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Dark Entries that weren't

© Jason C. Reeher

Everyone knows that gothic rock was invented by Bauhaus, if inadvertently, with their 1979 single “Bela Lugosi’s Dead.” Although Peter Murphy and company were quick to dismiss the title, Bauhaus had become kings of goth with their first album, “In the Flat Field,” in 1980. The band yielded a growing cult of eager young rock fans, who were drawn to the dark power of the imagery. Although Bauhaus sometimes tongue-in-cheek humor was often overlooked, the band had certainly started something.

The “Bat Cave” following wasn’t limited to mere fans, however; some of the goth kids started bands. In most cases, Bauhaus’ lyrical depth and experimentation with form was discarded, leaving the fledgling followers foundering in corny vampire garb and bad poetry. Many of these groups never got over the initial images, and so they painted themselves into a corner – albeit a black one.

By the late 1980’s and early 1990’s, the gothic scene was alive and well, if at times unimaginative. A great document of this “hit or miss” period is the hard-to-find three disc box set compilation, “Monsters of Goth.” Its very title belies the gothic dilemma: it’s a thin line between scary and stupid. Released on the enigmatic Dressed to Kill label in the U.K. in 1997, “Monsters of Goth” is an important document of some forgotten bands.

Disc One starts off righteously enough, with The Mission’s rousing “Stars Don’t Shine,” Lydia Lunch’s noisy, impending-doom mantra on “Stink Fist,” and Alien Sex Fiend’s (goth’s answer to the Cramps) unhinged reminiscence “Class of ’69.” That track sounds like what the Sex Pistols might have been if they had stayed together and hung around the Bat Cave, while Specimen’s “Hex,” also on Disc One, would provide a blueprint for Prodigy’s later success.

No exception to the rule, however, the first disc also shows the silly side of goth as well. Gene Loves Jezebel makes a dubious appearance, and Joy Division wannabes Red Lorry Yellow Lorry are on about something. Either of them are magnificent, however, compared to the cringe-worthy Ghost Dance, a Sisters Of Mercy side project which never lived up to the original band’s magnificence.

Disc Two is the best of the three. Lords of the New Church start it off with their inimitable dark rockabilly (“New Church”), and New Model Army’s “Sex” is claustrophobic, minimalist brilliance. Yet the lesser known (at least in the U.S.) bands take center stage here. “Decline and Fall” is perhaps the best track ever by goth’s resident minor-leaguers, Flesh for Lulu, while the Marionettes rock with abandon on the anthemic, bitter “Absolution.”

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