Bad Psychic – Soon (Sygil Records, 2014)

It’s been a little while since we last heard from Sygil Records, in fact it’s been just over a year since I reviewed one of their releases (Charnel House’s excellent Black Blood).  I’m pleased to say that after an all-too-lengthy silence, the label is back with yet another recording that challenges our perceptions of what dark and heavy music can be.  That recording is Soon, the debut full length from Bloomington, Indiana’s Bad Psychic.

Pinkish Black – s/t (Handmade Birds, 2012)

Of all the great heavy music that’s happened in 2012, I find myself being the most interested in the handful of bands that have openly defied the trappings of heavy music both musically and conceptually, while at the same time being embraced by the metal community. I’m thinking of bands such as Wreck and Reference, Menace Ruine and Author & Punisher; bands that have forged unique and innovative identities for themselves without adhering to the guitar/bass/drums format. You can add Fort Worth, TX duo Pinkish Black to that short list; their self-titled debut album is a drums/synth/loops/voice fuelled exercise in gothic/death rock exellence that nods to the past as it creeps towards the future.

Ignore the Machine: The Death of Gothic Rock.

Death to false goths.

I’m a fan of gothic rock.  Well, not what passes for gothic rock these days.  No, I’m definitely not referring to the dolled-up tarts that Terrorizer Magazine wastes valuable pages on with their uber-lame magazine-within-a-magazine known as Dominion, which should probably be re-titled Eyeliner-Wearing Attention Whores Monthly. But it isn’t really Terrorizer’s fault that Dominion sucks, it’s just that they’re about 25 years late to the party.  It is the modern day practitioners of gothic rock that are to blame.  Look at the cover image above and try to tell me that it hasn’t turned into a joke and a fashion show.

It should also be noted that when I use the terms “goth” or “gothic”, I am not referring to all the dyed-black hair and makeup-smeared buffoons that have taken up residence on various social networking sites like a legion of trolls living under one giant bridge. The gothic rock I’m referring to isn’t the domain of myspace namby-pambies with usernames like TeamEdwardLover0112.  Excuse me while I vomit.

It is for the above reasons that so many metal fans write off gothic rock as musical tripe for whiney teens who shop at Hot Topic and cry themselves to sleep every night while their makeup runs all over the pillowcase. That’s pretty unfortunate when you consider how many revered metal bands were influenced by the genre. Type O Negative, Katatonia, Moonspell, Cradle of Filth and Tiamat are just a few that come to mind. Of course the other problem is that most of what is billed as gothic metal is actually artery-clogging pop metal cheese with distorted guitars and some marginally talented, buxom trollop on vox. Blame Napalm Records, Nuclear Blast and Century Media for helping that shit propagate.

Ugh.

In the late 1970s and early to mid 1980s, gothic rock actually meant something. It was punk rock’s grave-robbing bastard cousin, prone to psychotic outbursts, deep depressions and unhealthy sexual proclivities.  The music could be as dangerous, incendiary and nihilistic as anything punk could conjure, but it also had atmosphere. Eerie and thick like a midnight trudge through a fog-enshrouded cemetery.  The Misfits successfully combined punk and goth, but it is the “pure” goth bands that we’ll be focusing on this dark and stormy night.

So take my hand, if you dare… as we look at some of my personal favorite gothic rock bands.  Bands who rocketed out from the crypt before image became everything…

Bauhaus

Arguably the original goth band, Bauhaus had it all; energy, atmosphere and Peter Murphy’s prototypical deep baritone vocals.  If there was ever a goth group with a knack for amazing singles, it was this UK foursome.  They could write haunting, chill-inducing numbers like “Bela Lugosi’s Dead” or catchy dark rock nuggets like “The Passion of Lovers”. The band even made a cameo appearance in David Bowie’s cult vampire flick The Hunger (coincidentally, their cover of Bowie’s “Ziggy Stardust” was also their biggest hit).  The band broke up in 1983, but briefly reformed on several occasions and released final album Go Away White in 2008. Peter Murphy has had a successful solo career, while other members of the band went on to form the considerably less gothic Love & Rockets.

The Sisters of Mercy

The Sisters of Mercy are the vehicle of the enigmatic Andrew Eldritch and are probably the most danceable of the original goth bands. You can hear their influence in groups like KMFDM and Rammstein. I’m pretty sure that Satyr Wongraven stole his current look from Eldritch as well. Powered by a drum machine known as “Doktor Avalanche” and deep, thudding basslines, The Sisters of Mercy possess an incomparable sense of groove that is more likely to make you want to shake your ass than slit your wrists. They can also sound quite epic and Wagnerian, as on tracks like “Dominion/Mother Russia” and “This Corrosion”. Although they still tour occasionally and perform new songs, the band has not released an album since 1991. Here’s to hoping they release something new in my lifetime.

Alien Sex Fiend

Some of you may recognize this band from Beavis & Butthead. The video for “Now I’m Feeling Zombified” appeared on the show, introducing pre-pubescent American males everywhere to the wonders of UK goth. ASF are probably one of the more genuinely frightening gothic rock groups, thanks to vocalist Nik Fiend’s bizarre physical appearance. He looks like a cross between Nosferatu and an anorexic mild psychotic.  Alien Sex Fiends’s songwriting tends to be noisier and more off-the-wall than some of the other bands, giving off a more frenzied and demented vibe. The band is still skulking around the goth scene today, though I can’t speak for the quality of their more recent output.

The Cure

The Cure’s Robert Smith is the poster boy for gothic rock. The makeup, the hair, the voice; everything necessary to make a Suicide Girl swoon, Smith had it in spades before age caught up with him.  Yes, Smith had the goth look down pat, but that wouldn’t have meant a thing if The Cure’s music hadn’t been utterly fantastic.  And fantastic it was, bringing a pop sensibility to the genre that was often sorely lacking amongst the other bands.  Rivaled only by Bauhaus in the area of writing great singles, The Cure have so many excellent songs under their belt that it’s hard to know where to start, but you could do a hell of a lot worse than “A Forest”, “Killing an Arab” or “Boys Don’t Cry”.  The band brought gothic rock’s gloomy atmospheres to the mainstream and became the genre’s most successful band in the process.  Although their material has gone downhill over the years, their longevity and influence can’t be denied.

The Birthday Party

Although they may have disdained the genre tag, The Birthday Party were among the most volatile and genuinely threatening bands to ever be classified as gothic rock. This is largely due to the presence of a fucking madman known as Nick Cave on vocals. Cave took Iggy Pop’s maniacal drug fiend schtick to its illogical extreme with The Birthday Party, howling and shrieking like a man possessed over the band’s decidedly twisted, cacophonous musical arrangements. “Deep in the Woods”, “Sonny’s Burning”, “Mr. Clarinet”, just about any track The Birthday Party ever released sounds like either Cave, the band, or both could fly off the handle and kill everyone in the room at any given moment. They never garnered much mainstream success, but The Birthday Party represented gothic rock at its most unhinged and avant-garde.

Of course, now some of you are thinking, “What about Christian Death, Specimen, Siouxie and the Banshees, Fields of the Nephilim, etc?!”  All I can say is, you can’t please all the goths all the time.  This isn’t meant to be a comprehensive guide. This is just a sampling of bands intended to prove that gothic rock does not and should not mean a bunch of ridiculous fashion victims parading around in faux-bondage gear and pretending to be depressed.

So… are there any modern bands out there doing gothic rock the “right” way that are flying under my radar, or is the genre officially as dead as Bela Lugosi?  Let me know.