Noughties: The Story of Goth in the 2000's

Why did goths change the way they interacted with outsiders after Columbine, why was fashion of the time starkly different from today, why was gatekeeping part of the scene in the first place, and why weren’t goths allowed to smile before 2010. All this and more as we walk through the story of goth in the late 90’s and early 2000’s with a panel of goths who lived through it.
Our guests this month are
Jessie Meowser: / jessiemeowser
Jessica: / ultramarinedream
Bruce Lord: www.idieyoudie.com/
If you enjoy the show, please support us on Patreon!
/ cemeteryconfessions
Intro 00:00
90's 3:48
Club Scene 11:20
Life in the 2000's 44:25
Columbine and 9/11 1:20:30
Goth Was Just Different 1:37:00
Vampires: 2:05:00
Emo vs. Goth 2:15:40
Find More 2:30:00
Fashion 2:34:08
Mallgoth 2:50:00

References:
-90’s goth youtube playlist
• Goth Documentaries
-90’s goth youtube playlist
• 90's Goth Realness (cl...
-small town goth
• Being a Small Town Got...
-simronan
l. l.php?h=AT3Gsa...

[@sephfaraj8480]

Loving the nostalgia. The photo collage is amazing! My partner and I have been doing a lot of talking lately about how the baby bats these days seem to look back on this time kinda like how we in the 00s did with the early 90s (depending on your age) and of course the 80s, and how all the shades and eras of goth experience need to be preserved for the youth for entertainment and educational purposes. It's so surreal to have a time you lived through be looked at through lenses of idealization by younger folks. Thank you for your labor for this community 🖤

[@Cyauuu]

I was just thinking about how people say the scene died or changed in the 2000s and was waiting for a vid about it! You never miss, I swear! Can’t wait to watch

[@MissLizzy882]

Ahhh!! Here we go - my era! Gosh, this is going to be a nostalgia feast! 😂

[@DesertNebula]

After Colombian my middle school banned chains, trench coats and all black rocker type outfits 😐 I also noticed most venues banned metal head type jewelry. That's when I got into my raver era. That lasted a few years but I would still incorporate dark military aspects. Once my high school got off our backs, I went back to rivet head. I do miss goth picnics taking pictures.....in trees 😅 2:49:48 this unlocked a memory! I remember a store in hollyweird. New rocks with 3foot platforms, holes with springs. 3:09:01 me mentally running to the dance floor 💃

[@-RONNIE]

I want to thank you all for the episode. There was a lot of memories growing up back in the 90's & 2000's. I think so many people in this generation has lost out on the experience of the subculture in some way or another.

[@CemeteryConfessions]

Thank you for all the support! 🪦

[@-RONNIE]

@@CemeteryConfessions I hope you all enjoy your upcoming weekend

[@jessiemeowser]

This photo collage is precious. 🔥 Thanks so much for having me. That is funny that cyber and bunker fashion and people went unsaid. For myself in California, by the time 2000 came, Cyber was already happening. I remember my friend telling me about a girl that had a cyberlock brand doing well. On the club side, Das Bunker in LA is where ebm/industrial excludes goth. EBM had the main room with cyber crowd by the stage. Rivetheads and myself took the middle or rear. That room holds hundred of people. We also had the noise room/loft and old school industrial/ebm basement. It also had a gamer room with different computer terminals set up. I never really hung out on the patio. I was dancing non-stop. Patio is good place to be in general on the social side.

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I felt the hair falls and goggles made their way in the steampunk scene as well. It has quite the colorful history. Who didn’t make their own falls in the late 90s/early 00s? Patios and inner “smoking” rooms in CA were quite enough to actually meet people. :)

[@jessiemeowser]

I never did the cyber look. But I loved some of the looks and they definitely were a thing then. I Definitely associate goggles with steampunk but in bronze/gold tones more so. For cybergoth and Rivetheads I saw the ready for war actual military surplus gas masks for Rivetheads in the late 90s/very early 2000s. For cybergoths, I saw more marketed to dark alt nuclear/toxic gas masks and goggles for fashion, not function. So much eye candy back then. And suddenly colorful in contrast to the 90s. 90s had some surprising colors but overall it was the blackest of times in California 😊 @wildmajoramdieselpunk6396

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I miss songs like “Bite of God” being played at goth nights. I am not sure if it is the Midwest, but here I hear “Time Warp” and “Magic Dance” a lot vs. stuff I like from Ant-Zen…so it’s odd. I miss Faith and the Muse played as well. I also got water once at a SS show for Tina Root and talked to her about Nina Hagen. My favorite band is Foetus and honestly, only heard “Bedrock” once.

[@jeradswartz5609]

Danny Ashes you are amazing. Thank you so much for this show every month. Hope that you can do more often.

[@CemeteryConfessions]

Well you're in luck, because there *should* be a new episode in a couple weeks!

[@samuelpenn2973]

I adore the pictures!

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I remember a Elizabethan collar moment in the late 90s/early 00s. Still have mine!

[@jessiemeowser]

The Europeans in 2010s definitely had a beautiful ruff trend comeback. Didn’t see it here in the states though. I was tempted. Still time. Always time to experiment with a goth look

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

Do any of you remember a song that was basically only factory sounds to an increasing beat? It was instrumental. I thought it was an Ant-Zen artist but I searched most of their bands and never found it. It was a very boot stompy song. Once in LA, I heard so much stomping during it, it almost sounded military. Can anyone help me here? Thanks! This would be early 00s.

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

Yeah, you really can’t find goths or punks by only their dress anymore. Maybe you can find steampunks. I saw a girl dressed goth with a Cramps sweatshirt on a few months ago and I asked her what her favorite Cramps song was and she said she got the sweatshirt because the graphic was cool. She didn’t listen to them. But hey when the Kardashians throw the word goth around and wear corsets…look how much of that goes on like at the Met Gala…it really waters down what goth is now. Oh you mentioned Nick Fiend. Love that guy! Ms. Fiend too! More awkward goth! That needs to happen!

[@robertpetre9378]

There used to be a company in the U.K. called Criminal Damage that sold so called Tripp pants in the U.K. and a lot of people I know who were getting into goth and other alternative subcultures would wear them as well as bondage trousers which I always preferred because of the buckles and straps. One of the things I used to do which I’m not sure if anyone else did at the time was to sew 🪡 patches into my trousers and when I would tear them by mistake, I would often use safety pins 🧷 to try and conceal the tear.

[@greekvampy3690]

Some of those questions are still asked today

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I always felt Laibach was satire. I also think the “sad goth” was that many new wavers or New Romantics listened to both The Cure and The Smiths. Writing poetry in the cemetery and reading Mary Shelley. :)

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I wore trench coats in the late 80s in high school. The Cure wore them in a poster I had. Also easy to find in a secondhand or surplus store. Still wear them but buy fancier ones with piping or more Victorian looking in rich wine velvet or purple wool.

[@user-kk2pc7ik7t]

It never seizes to amaze me what people have to deal with. As for Eric and Dylan, Im sure there are lots of opinions about why they did it, but it's pretty obvious that such cases are complex. There's lots of books about the Columbine shooting, including A mothers reckoning by Sue Klebold.

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I remember mix tapes were key. Your friends would buy all different music and trade or even record songs off the TV!

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I was told to wear less black in the 90s at jobs, so I would go to thrift stores and buy the grossest items to wear. I found a green sweater made out of leather chords and it had an odd smell. Hot pink angora sweater and skirt set. Neon dresses. Ugly tye dye stuff. They never asked again. I had girl friends who had to borrow clothing that wasn’t black from friends for jobs. We also colored our hair in the bottom layer or shaved the bottom layer so we could put our “normal” hair so our parents wouldn’t find out. I don’t think any of my male goth friends had the same problem with dark clothing since that was the norm for men. Sexist, yup. There was an idea girls only wore pastels or maybe neon…it’s weird to think about it now.

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I found the 90s less sexist and less fat phobic. A lot of the smaller run goth zines had plus size girls in them. The thin goth is the stereotype but I didn’t feel this until I lived in CA. The gothic beauty contest one of the later magazines had were odd to me and thin goths always won. :/ I felt in smaller towns, everyone was accepted early on because it was underground. Less people.

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I went to H&M and there was a girl in complete goth makeup and Baphomet tee shirt, working the register. What a world! Or a girl with neon makeup all over her cheeks at Kohls. Crazy. I compliment them. :)

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

Ooh, is there talk about goth magazines here? I have so many and bought them at local music shops. Tower Records, remember that? When I moved, I thought of selling them, but they are precious, so I still have a comic book box filled with them. Some were even one off. I just can’t let them go. Propaganda, Ghastly, Black Moon, Industrial Nation, etc. Sigh. And some cool European ones with so much information on bands. Can’t remember the names of those unlessI dig in the box!

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

In my town, goths and strippers both bought their shoes at The Wild Pair.

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

Never heard of the “no smiling” thing. I was never told by anyone what to do. :/ I just danced swirly too. I never got why it had to be named. I was never pressured to “bring it”. Was it different in other cities or countries? Was it just your peer group? It reminds me of that movie, “My Summer as a Goth”. Bands smiling too much? Where was this? My experience was totally different. I smiled and had a ball. :) I have heard of the “goth card” and “goth points” as jokes, though.

[@CreightonChaney-io4xv]

This definitely takes me back to when I just entered adulthood and got to go clubbing in the '00s I met and got engaged twice and married once Met some friends, frenemies and a nemesis I finished filming a horror movie and later met my now ex-wife

[@Chill-mm4pn]

I had that same Siouxsie Sioux' shirt! And Asleep By Dawn had the CD with magazine! Ah, such nostalgia.🖤 It was definitely different from today when it comes to us dealing with normies. It is nice to see other black goths and poc in the scene. I see more of us in the scene now in my late 30s. Also nice to see how it's less animosity towards us. Granted things are different these days. However, I am heavily tattooed, pierced, and quite muscular so due to that people treat me differently because I look masculine with a shaved head and beard.(My hair won't grow like it used to!). I just wear mens' and a quite a bit of women's jewelry lol. As a black guy in rural virginia I still get looks when I'm NOT dressed to the nines so I just say fuck it. I'm too old to really care. Churches everywhere and as a pagan I just mind my business. Though it is very conservative here.

[@CemeteryConfessions]

Totally agree, thank you for sharing. And I still have that shirt except it's almost totally Grey now and it has no sleeves 😄

[@Chill-mm4pn]

​@@CemeteryConfessions☺️🖤🖤

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I lived in a smaller city and found the gothic shirts I bought local ended up being bootlegs. :)

[@ostwestfalischehochmoorlei4705]

Was ist a cool time? It was. We were young freaks. 😂 But more than 20 years later I feel more commod and free spendig life time in the scene and in my life outside the scene. Thats not realy all couse the world is more free. That are the years of subculture, position in life, and the age too. But i'm very sorry many alternative countryside discos closed through the years in Northwestern Germany. Shops closed too. So, I think for todays young freaks... goth, punk, metal, grunge etc it ist harder to meet new in real life and go out together to alternative places. The internet is not equal for that. What stayed through the years, till today: Goth... and many mixed alternative spaces... are save spaces for people. Age, gender, sexuality, style, job etc isnt a prime thing. Feel free, feel relaxed. There ist no "agression" about. Thats timeless wonderful.

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I feel people should start doing the coffee nights again. I would like to do a gothic or steampunk one, but a lot of my local coffee places shut earlier than they used to.

[@Miserycordya]

starting the video and already a flood of nostalgia lol .. how old are you currently, CC? As a 36 year old, i feel conflicted about where I fit into this crazy world. it's a horrible feeling, and not sure what to do with it..

[@CemeteryConfessions]

37! Ya I was a bit melancholy the week we recorded after going through all those memories.

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

@@CemeteryConfessionsTry being 50. :/

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I enjoyed all the female voiced bands in the 90s/early 00s. The Shroud, Stone 588, Dead Can Dance, Die Form, Faith and the Muse, Faith and Disease, Wench, Switchblade Symphony, Gitane Demone, Lacrimosa, Siouxsie, Cocteau Twins, Lush, Pixies, Black Tape for a Blue Girl, This Mortal Coil, Attrition, Ataraxia, Demonia Nymphe, etc. I am not sure if females voices are as populous now. :/

[@Flamingfred]

Daniel, I need the link for this at the belfry network so I can listen to this while scrolling on fb.

[@CemeteryConfessions]

Hey thanks for the heads up! I've somehow been locked out of my Google developer account so I'm not sure I can fix the app, but I'll keep working on it.

[@JhonNye96]

Anyone know where to get that Joy Division shirt in the upper left?

[@CemeteryConfessions]

Unfortunately I bought that shirt in 2004, so I have no idea where it came from. Sorry!

[@greekvampy3690]

Septermber 11th 2001 was when goth gate keeping took off but it took a dive in 2005 thanks to emos

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

Oh, there was gatekeeping way before that! :)

[@Happygoluckyghost]

We can't get old.

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

Tell that to my back. :)

[@Happygoluckyghost]

@@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396 touche.

[@greekvampy3690]

I live in country suberbs even now pepole are intmenateď by goth

[@greekvampy3690]

In the 1990s goth was way more underground & money limited to mager city's in 200s goth started rise up in the suberbrs even though goth entered the suberbers in 1998

[@greekvampy3690]

The cell phone played a mager facter it increased the goth alturive cumunity plus the collapse & the destruction of skate parks by poltitions add to goth too especily if u lived in the suberbs in californa

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

It is weird because my 90s nostalgia are all these great indie goth bands and not the typical 90s music everyone else loves like the Cranberries or Smashing Pumpkins. When people say “90s music”, I think of The Shroud or local bands I helped set up. :)

[@greekvampy3690]

Even now pepole are still haveing those same problems

[@medusatorrez8068]

Gasmasks 😅

[@wildmarjoramdieselpunk6396]

I feel like gas masks and cyber falls found it’s way into steampunk culture a decade or two later.