Is a Goth revival in our midst? PSFK investigate the darker side of fashion and music

A recent study by Sussex University found that teenagers who become Goths are essentially middle class, more interested in books, poetry and the arts and very likely to be doctors, lawyers or architects in adult life. No need to worry then for the middle classes if their sons and daughters take to dressing up in black overcoats, pile on the white make-up and become morose listening to the music of Bauhaus, Sisters of Mercy, Siouxsie and the Banshees or Fields of the Nephilim. They will grow out of it, or will they? Dunja Brill, who conducted the study, also found that “many teenagers carry on being Goths into their adult life, wearing toned down clothes, having good jobs, a mortgage, a car and children”.

Middle Class Subculture
A stroll round Camden Market regularly throws up emissaries of this “middle class subculture” who have long left pubescent times behind them. Ever since hooking up and marrying burlesque Betty Page double Dita van Teese even shock rocker Marylin Manson – whose lyrics were once blamed for inciting the Columbine massacre – has become so acceptable that his wedding pictures made the pages of Vogue. Manson was dressed in John Galliano, van Teese chose Vivienne Westwood for the nuptials. But is high-class or middle-class gothic fashion really the mode du jour again? Will we start ferociously plucking away at our eyebrows only to redraw them in a thin line over a base coat of near-white foundation and baby powder.

Goths Have Never Been Away
Acolytes of the scene will readily tell you that Goths have never been away. Recently a gig by Gothfathers Bauhaus saw queues trail around the back of London’s Brixton Academy. Admittedly most of the audience were the best part of 30, still the band garnered rave reviews and might be due for a comeback. Similarly The Cure, also often associated with the scene, played their only summer show in April at the Royal Albert Hall. Sisters of Mercy frontman Andrew Eldritch never liked to be associated with the Goth phenomenon, but is still banking on said audience to fill the pockets of his golden blazer (his stage outfit in 1992). In May he is back in the UK for several live performances.

Gothic Spirit In Moderation
But music aside, what about gothic fashion? The Times recently called Chanel’s Karl Lagerfeld’s a “white haired, fan-wielding demi-Goth”. Paris fashion shows for A/W 2006 have led the paper’s fashion editor Lisa Armstrong to predict that “Gothic spirit will enter your wardrobe”. Taking inspiration from designers such as Viktor & Rolf, Jean Paul Gaultier, Alexander McQueen or Lanvin, her take on the matter is thankfully characterised by a strong call for moderation.In the throws of the Eighties revival, skull print scarves, drainpipes, leggings, stripes or smokey eye make-up, gothic chic might soon be rising from the dead in a high street shop near you.

Gotik Professionals
Failing that, just head to the German town of Leipzig at the beginning of June for the Wave-Gotik Treffen. Now in its 15th year this gothic gathering attracts more than 20,000 people with this year’s line-up including band such as All Gone Dead, Bloodflowerz, Cate Rapes Dog, Gothminster, Killing Miranda and – bizarrely –Heaven 17. The German gothic movement has also influenced the look of the country’s biggest teenband Tokio Hotel incidentally also from Leipzig. The group’s 16-year-old frontboy Bill dyes his hair black, wears dark nail varnish and more black eye make-up than Robert Smith in his heyday. But parents need not fret. Most pubescent girls copying are destined to have a middle class career and become a lawyer anyway.

WORDS: Andrea Dash