums stuffed with unashamedly retro and respectful
references but with a full-on modern sound. With nods to the pillars of the
original mid-1980’s UK gothic rock sound – Floodland, Phantasmagoria and
Love – Black Angel create an original yet strangely familiar film noir
soundscapes which never fail to impress.
With The Kentucky Vampires continuing their studio hiatus, guitarist
Zac Campbell has busied himself with a number of side projects, notably an
innovative surf-goth project Los Vampiros del Mar and this fully-fledged trad
goth project The Waning Moon, a collaboration with Costa Rican vocalist Ariel
Maniki. Campbell’s multi-layered approach and golden guitar tone makes The
Waning Moon’s debut album a delight for all fans of late 80’s/early 90’s gothic
rock, giving full rein to his genius, with Maniki’s dramatic vocal adding an
impassioned element to the overall sound.
In a year when heritage acts like The Damned and Iggy Pop
delivered unexpectedly good albums, the most pleasant surprise of 2023,
Treponem Pal’s Screamers is the album many fans of industrial goth have
been waiting for since The Young Gods’ seminal TV Sky. With tongue
firmly in cheek and covering a range of sub-genres, Screamers is best
played at the recommended “full power” and would be the perfect soundtrack to
an all-night biker festival. This is the album Al Jourgensen has been trying to make for the past thirty years.
Belgian/Manx trio Ground Nero had showcased half of their
November 2023 release Blood Never Sleeps as singles over the past two
years, their first full length release since Mark Sayle replaced the irrepressible
Gwiijde Wampers on vocal duties. Ground Nero’s trademark wall of sound studio
approach gives their songs a depth and richness of texture few can emulate, and
Sayle’s velvet baritone is the perfect foil to Peter Smeets’ inventive guitar
work over keyboard soundscapes which are heavier and more powerful than Sayle’s
work with his other excellent band, Mark E Moon.
The prolific Mr Heyes has built BS&E into arguably the
most expansive and original UK goth act of the last decade, and his latest LP
is by far his most consistent and accomplished set yet. Ranging from bar room
piano laments to dancefloor filling Lucretia-esque goth bangers, Everything
But The Ghoul is stuffed with a range of simply-but-beautifully constructed
songs which Heyes’ beloved Damned would struggle to better.
La Scaltra started the year with a bang with this stunning
set of witch doom classics, the twin female vocal embellishments contrasting
superbly with the sleek stoner riffs beneath them in a series of hypnotic
modern gothic chants. Like most bands on the Solar Lodge imprint their image and
sound flirt dangerously with the ridiculous at times, but they have the class
and panache to pull it off.
The latest set from Grenoble-based Varsovie was the
stand-out post-punk album of the year, combining intricate arrangements, a
driving insistent beat, and a timeless, semi-spoken vocal that has been the
hallmark of French language darkwave for over four decades, in songs which had
enough musical and lyrical originality to rise above the competition and mark Pression
À
Froid out as a future classic.
After Diavol Strain in 2022, Maletas Vacias maintain a
Chilean presence in our annual countdown with their own uniquely singular take
on the gothic darkwave sub-genre on a stunning debut album which bristles with a
fresh energy and a willingness to dip into other genres, adding a haunting retro
80’s quirky dark pop sheen to their post-punk sensibilities.
The second Latin American selection of 2023 may only be a mini-album, but Mexican post-punk project Decena Tragica deserve plaudits for conjuring up the ghost of legendary early 80's Spanish post-punk outfit Paralisis Permanente on the main track of this release, with shades of death rock on other tracks.
Although this blog usually eschews artists who embrace
rather too enthusiastically some of the more cartoonish aspects of goth, there
were undeniably some excellent if cliché-ridden examples of Californian
deathrock in 2023, with Grimoire, the physical release of an expanded re-working of
Shrouds’s 2017 debut EP an undisputed highlight. Indeed an early version of the track below, Sin, initially featured on an even earlier EP back in 2015! Histrionic vocals, frenetic
drumming, angular spooky guitar parts, the whiff of ultra firm hold hairspray
and a wilfully muddy production mix conjure up ghosts from the 1981 heyday of
positive punk.
France’s Cemetary Girlz are another act not afraid to tie
their colours (ok, colour) firmly to the 1980’s/1990’s goth mast, and their
debut LP L’envol du Corbeau was a thrillingly haunting examination of some of
the darker corners of the genre, exhuming corpses left untouched for thirty
years. Their songs are intriguing guitar FX-drenched soundscapes which branch
off into ever deeper, more melancholic sub-worlds.
Another stunning debut, In A Darkened Room’s Sorrow was
another release which brought together previous singles alongside new material.
Slower, more melodic and more introspective than many other acts, with lugubrious shades of the 'miserygoth' sub-genre at times, Sorrow was another consistently excellent release from a North
American scene which enjoyed a real renaissance this year.
There’s always something really authentic and deeply satisfying about going to a
goth gig at Nice n Sleazy in Glasgow – perhaps it’s the steep staircase,
reminiscent of that of the legendary Phono in Leeds, leading down to the dingy
gig room, it could be the timeless, simple layout of the venue itself, a rectangular
low-roofed space with a very low stage at one end and a small bar at the other,
or maybe it’s the wall of sound that emerges when you open the sound-proofed
door.
Descending that staircase on Tuesday evening, I could still
easily make out (through the opaque glass in the entrance door to the dimly-lit
room) the instantly recognisable monochrome figure of Joel Heyes, sole member of
headliner Byronic Sex and Exile, hunched over a desk containing the
paraphernalia of the modern gigging goth artiste; presale list and highlighter
pen – check; handstamp for pass-outs (on this occasion bearing the legend “Goth
City, Leeds U.K” in, what else black ink – in my teenage years I would have
avoided washing my hands for a week to try to prolong any vicarious cool which
evidence of my attendance at a particular gig may have afforded) – check;
copies of CDs and t-shirts for sale, the best chance for the artist to make any
money from the show – check; credit card-reader – check; candelabra (well, this
is BS&E)– check. Such is the glamorous life of the modern-day gothic-rock
troubadour. I don’t remember the likes of Andrew Eldritch or Peter Murphy
having to work on the door or sell their own merch in their band’s early days,
but this is the norm in 2023 for even the scene’s leading lights. For this gig,
Joel has left his trusty (or rather, untrustworthy) hearse at home and
travelled four hours by train along with his Bronte hero/villain Victorian
dandy stage garb, his guitar, the afore-mentioned items on the entrance desk
and his other stage props, all lugged from station to hotel to venue.
Gothzilla
Looking towards the other end of the room, I could see
Scottish goth duo Gothzilla starting their set to no more than a dozen punters,
which included the members of the opening act who had already performed, It
(made up of two-thirds of the former members of 90’s eclectro-goth stalwarts
Libitina). But rather than bemoaning the lack of attendees, Gothzilla mainman
Tim Jarvis seemed to positively revel in the situation, demanding audience
participation which in the circumstances it would have been extremely churlish
to refuse, and he and guitarist Mike (who replaced long-serving Stuart Harbut
and rejoined the band earlier this year from The Dead Seasons, whom ironically they
had replaced at this gig due to a last-minute covid-related issue) treated the
few of us present a storming set of classic drum-machine driven upbeat goth
rock from their multi-album career, but much more energetic and powerful than
their studio releases. Jarvis is an excellent vocalist and usually bills the
band as “for fans of The Sisters of Mercy” to give an indication of their main
influence, and the pair’s tight renditions of the highlights of their back catalogue certainly went down well,
in front of their “Goth and Proud” stage banner. Ending their all-too-brief set
as usual with a barnstorming rendition of goth club classic The Temple Of
Sound, they left what passes for a stage with a reminder that they will be back
in Glasgow in the spring, supporting 1919 (although they are playing a gig in
Aberdeen before the end of the year), another double bill not to be missed.
Stage Fright
Equally unperturbed by the poor turnout was Joel Heyes, a
gothic national treasure if ever there was one, joining the ranks of the likes
of Mick Mercer, Trevor Bamford and other keepers of the UK gothic flame. Label
boss, festival organiser, charity fundraiser and uber-prolific one-man band,
Heyes unbelievably also has a day job and still finds the time to maintain a
strong social media presence, creating a strong brand that occasionally sees him
pigeonholed as Leeds’ "Mr Goth" in the same way as others begrudgingly carve out
a career for example as a “professional Northerner”.A Byronic Sex and Exile show is as much an
event as a gig, and Heyes took to the stage carrying his now-lit candelabra,
lurching from the back of the hall towards. and peering at, the small gaggles
of attendees like a latter-day graveyard-bothering Wee Willie Winkie as he
prepared for the performance ahead. Not since The Virgin Prunes' infamous Channel
4 TV performance of 1982 has someone pulled off such a dramatic candle-related
start to a gig, no mean feat when the audience barely reaches into double
figures. Launching into Grave Is In The Heart (from the equally
puntastically-titled but wonderful current album Everything But The Ghoul),
Heyes puts on a typically impassioned one-man show, strumming frantically at
his guitar over the pre-recorded backing, eyes closed as he strained for the
lower reaches of his lugubrious Yorkshire baritone, with the show enhanced by
the usual props - his famous sword during Death and Joy and the Hamlet-inspired
skull to whom he addressed the opening of the more jaunty Damned-influenced
Monster Man. The centre of the set was the typical Tombstone World, again from
the new album, building slowly from a simple four-chord motif like many past
BS&E classics. With the venue curfew approaching, Heyes ended with two
bangers from his previous album, Your Name On The Wind and Leviathan, all
Floodland guitar and anthemic chorus.
Is this a cheap rubber skull I see before me?
Taking a counter-intuitively positive take on the distinct
lack of last-minute walk up customers – “quality, not quantity” - (probably due
to this gig being sandwiched by expensive shows by Death Cult and The Sisters
of Mercy and in the same week as local gigs by Sex Gang Children and Kirk
Brandon), Heyes felt that the current tour is nevertheless a success having
already broken even financially, and told me that variations in attendance are to be
expected at his level (the previous night had seen a larger-than-predicted
audience in Nottingham for example), but his (and Tim Jarvis’) indefatigability
is what has kept the scene alive - or at least undead - during (no pun intended) dark days.
En garde!
The current scene is arguably more deserving of your support
than the afore-mentioned heritage/nostalgia acts trying to re-create past
glories, and the newer band scene is certainly more democratic and unified,
with the acts supporting each other to try to make ends meet. Whilst pairing
older and newer acts on multi-band bills gives more recent acts at least the
opportunity to prise open the closed minds of the elder goth community, it’s
hard to escape the conclusion that like many current acts, Heyes was born
twenty (or is it two hundred?) years too late, and, realistically, barring an
unlikely mainstream goth revival, his impressive series of releases and live
shows will never reach the size of audience they deserve.
As ever in the heat of summer, goths tend to head for the
shadows and the recording studios, so the number of actual new releases tends
to decline a little in June and July. However, on the back of renewed media
interest in the genre, thanks to the Siouxsie comeback and the recently
published histories of gothic music, there is still plenty of excellent new music
to keep us entertained. This month’s new selection is a real curate’s egg, with
old school deathrock rubbing shoulders with everything from trad folk goth to industrial
goth rock. Enjoy!
1.Girls Under Glass – We Feel Alright
Back from the grave are legendary
German goth industrial act Girls Under Glass, with this fantastically-produced
spoiler track which heralded their current comeback album Backdraft,
their first for nearly two decades, built around an electro darkwave strong
metallic riff that recalls the over-the-top vibe of an early nineties Nine Inch
Nails dancefloor stomper.
2.Byronic Sex & Exile – Kiss of
the Firebrand
There’s an equally Wagnerian epic This
Corrosion quality about the lead track from the latest EP from the prolific
Byronic Sex & Exile, Joel Heyes’ one-man project which aims to keep the
gothic flame burning bright in its Leeds heartland. Other tracks on the EP such
as Ectoplasmic Dreams are more typical of the project, gradually
building huge slow-burningFloydesque
soundscapes from an initial simple, haunting riff.
3.Temple - Submission
The Portland (Oregon) trio are
back with a fabulous album of hauntingly heavy deathrock-influenced darkwave.
The title track features some superb reverb riffing over a wonderfully muddy
rhythm section, whilst the verse has an almost Chameleons-esque purity. Another
essential purchase from the ever-reliable Swiss Dark Nights label.
4.Perish - Reliquary
Reliquary would appear to
be a hardcore five-track Bad Seeds meets Christian Death deathrock demo
recorded by a supergroup of San Francisco band members in 2013 and finally
given a Bandcamp release last month. Heavy, unhinged, scuzzy and inventive,
there’s a raw energy and power in these songs which mark this out as one of the
best releases of 2023 in a sub-genre enjoying a real renaissance.
There’s a distinct Paralisis
Permanente vibe on the opening section of this excellent new track from Mexican
stalwarts Decena Tragica, although the song opens into a broader gothic
darkwave soundscape in the skilled hands of producer Ariosto N Uribe (of La
Procesion de Lo Infinito fame).
6.Ember Sea – Meet Me By The Fire
Soothing trad goth folk from
German band the Ember Sea on this new EP, like All About Eve at their most wistful.
Acoustic guitars, strings and a predictably big soft goth metal chorus for this
epic and melodic ballad which will surely go down well across Europe.
7.Varsovie - Perspective Nevski
Great new classic French wave
track from Grenoble outfit Varsovie, a wonderfully full production with a busy,
driving bassline, typically semi-spoken crache ton venin/je m’en fous-tiste vocal and even a bit
of dark twang in an unpredictable song whose twists and turns whet the appetite
considerably for forthcoming album on Icy Cold Records, Pression à
Froid.
8.Misery Eden - Woods
Fabulously dense and occasionally
cacophonous post-punk production on this dark punk deathrock track from the
excellent six track debut EP Thorns and Woes from Misery Eden, a project
based in Tallin (Estonia). Of the other tracks, Salvation is less
breathy and claustrophobic but equally intriguing.
9.Grinning God – Arrow of Wrath
From the Rope Sect stable comes
side-project Grinning God, with Sardonicus releasing a new version of the debut
Sardonios EP with a couple of extra tracks of equally high quality. The
droney dreamgaze of Divine Decadence is probably my favourite of the
pair, with its dark garage psych vibe, but Arrow of Wrath has the same
mix of sotto voce screamo vocal on the verse changing to a warmer melodic tone
for the chorus in an unusual (note how I’m clutching at genres here!) yet
highly effective manner.
10.Final Gasp - Mourning Moon
Very strong late 80’s Killing
Joke vibe for this Massachusetts band, with a chugging, versatile goth-indus guitar sound,
pounding bass, thumping drums, haunting keyboard riff and an angry echoing
vocal. Great production and dynamics on a well-structured if derivative song.
