ice cream and sadness image
Nuseed
I love all types of musics but my 13 year old sister has told me that one of my favorite songs, "Love Like Winter" by AFI is an emo song. I thought emo songs were depressing. Love Like Winter makes me want to get up and shake my booty--not want to grab a gallon of ice cream and cry. I always equated emo with goth music. But then my sister tells me there's a difference. She proceeded to explain the difference but I suddenly developed a headache midway through her explaination. Maybe you guys can help me out. Straight to the point please [I'd like some examples of groups and songs]
Thanks in advance!
The question is, "what's the difference between goth and emo?" Seems everyone is answering everything but the question I asked.
Answer
Goth in musical structure tends to be extremely disciplined which contributes to the strictly constructed spiderweb of overlayed instrumental textures that result in a lush density still allowing for the play of space in the music to create a breathing lifelike quality to the music. For the most part the vocals in Goth are postured affectations of either effeminite or masculine caracatures.
Emo on the other hand is a musical Gestalt self actualization knife edge of emotion that can become destructive as easily as it can become overwrought in delight. While not of the emo Genre it is believed that the post punk speed pop of Husker Du's Zen Arcade album is a primary influence on emo. The music itself combined the thrash, random quality of punks musical sloppieness but where punks posture was that of not caring about self or society emo is entrenched in the extremes of emotion and passion and played out in raw fierceness and recklessness with a greater emphasis on the overall mass of the music and less attention to finer style points.
Goth on the other hand not only embraced a sonic style it also was equally conscious of an entire image and cultural style drawing from the darkness of Gothic horror novels, art, history and in practice actually adopting the Aubrey Beardsley frayed gauntness in appearance. Goth was a complete scene which was as intricately woven with the music as the music was with the image. Bauhaus set a tone, followed by Souxie and the Banshees, The Damned, Joy Division all worked in a heavilly dark mood tonally and played to the characterization of dissapated pseudo zombie fasion further enhancing the mystery and disassociation the scene wished to embody. The lynchpin of the Goth scenes establishment as a culture and artform was brought about by The Cure. While Souxie maintained her virtual monotone musical constructs it was Robert Smith that expanded the genre musically by interplay of story, pathos, humor, ennui, coupled to music that ranged from playful novelty swing to thick sludgy waves of dynamic drive to near avant garde noise all with heavily emotional revelations that went from the nightmarish to the juvenile fantasy to the crushing sadness and melancholy of grief all with a remarkable agility. Goth had an artist of real merit.
Emo however never gained a full identity due mainly to the emphasis on emotional expression over creative expression. Where Goth could spawn the industrial hedonism of an Andrew Eldrich and Sisters of Mercy with their nearly erotic manifesto of power and lust, desertion and motion Emo couldn't find the way to encorporate a cohesive identity.
Goth however did encumber itself in pretense and imagery and eventually all fog machines and drones become monotonous which due to the Cure's expanding stylistic range was laid even more exposed as lacking in dimension. Goth became formulaic for all but the few and for many of them it was an infusion of synth techno or industrial that prolonged their viability.
Emo on the other hand virtually vaporized as the sound of many bands proved thin on music and mostly cobbled together sound. Of all the bands associated with emo it is often Fugazi that gets the nod as most significant which is indicative of the nebulous form emo barely established since Fugazi isn't an emo band.
Goth has managed to produce a couple of truly legendary musical forces in Robert Smith and Siouxie Sioux.
The thematic thread of Goth is curiously a delicate tenderness of expressions of love. While it has been saddled as death music there is a strong vein of passion and joy that belies the gloom. One perverse offshoot that has been tagged as Goth but is actually the purely manufactured pretender to the Shock Rock crown of Alice Cooper is Marilyn Manson who is a practitioner of Theater of Shock Rock with roots in Arthur Brown's Crazy World and Screaming Lord Sutch's Jack the Ripper theatrics where the show validated the music and only in the case of Alice Cooper did the music rise to the quality of the production.
I personally believe that emo never coalesced into anything beyond tenuous potential and sporadic unpredictability in performance and output and if the spirit of the emo genre is what one desires a listen to Husker Du's Zen Arcade or Land Speed Record or even the bleak Candy Apple Grey would be worthwhile but know in advance that Zen Arcade is an extremely intense sonic experience that will test ones tolerances.
Emo never really stopped being punk while Goth morphed into New Wave/Synth/Industrial/Techno/ and whatever bits and pieces could be encorporated into the Goth Creature is remains.
I should say that I'm adamantly against calling any of the current offerings claiming Goth or emo cred anything but substanceless chamelions merging images and postures with mediocre rehashes of weak copies of past scenes. All show and no go musically for the ones I've heard but there is no room for artists in the business these days, sell the package and the fad and move on, one day barefoot surf roots balladeers, the nextday pogoing pop punk midgets with punk coreography and matching wardrobes.
Goth in musical structure tends to be extremely disciplined which contributes to the strictly constructed spiderweb of overlayed instrumental textures that result in a lush density still allowing for the play of space in the music to create a breathing lifelike quality to the music. For the most part the vocals in Goth are postured affectations of either effeminite or masculine caracatures.
Emo on the other hand is a musical Gestalt self actualization knife edge of emotion that can become destructive as easily as it can become overwrought in delight. While not of the emo Genre it is believed that the post punk speed pop of Husker Du's Zen Arcade album is a primary influence on emo. The music itself combined the thrash, random quality of punks musical sloppieness but where punks posture was that of not caring about self or society emo is entrenched in the extremes of emotion and passion and played out in raw fierceness and recklessness with a greater emphasis on the overall mass of the music and less attention to finer style points.
Goth on the other hand not only embraced a sonic style it also was equally conscious of an entire image and cultural style drawing from the darkness of Gothic horror novels, art, history and in practice actually adopting the Aubrey Beardsley frayed gauntness in appearance. Goth was a complete scene which was as intricately woven with the music as the music was with the image. Bauhaus set a tone, followed by Souxie and the Banshees, The Damned, Joy Division all worked in a heavilly dark mood tonally and played to the characterization of dissapated pseudo zombie fasion further enhancing the mystery and disassociation the scene wished to embody. The lynchpin of the Goth scenes establishment as a culture and artform was brought about by The Cure. While Souxie maintained her virtual monotone musical constructs it was Robert Smith that expanded the genre musically by interplay of story, pathos, humor, ennui, coupled to music that ranged from playful novelty swing to thick sludgy waves of dynamic drive to near avant garde noise all with heavily emotional revelations that went from the nightmarish to the juvenile fantasy to the crushing sadness and melancholy of grief all with a remarkable agility. Goth had an artist of real merit.
Emo however never gained a full identity due mainly to the emphasis on emotional expression over creative expression. Where Goth could spawn the industrial hedonism of an Andrew Eldrich and Sisters of Mercy with their nearly erotic manifesto of power and lust, desertion and motion Emo couldn't find the way to encorporate a cohesive identity.
Goth however did encumber itself in pretense and imagery and eventually all fog machines and drones become monotonous which due to the Cure's expanding stylistic range was laid even more exposed as lacking in dimension. Goth became formulaic for all but the few and for many of them it was an infusion of synth techno or industrial that prolonged their viability.
Emo on the other hand virtually vaporized as the sound of many bands proved thin on music and mostly cobbled together sound. Of all the bands associated with emo it is often Fugazi that gets the nod as most significant which is indicative of the nebulous form emo barely established since Fugazi isn't an emo band.
Goth has managed to produce a couple of truly legendary musical forces in Robert Smith and Siouxie Sioux.
The thematic thread of Goth is curiously a delicate tenderness of expressions of love. While it has been saddled as death music there is a strong vein of passion and joy that belies the gloom. One perverse offshoot that has been tagged as Goth but is actually the purely manufactured pretender to the Shock Rock crown of Alice Cooper is Marilyn Manson who is a practitioner of Theater of Shock Rock with roots in Arthur Brown's Crazy World and Screaming Lord Sutch's Jack the Ripper theatrics where the show validated the music and only in the case of Alice Cooper did the music rise to the quality of the production.
I personally believe that emo never coalesced into anything beyond tenuous potential and sporadic unpredictability in performance and output and if the spirit of the emo genre is what one desires a listen to Husker Du's Zen Arcade or Land Speed Record or even the bleak Candy Apple Grey would be worthwhile but know in advance that Zen Arcade is an extremely intense sonic experience that will test ones tolerances.
Emo never really stopped being punk while Goth morphed into New Wave/Synth/Industrial/Techno/ and whatever bits and pieces could be encorporated into the Goth Creature is remains.
I should say that I'm adamantly against calling any of the current offerings claiming Goth or emo cred anything but substanceless chamelions merging images and postures with mediocre rehashes of weak copies of past scenes. All show and no go musically for the ones I've heard but there is no room for artists in the business these days, sell the package and the fad and move on, one day barefoot surf roots balladeers, the nextday pogoing pop punk midgets with punk coreography and matching wardrobes.
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