Cradle of Filth are a popular goth band who have defined a certain aeshetic (Picture: Jo Hale/Getty Images)

Whether you’re an aspiring vampire, have a passion for black PVC or just enjoy Tim Burton movies, it’s time to goth ‘n’ roll.

Yes, it’s World Goth Day 2018, the perfect time to paint everything black and hide in the shadows.

Goth music, movies, fashion and lifestyles have been around for yonks, and Whitby Goth Weekend still commands serious dedication and sartorial excellence every year.

But where does ‘goth’ come from, who was the first ever goth and when did goth music start?


A gathering of goths in Whitby at the Vampire Society weekend, 1992 (Picture: Getty)

Goth, or at least the movement we know of today, began in the late 1960s.



And it was first used to describe music – specifically, the sound of The Doors, Jim Morrison’s rock band.

Critic John Stickney coined the term ‘gothic rock’ way back in 1967 when describing a Doors gig, so it may be argued that Jim Morrison was the first modern goth.

Tim Burton movies, like his adaptation of Sweeney Todd, are infused with goth (Picture: Paramount)

Stickney wrote that the cavernous venue was ‘the perfect room to honour the Gothic rock of the Doors’.

That same year, Velvet Underground’s track All Tomorrow’s Parties was also described as a ‘mesmerising gothic-rock masterpiece’ by Kurt Loder.

It wasn’t until a decade later, in the late 70s, that goth started to be thought of as a genre.

Jim Morrison in 1967, the year he and his band The Doors inspired the term ‘Gothic rock’ (Picture: Getty)

Siouxsie Sioux of Siouxsie and the Banshees performs in 1978 (Picture: Gus Stewart/Redferns)

And a striking image, involving pale make-up and wild hair, was presented by singers from bands like The Damned and Siouxsie and the Banshees.

The latter band was compared to ‘gothic rock architects The Doors and The Velvet Underground’ by one critic.

At the same time, goth was being reflected in cinemas with the arrival of films like Suspiria and Eraserhead in 1977, and Wener Herzog’s Nosferatu in 1979.

Quintessential goth band Bauhaus formed in 1978, and by the time the brash, shallow decade of the 1980s had kicked off, goth was firmly established.

Dave Vanian and his band The Damned also came to define goth music (Picture: Harry Goodwin/Paul Popper/Popperfoto/Getty Images)

Goth acted as the perfect counterpoint to the neon pop and electro tunes of the 1980s.

Some bands, like Dead Or Alive, melded the two genres together, while the goth image became central to artists with a broad appeal like The Cure and performers like Nick Cave.

It soon transpired that goth had more longevity than punk (though the two were related) because aspects of goth were absorbed by the mainstream.

Robert Smith and his band The Cure were at the forefront of 80s goth though their sound is more accessible than most bands of the genre (Picture: Getty)

However, the concept of goth predates the musical genre by several hundred years.

The first ever usage of the term ‘gothic’ came in 1764, when Horace Walpole was describing his novel, The Castle of Otranto.

Walpole took the term Gothic from architecture, implying that these sort of tales would take place in (pseudo)-medieval buildings, which he happened to admire and live in himself.

In fact, Walpole is likely the best candidate for first goth in history, because he really lived it.

The origin of goth lies in a story by Horace Walpole, right, called The Castle of Otranto Pictures: Getty)

Poet Thomas Gray told Walpole that The Castle of Otranto made ‘some of us cry a little, and all in general afraid to go to bed o’nights’.

His creepy story then inspired a huge wave of Gothic literature, that included works like Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights.



Dracula, which was written in 1897, was one of the most influential in terms of the UK because Whitby, where some of it was written and set, is thought of as the home of British goths.

Whitby Goth Weekend attendees in 2017 (Picture: Rahman Hassani/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Whitby has become the home of goth over the years (Picture: Ian Forsyth/Getty Images)

But of course, goths can be found all over the globe, even if it is harder to hide from the sun in warm countries.

And while subcultures continue to come and go, goth has remained pretty much unchanged over the years.

That said, several goth subcultures have been spawned over the last few decades, including cybergoth, steampunk and trad goth.

This image of a goth dad with his baby shows there are no limits to goth dedication (Picture: Twitter)

In April 2018, Whitby Goth Weekend once again attracted some of the most beautifully-dressed goths for its events once again.

However, goths know that darkness is not just for a weekend, but for life.

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