Would you believe it's been 30 years?
Jan. 8th, 2008 08:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mbarrick
What you see here is my now thirty year old original 1978 Polydor U.K. pressing of Siouxsie and the Banshee's "The Scream," arguably the first "Gothic" album, though the word was yet to be applied. There are apocryphal stories (including the alt.gothic FAQ) that Siouxsie Sioux first used the term herself in describing the direction of the band, but it would be at least another year before the word "Gothic" would be used in print to describe any band, and several more years before the term really started to stick.
At the time, though, this would have been called punk and punk is how I came to it. Already a fan of the Sex Pistols, I'd read that Sid Vicious played once as drummer for band called "Siouxsie and the Banshees" and I was curious to hear them. Of course no one in Duncan knew who the Sex Pistols were, let alone Siouxsie and the Banshees. And there was no public Internet, period. I was still a few years away from trading mixed tapes with pen-pals. "Brave New Waves" on the CBC was also years away. The only recourse was pilgrimage to the "big city" - Victoria.
I purchased this used sometime in late 1979 from "Lyle's Place" (the price tag is still on the front, $5.95) on Yates Street in Victoria, most likely while out with my dad to see some awful movie at the Odeon that would never play in the cinema in Duncan. I would have been 12.
This is it. This is the beginning. This is the undifferentiated stem cell from which all goth music split. And what's most remarkable is even now, thirty years later there is nary a song on this album that wouldn't fly on the dancefloor at Sanctuary right now in 2008.
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Date: 2008-01-09 06:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-09 06:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-09 07:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-09 07:08 am (UTC)Do you consider Joy Division a Goth band? Tangentially?
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Date: 2008-01-09 07:30 am (UTC)Well, really that's it in a nutshell. There is the old refrain that "Goth evolved from punk", but this is the "missing link" of that evolution - and it is pretty closely tied in. As I mentioned, when Siouxie and the Banshees first formed, Sid Vicious was the drummer (albeit for one and only one performance). In 1979 Robert Smith was the guitarist for Siouxsie and the Banshees. You couldn't ask for a more obvious bridge than that.
And, yes, I always thought of Joy Division as Gothic.
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Date: 2008-01-09 03:50 pm (UTC)*envious*
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Date: 2008-01-09 07:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-09 08:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-10 06:32 am (UTC)By the way my sister is now working at lyle's place.
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Date: 2008-01-10 06:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-10 10:15 pm (UTC)The term 'gothic rock' was coined by Rozz Williams of Christian Death in and interview with Billboard in 1980 after Castration Squad invited Christian Death on stage to play a couple songs. In 1982 they released their first alblum 'Only Theatre of Pain' on Frontier records with the desciption of Gothic Rock on the gatefold of the record. In various other interviews and in print notes along with some releases, it is said that Williams gave credit for origin of the term to Roxy Music, though as a music historian with one hell of a collection of this stuff, I have yet to see said articles. However it's quite beliveable given the NY music scene at the time. In any event, a number of alternative / melodic metal type bands that were classified as Black Metal by the american recording industry catalogs started getting listed as 'Gothic Rock' in distribution catalogs between 1980 and 1983. Names such as Batz without Flesh, The Killing Ground, Castration Squad, Suicide, Hawkwind, Thus Spake Zarathustra, Psycic TV, Chris and Cozey, and the ground breaking Sisters of Mercy started to appear in catalogs beside Christian Death in their own little sub-division of what was called 'Black Metal'. Sadly Siouxsie wasn't amongst them, and didn't join them until some years later.
It wasn't until the release of Peepshow in 1988 that Siouxsie started gettting tarred with the same label. Gone were the shreiking punk sensibilities, replaced with a much more mature, more melodic sound. The noise, and often chaotic lead guitar work gave way to the di-chromatic chord structure that was rapidly becoming the 'watermark' of goth rock. Prior to that her material, as identified by her fans was punk, afterward, a flock of young women in black leather and too much mascarra flocked to her tuneful dirges.
I think that it's fair to say that Siouxsie may have been amongst the earliest artists that later became identified with the growing gothic rock movement, she didn't by any stretch release the first goth album.
The Scream is punk, in both styling, audio quality, and structure. I love some of her work, but calling it goth doesn't really make it so. Mind you, I feel the same way about the Cure. Great music, but not goth at all. A point of view that is held by many modern music historians, such as Mick Mercer and Andrew Webb. I think the same could be extended to just about everything on the Metropolis label by the way. There are a lot of great electro and industrial acts on the label, but nothing I could really call goth.
I suppose that it's not unlike food in that respect. You may really love oranges a lot. You alo really dig lemons. In fact you might really love citrus on the whole, and absolutely hate cabbage. However, no matter how much you hate cabbage, and love all citrus fruit, calling a lemon an orange doesn't make it so.
heh. sorry for the rant. music history is one of my rabbid passions. prolly why I ended up as a DJ
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Date: 2008-01-11 12:53 am (UTC)You've got and argument made up of
- begging the question,
- post hoc,
- appeal to authority,
- more appeal to authority, and
- a straw man.
.What you are saying is that in the absence of the label, the genre didn't exist, which begs the question, what was the label being applied to? Does it take a category in a music industry catalog to create a genre? Bowing in the direction of Mick Mercer is not an argument (albeit Mick Mercer may have a good argument of his own, but not knowing it,The citrus fruit straw man is actually a lot more salient that you might have intended though. The Latin citron refers a fruit that no longer exists, an ancestor of modern citrus fruits. Words derived from "citron" apply, depending on the speaker to lemons, limes, sour oranges, or an inedible ornamental plant. There is a general theme and a definite relationship between the fruits, but there is a substantial variance over what a "citron" or a "lime" or a "lemon" is. What I call "Gothic" may not, and need not, be what you call "Gothic".
What there is with this album is a variation on punk that is unambiguously more sombre and more melodic. Unlike the "fuck you" rebellion and anger pointed directly at authority that characterizes punk, this has more a "fuck it" nihilism and the evocation of exotic Romantic horror, the very reason for the application of the term "Gothic" in reference to 19th century Romantic literature and fin-de-sièle Bohemianism, is rampant in this album.
In short, what am I saying, and what I said, is this is where I see the beginning. I draw the line here. You can draw it wherever you like.
Whoops, dropped a thought there...
Date: 2008-01-11 12:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-11 01:50 am (UTC)A: specifically the muscial style of Christian Death
Q: Does it take a category in a music industry catalog to create a genre?
A: In so far as it is the first common usage, yes. Granted definitions may drift over time.
Now, as to your 5 point assertions:
1 Begging the question.
Um, I didn't beg any question. I merely reported on historical and documented events.
2. Post Hoc
Post Hoc only applies when there is not a progression of related events connected by a causal relationship. Provided that you allow for the fac that people do in fact influence each other in clothing, fashion, usage of words and terms, and other aspects of life, you accept a causal relationship, ergo Post Hoc does not apply. It is worth pointing out however, that this is an extrapolation from what I wrote. I did not claim that there was any causal relationship in place, I provided only a simplified history of the origins of the term in modern music, and what style of music it became applied to. No causal connection to later works, so you may wish to examine your reaction a bit more carefully.
3. Appeal to authority: this is only a fallicy if used to make a point or as substaniation of a given. In the context of indicating that others share the view that has already been established by a recounting of historical fact - not logical argument, simply a statement of a fact about my view and the views expressed by others.
4. More appeal to authority? Well in so far as I talk about documented events, definitely. However, I'm unwilling to throw out the whole concept of documentation because it is merely an appeal to authority. At some point we have to admit to ourselves the value of the experience and records left by others.
5. A straw man: Indeed. This would require that I set up an argument with you, and put together a hypothetical argument by yourself to the contrary, which I did not do. I simply provided documented history and expressed an opinion shared by other musical history buffs. You can make of it what you will, but throwing out accusations of logical fallicies in a discussion of historical events is not much more than Ad hominem.
I'm sorry that a disucssion of musical history, which is very important to muscians (and sadly, often lawyers theses days), got you so heated. I suspect that if you take a step back and re-read the reply in the spirit it was intended, you'll get a smile, which was the intent.
Re: Whoops, dropped a thought there...
Date: 2008-01-11 01:57 am (UTC)As far as musical descriptions go... well, there's the lingo that musicians and audiophiles use to talk to each other, and there's common usage. I suspect that they are rarely even closely related in any way at all.
Think Pink Floyd realized they were making 'classic rock'? *giggle*
Re: Whoops, dropped a thought there...
Date: 2008-01-11 03:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-11 03:40 am (UTC)ditto.
Nonetheless, I'm not going to let you have at me for my logic! --
Begging the Question - technically this refers to a circular argument where the presumed truth of the assertion is an unstated premise in the argument. By claiming that the application of the label represents the creation of the genre the question is begged, what is the label initially being applied to? What I am saying is that there is necessarily music that is "Gothic" antecedent to the application of the label. I'll accept your answer to that as well in terms of musical jargon, so no point pushing that further. In my less precise use of the term I will still maintain that music more precisely referred to as "positive punk", of which Siouxsie and the Banshees and Joy Division are examples, falls under the subcultural definition of "Gothic" and the release of album is as good a place as any to draw the starting line.
Post Hoc - Post hoc, ergo propter hoc. After this, therefore because of this. Similarly to above, it's not because someone created and applied the label that the musical genre and associated subculture came into being. That's the false causal relationship I'm referring to. The music and subculture existed to be labeled first and it started somewhere. I'm saying that it started with Siouxsie and the Banshees. Once again, we're only at odds because a difference in scope.
Appeal to Authority - You're right. I was needling you.
Straw Man - "This would require that I set up an argument with you, and put together a hypothetical argument by yourself to the contrary, which I did not do." **AHEM** You set up an argument about citrus fruit and hypothetically had me calling lemons oranges! Geez!
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Date: 2008-01-12 05:18 am (UTC)