Popular Culture Review Vol. 16, No. 1, Spring 2005 | Page 83

Goth and Industrial Cultures
79
both sexes. Goths of both genders wear considerable amounts of silver jewelry,
including earrings, nose rings, bracelets and necklaces along with the more
recent additions of piercings to lips, eyebrows, tongues, and navels (Hodkinson
2002; Porter 2003).
Like Goth, Industrial music developed around the mid-1980s. Unlike
Goth, Industrial culture was not an offspring of punk, but was bom out of
performance art, most notably through the group Throbbing Gristle (Dugiud
1995). The term “Industrial music” is attributed to Throbbing Gristle’s recording
label, Industrial Records. Early Industrial groups pursued the idea of
“transgressive culture” where noise was music (e.g., train locomotives, factory
sounds, jack hammers, etc.). Since these early years of pre-industrial history, the
genre has evolved into two distinct classes: experimental (or noncommercial)
and dance (or commercial). In the former category, performers are more aligned
with the original incarnation of Industrial music. The latter group incorporates
power rock, techno, and EBM (electro beat music). In the early to mid-1990s,
groups such as Ministry, Skinny Puppy, and KDFM were at the forefront of
Industrial music. More recently, groups such as Funkervogt and VNVNation
have contributed to the genre. Industrial music (and, by extension, the culture)
emphasizes the theme of responding to living in a de-humanized, subversive
society with paranoia and aggression. Goth and Industrial music are often
listened to at the same venue as both share themes of dispossession, alienation,
and fear.
Methods
Site:
McCall and Becker (1990:5) argue questions are answered by “going to
see for yourself, studying the real world, and evaluating the evidence so
gathered.” Heeding this call, a Goth-Industrial nightclub located in Hollywood,
California, served as the research site. The nightclub Blue operates as one of the
locations for the promotion company Evil Club Empire (ECE). On Thursday
nights, Blue transforms into Perversion. Situated just south of Hollywood
Boulevard in the heart of that city, Blue is a mid-sized club with main and back
areas (i.e., rooms). The rooms are separated by a wall. Two hallways on each
side of the wall allows patrons to easily travel between each room. Both rooms
contain full bars, DJ booths, and dance floors. Perversion is advertised as
featuring an “Industrial Room: EBM, Electro Tec, Dark Techno” music and a
back area “Gothic Room: Goth, Ethereal, Dark Eighties” (see Appendix A). The
club is patrolled by in-house security. Capacity ranges from 200 to 500 people
on any given night.
Data:
The categorization of Goth and Industrial by the larger society as
deviant has been well established in the literature (Gunn 1999; Hodkinson 2002;