So, having skimmed a variety of recent LJ posts on the subject...

[mrph]

Today's question: Is the UK goth scene broken? And, if so, just what changes d'you think would be needed to fix it?

Yes, I know this is a can of worms. But I'm curious to see what people think. This is mostly sparked by Uncle Nem's excellent Leipzig piece and the LJ comments it triggered.

(Now that you've lured him to Leipzig, can we drag him to M'era Luna next year, chimera_s? I'd quite like to see a similar write-up on that, a very different kind of German festival...).

Comments

[markeris.livejournal.com]

"Unfortunately decent bands cost money to put on"

AS I`m giving mine and quite a few other people tuppence worth on this thread.....

This attitude, and I`m almost certainly taking it the wrong way so I apologise in advance, is also a symptom of the problem. Decent bands *can* in fact cost fuck all to put on, EXPENSIVE bands cost money to put on and it worries me that people rather regularly substitute the two as though they are interchangable.

When I was a promoter, I reached a point where I consciously inflated prices over and above my general policy of keeping it cheap for the kids, largely NOT because I could do with making a few extra quid, but because if it was too cheap, people assumed it would be crap. I could get more people coming at a fiver than I could if the same gig was free. How fucked is that? Maybe Franks more asture than we think.

A different take on the same problem, and the reason I finally gave up promoting, was because I got sick and fucking tired of sneering teenagers with New Rocks, Black Leather Trenchcoats and NiN T Shirts pointedly ripping my flyers up in front of me. Oh. Nice one. So, in fact, the target audience I perceived for my efforts in flying bands in from the US and Europe plus the best up and coming UK acts, does in fact think I`m a joke does it? Well fuck you then. If 25% of these cunts coming out of the Gloucester in Ministry and NiN T shirts had come along I`d have more than broken even every time. At the time, I kind of figured it as a "well, if my parents haven``t heard about the band, they won`t be annoyed if I go, so the idea of seeing tommorows NiN playing a lowkey gig isn`t really of interest" attitude. Perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps people do genuinely believe these days that unless it`s an enormogig with an MTV rotated act then there is something deficient about the quality. That DECENT bands DO in fact cost money. If this is so, then theres a major difference from the postpunk days in which this genre thrived *right there*. None of the big names, and you can include the Sisters, The Cure, The Mission, *whoever* would have gone beyond upstairs at the garage if people hadn`t gone to see them in pokey sweaty basements and fucking LOVED it, if they hadn`t kipped on the station waiting for the first train home in the morning. I rather suspect that they were a damn site worse for quite a few years than some of the cheap and nasty UK bands we have now as well.

[markeris.livejournal.com]

A few years ago, at least Rattler was doing this - he went to almost EVERY Queen Adreena gig, until they started recognising him gave him permanent guestlist / backstage pass and he bottled it. Bless him. Now *theres* a sorely missed face from the UK scene.