There are few subcultures as globally and universally recognisable as goth. Derided by those outside of it, it is the quintessential subculture for misfits. Defined by its alternativeness rather than any geographical centrality, anyone anywhere can be a goth. But while the Batcave club, which opened in Soho in 1982, gave goth the platform that would spread the scene across the globe, it was in Leeds and its surrounding suburbs that goth evolved from punk to have an aesthetic and identity of its own.

Like other subcultures that had their origins in punk, the scene was the product of a generation that felt it had little or no future. Under Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government, economic instability caused mass youth unemployment in industrial cities across the north of England. As in other provincial cities such as Manchester and Liverpool, a lack of jobs created a sense of disenfranchisement in Leeds and its surrounding towns. Adding to the city’s gloomy atmosphere was the on-going spate of murders committed by serial killer Peter Sutcliffe — dubbed the ‘The Yorkshire Ripper’ by the press — who was responsible for 13 murders and several attempted murders of women around the city from 1975 until his arrest in 1981.

Describing the atmosphere in the city during the germination of the scene in the late 70s, music promoter John Keenan said Sutcliffe “held the city to ransom”, creating a climate of fear. “Leeds was a bit of a dump in those days, a dark and gloomy industrial city. The whole of Boar Lane (at the bottom of the city centre) was crumbling and the pavements were dug up,” he says, “It was a pretty doomy city.”

“They didn’t clean the buildings and there was a lot of pollution. All the buildings were blackened with exhaust fumes, and it just had a depressing feel to it. The (Yorkshire) Ripper had been on the loose for a few years and there was an atmosphere of ‘What’s he going to do next?’ People were paranoid. They didn’t want to go out, parents didn’t want their daughters to go out or their own, or even with friends.”

“The (Yorkshire) Ripper had been on the loose for a few years and there was an atmosphere of ‘What’s he going to do next?’ People were paranoid. They didn’t want to go out, parents didn’t want their daughters to go out or their own, or even with friends.”

Keenan, who had promoted gigs at university in the 60s, returned to the Leeds music scene after the emergence of punk and post-punk, putting on ‘darkwave’ bands such as Joy Division, The Damned, and Siouxsie & the Banshees, who would each heavily influence gothic rock.

Bands at the forefront of the local music scene such as the Sisters of Mercy and Red Lorry Yellow Lorry styled themselves in all-black, wearing the jewellery and hairstyles that would come to define and differentiate the subculture from punk. The release of Bauhaus’s single “Bela Lugosi's Dead” was a seminal moment for what would become gothic rock, leading to a number of bands in the city to combine the sound of the record with influences of punk and glam rock.