Heart of a Punk Soul of a Rasta

The Birth of Goth (Part 1) - A Winter's Tale.

Everyone who has heard the word Goth will have their own image to accompany it. If questioned to who they believe were or are the main exponents of Goth music, they may readily facilitate you with a list of disparate names. However when you ask if they know how Goth music came into being their answer may not come with such speed or certainty.

There is usually a defining moment in the chaotic birth of a musical hybrid. For punk in the UK it was those first Sex Pistols gigs outside London, the Lesser Free Trade Hall Manchester, Eric's Club Liverpool, where the Pistols inspired a multitude to take up the cudgel. And later at the Club Lafayette Wolverhampton where they inspired - well it didn't happen like that everywhere.

But I digress; I have to tell you of a curious series of serendipitous happenings, meetings and personal interactions that gave life to Goth music. Looking over the facts before me I can see that the date of its conception can unequivocally be traced back to the evening of the 22nd December 1977.

Almost a month before on the 29th November Siouxsie Sioux and the Banshees recorded a session for the John Peel Show - four tracks Love in a Void, Mirage, Metal Postcard and Suburban Relapse. Siouxsie received the princely some of £50 in cash for the session - she had a pressing requirement for the money. She missed the first transmission of the session on the 5th of December but listened to the second broadcast on the evening of the 21st of December, on the 22nd Siouxsie and the Banshees made their way to Wales where they played at the Dixieland Showbar Colwyn Bay. Her money from the Peel session had been wisely spent and a trusted friend remained in London to do the necessary. The day of the 23rd December was bright, cloudless and pleasantly warm but the temperature plummeted when dark descended and the capital froze on one of the coldest nights of the winter. The band returned to London and that evening Siouxsie remained cocooned within the confines of her London flat.

On the morning of the 22nd of December 1977 at 8 Strawberry Lane Yarmouth Port Massachusetts the writer and illustrator Edward Gorey looked distractedly through his morning post, it amounted to six or seven letters but only one took his attention, it was hand written in firm large capitals of black ink and had a neat row English postage stamps affixed to the top right hand corner. He turned over papers on his desk, stood and lifted aside a stack of books, opened a side drawer and finally laid a hand on a small meticulously carved off white whale bone paper knife, in one swift and assured flourish he slit open the letter.

More than three thousand miles away on the evening of the 22nd of December '77 Robert Smith and the Easy Cure were playing live in his home town of Crawley. They would do so again the next evening but on this evening he did something that was extremely out of character. At eight o'clock Smith left the small venue alone saying that he needed to make "a personal call" - his prolonged absence soon became a cause for concern. He ventured out into the sharp dry chill air intending simply to cross the road to the red telephone box opposite, but when he swung open the heavy metal and glass door and entered the box the acrid stench of burnt plastic that entered his nostrils informed him, prior to lifting the receiver to his ear, that the telephone was inoperable. He knew the area well and knew also the distance and time it would take to reach the next nearest phone box, he paused for a moment looking across at the St Edwards Church Hall musing inwardly, a huddled group of four people stood outside the main doors seemingly returning his gaze, it was perishingly cold but to his mind there was no inner debate required, he turned, stepped over the grass verge back into the middle of the pavement then began walking briskly away. Beneath the silver orbs of light emanating from the evenly spaced lampposts he quickly broke into a run along the straight suburban road, after hundred yards or so he entered a patch of shadow, a smashed or burnt out bulb broke the line, the blackness of the night enveloped him, and he was lost from sight.

Unknowingly the connections were made, the runes had been cast.