[LMB] AKICOTL: goth, emo and jrock

[Raye Johnsen]

--- Becca Price <becca_price at yahoo.com> wrote:

> I've just been informed (rather scornfully) that my
> daughter
> isn't goth, but that her personal style is more
> accurately
> called jrock. 

Erk, erk, ERK!!

First off, it isn't jrock.  Jrock is short for
'Japanese rock', and it comes in as many different
flavours as the American kind.  Unless your daughter
has Japanese music blaring from her stereo, she's not
into Japanese rock.

The only thing I can think of that might match that
description is 'visual kei', which is a style that a
subset of Japanese rock stars developed.  Probably the
best Western analogues would be the British band
'Culture Club' from the early Eighties. 

> Another friend told me that she
> sometimes comes
> across as emo, but that friend had never heard of
> jrock, and so
> couldn't really comment. I suspect that, here in the
> staid
> midwest of the USA, the distinction passes
> unnoticed, but it may
> be something that means more on the west coast.

There are many different shades of both emo and goth. 
It's very hard for those on the outside to tell the
difference, but there is a wealth of differences
between them.

'Emo' comes from 'emotional' and is a style of music
and clothing designed to evoke an emotional response. 
I would as a general rule describe this as
'melancholy'.  Most emo musicians I know draw heavily
on 1930s blues for inspiration.

'Goth' comes from 'gothic' and is more aesthetic than
the emo style.  It is heavily rooted in
late-Victorian, early-Edwardian fashions.  It has a
reputation for necrophilia and depression, but this is
mainly due to the preponderance of black, white and
scarlet in its colour palette and the fact that the
vampiric fashion/music/literature movement is a
subgroup of Goth fashion/music/literature.

I hope this helps!

Raye

raye_j at yahoo.com
http://windtear.livejournal.com
http://www.thejohnsens.com/index.html

I believe in dragons, unicorns, good men
and other mythical creatures.


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