This is Suspiria. A 90s goth band.

If it were up to me they'd be worshiped more than Rozz Williams.

Opinions (even my own) taint everything. My perspective comes from a different place to everyone else. But that doesn't mean different opinions and perspectives aren't important. What is important is to listen to as many as possible and never assume one "expert" should have more say than anyone else. If the things many people say match up and are evidenced in historical facts, its likely to be true.

I have said it once and I'll say it again - consult multiple sources and make up your own mind. Don't let a single source decide what goth and the goth subculture are for you. Seriously, if you aren't even willing to do a little research into this thing that you "love", "is where you belong" and "is a part of you" then why the hell are you here?

Re-Writing History

Boy have I seen a lot of this going on of late. But its nothing new. People have been trying to do this for years, often out of ignorance, sometimes to push a personal agenda. But not always. Sometimes something that happens locally will influence how they think history must have happened before they came along. This can be done in positive ways, negative ways and applying modern standards for either.

The positive way (ie - seeing the world through bat-coloured glasses) is to over-emphasize the importance of certain things or to apply positive modern standards to the past.

A local example (for me) is Proscenium - the "goth" club in Adelaide which ran from early 90s to early 2000s. A lot of younger people today hear stories and assumed it was a goth haven where everyone dressed in black and it was 100% goth 100% of the time. The reality is at best it was goth one night a week (Thursday) and had some goth played on Saturday which was mixed genre. The Friday night was indie night and a mostly different crowd went to that. They tried an 80s night at one point on a Wednesday but it never worked out. They also used to have huge events like raves and hip hop nights (often in place of Saturday nights which pissed off the regulars as they were never announced to us in advance so we knew to stay away) because they made a ton of money. If it wasn't for the owner treating it as his hobby farm/tax write-off it would have closed years before it did. Also a lot of people dressed in colour. It didn't really start doing the sea of black thing until around 2000 when the punks disappeared and all the metalheads turned up.

See? Bat-coloured glasses. The modern standard is people assume it was like how things are today. They don't realize things like metalheads being rare at goth clubs in the 90s because most metalheads usually hated goths and goth music. Also (at least in Adelaide) punk maintained a stronger influence up until the late 90s. That positive modern standard tends to think it was more inclusive than people perceive the goth subculture to be today. I would say the mixed genre stuff was very inclusive (it covered all things alternative) but the goth nights were not.

Lets put it this way... you don't tend to see dance-based attacks or glasses and billiard balls thrown at people the locals deem as being unworthy anymore. I would know - I was one who was deemed unworthy.





