I never really got the goth thing. I know that it sort of evolved out of the darker side of punk, a step-child of Siouxsie & the Banshees, and that it spawned all sorts of mini-tornadoes like shoe-gaze and grunge. I liked the fact that it spoke to poeple who were fundamentally out of kilter with the rest of the world, in exactly the way that punk emphatically did not.
One or two songs from that era penetrated my consciousness, but on the whole I was looking for a more sensitive, laid-back groove at the time and I had no time for the sheer ponderous weight that goth laid down.
But I remember *this* song very well. I think it was the not-terribly-discreet rip-off of "Kashmir" that did it for me, the fact that Wayne Hussey adopted a ridiculous gun-totin' Western image for the video (riding a horse through the city, wearing poncho and hat, for goodness sake), and that, really, it was a great song because it wasn't entirely original.
Yes, it's a tad ponderous; yes it looks like a Goth, feels like a Goth and sounds like a Goth; yes, it's derivative and therefore utterly predictable, and yes, the video is ridiculous.
But it's a GREAT song!
2 comments:
I had a friend that swore up and down that the seeds of "goth" were sown by Berlin era lou Reed and Iggy Pop (and, to a lesser extent, David Bowie).
I enjoyed Goth. It was a handy combination between punk and art rock, though I must admit I never bought into the whole "everything's a bummer, let's steal mommies eyeliner" mandate of the miserable bastard set.
Still, Mask by Bauhaus remains a very great album.
I never "got" goth, either, and I don't care to bother trying. But, hellyeah, this is a great song I never heard!
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