Gothic rock

Gothic rock (also known as goth rock or simply goth) is a subgenre of rock music which grew out of British post-punk in the late 1970s. The genre draws from gothic literature, nihilism, dark romanticism, poetry and tragedy. The style evolved through early post-punk bands such as Siouxsie and the Banshees, Joy Division, Bauhaus, and the Cure, who shifted their music toward darker gothic overtones through an emphasis on minor chords, reverb, dark arrangements, and melancholic melodies.

In 1981, Sounds writer Steve Keaton published an article on "punk gothique", a term coined by UK Decay frontman Steve Abbott to describe their music. By 1983, the NME briefly used "positive punk" to describe a music scene associated with a London club known as the Batcave, which included artists such as Alien Sex Fiend, Specimen, UK Decay, Sex Gang Children, Rubella Ballet and Southern Death Cult. The British press later opted for the term "goth" to define the subculture and style of music, which was further developed by the arrival of the Sisters of Mercy, followed by Flesh for Lulu, Play Dead, Rubella Ballet, Gene Loves Jezebel, Blood and Roses, and Ausgang.

In the United States, 45 Grave and Christian Death further developed the scene, which led to the emergence of deathrock. By the late 1980s and 1990s, gothic rock gave rise to several fusion genres such as gothabilly, gothic country and gothic metal.

Etymology

The term "gothic rock" was originally coined by critic John Stickney who used the label to describe the music of the Doors in October 1967, in a review published in The Williams Record. Stickney wrote that the band met the journalists "in the gloomy vaulted wine cellar of the Delmonico hotel, the perfect room to honor the gothic rock of the Doors".