MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM....................Machine in the garden, the
Atmospheric but with an almost poppy Lovecatsesque percussion and haunting female vocals like a thinner sounding moonchild but conjuring a real mediaeval feel.
Machines of Loving Grace
Quite tuneful noisy guitar industrial. American and early 90s it would appear and the sound certainly fits that MO.
Macronympha
Noise from Pittsburgh. Hard to tell if a chainsaw wielding maniac being followed by a bee has highlighted the fact I need to oil my door hinges or if this is the music. I am currently 50/50 as to which is my preferred option.
Mad Masks
Nice play on Mad Max in their moniker. Another gloomy dungeon one.
Madness of the Night
A bit medieval a bit prog Rock quite Within Temptation. Perfectly listenable. A bit Siouxsie
Madre del Vizio
Foreign almost Sex Gang vocals over high energy Sisters riffing
Madrigal
big metally power ballad material. quite epically broody in a kind of Nickelback kind of way
Maida Vale
Hail from Holland apparently which is surprising given they seem to have named themselves after some BBC studios. Quite Indy sounding almost an element of post shoegaze 4ad but with definite Goth sensibilities. “Remote Control,” started with some nice samply bits that might have even come from the BBC.
Malacoda
More at the epic metal end of Goth really
Malaise
My initial reaction based I seem to recall on a single contribution to a compilation I can no longer locate, were they sound a little like “One,” very melodic male vocalled Goth metal would not be particularly out of place with the more traditional metal bands on Nuclear Blast. There was obviously something about them though as they got added to the "try and buy more by," list and very much became a gothapedia band after I subsequently tracked down the mini LP “Hypnotized by forgotten lies,” which is a real quality late sisters/Merry Thoughts affair.
Remained in the band I definitely like enough to buy their records camp although the shortage of record shops these days stymied any real further activity until "Fifty Two Ways," cropped up on ebay.
We've been discussing the Sisters/Merry Thoughts confusion a fair bit in Gothapedia Towers recently and Mrs Gothapedia's first thought when it came on was "is this the Merry Thoughts?"
Actually some of the tracks sound almost Ghost Dance when the Jenny Olson performs guest vocal duties. Although pretty trad rock in much of the arrangements there are touches of electro industrial in places too.
Malice Mizer
Japanese Goth I was promised. Accordion led show tunes sung in French is what I got. They’d struggle to get points at Eurovision
Malochia
This lot are ace. They do the blokes voice, birds voice thing but just much more atmospherically than most. The music is kind of pimped up dungeon stuff. There is a distinct debt to Garden of Delight. Possibly Dutch. Released 2 CDs in the late 90s. Album “Dreamhunter,” and EP “Shiver.”
Mandrake
Mandrake are everything I like in big Female fronted Gothic Metal albeit with hints of MoR
Mandylion
Quality European Gothic rock. Very melodic with an almost anthemic John Hughes kind of feel about it
Manticora
Conceptual Gothic metal. “The Black Circus, Par 1 – Letters,” is some kind of concept piece set in Victorian New England. Very grand with widdly guitars and epic choruses. Rousing!
Mantra
Kate Bush
meets Brian Eno so a Lemon Kitten’s for the late 90s
really. Not unlike the medieval end of Dead Can Dance at times
Mantus
Manifest is top quality poppy Gothic Rock
Manuskript
Although
I think they may have gone on and released another
album or two Manuskript are remembered by most for the “I can’t believe
it’s
not goth” EP, “Diversity of life” LP, and rather ace cover of “The Sun
Always
Shines on TV,” by Aha
Based in
Nottingham along with the Horatii who they often toured
with Manuskript were one of a handful of bands to keep the more
traditional 90s
sound going in the face of new metalesque bands wanting to introduce
women
singing whilst men rapped over the top (eg Lacuna Coil).
"Flies in the marzipan" is the quintessential Manuskript track.
Marble Arch
The name is one of those phrases that is just so familiar that you never give it a second thought but Marble Arch has really quite a nice ring.
“A
Million Crises” the opener to long player “another Sunday bright,” which sounds
like it should be by a Sarah band starts all moody like “I Love the World,” by
NMA before turning into a more American alt-rock HIM with touches of Type-O and
more mainstream Nickelback type bands. I suspect they might be German. Seem
quite an arty bunch.
March Violets
For most people March Violets will be “Crow Baby” the track that seems to appear on every alternative 80s compilation ever produced despite the fact “Grooving in Green,” and “Walk in the Sun,” were better offerings.
Another
The Violets star burned fast and bright although their constant inclusion on retrospectives highlights the status in which they were held.
Something of a renaissance in the early 2010s which saw championing by 6 music and a brief flirtation with Steampunk before ill health has cut short the MC revival.
Marian Gold
Very Wolfsheim but with a bit of early 90s U2 thrown in. very good 5 out of 5 etc.
Marian’s Joy
A
masterclass in European electro really. I can hear Kraftwerk and Jean
Michelle as well more recent upstarts like Wolfsheim, Colony 5 and
Apoptygma. Released through COP Heaven is a classic example of its
genre. Might actually be a one man band but hard to tell.
Do a very interesting interpretation of the Stranglers “Golden Brown.”
Marilyn Manson
I never consciously excluded MM from this site and whilst I was never really taken by them and thought Brian was a dick that didn't really justify disqualification for the site (see Libitina). Having said that I genuinely don't think we had any of their music in the house since Mrs Librarian traded in her couple of CDs many years ago. Well as it happened I stumbled across a copy of their Best of CD the other day and thought with the passage of time I would give them a listen and try and maybe be a little more objective about them.
Long story short they are shit. God knows how they ever became famous (well having Dita Von Teese along for the ride probably helped.) The CD is actually worse than I expected. I was resigned to the odd song having aged quite well but none had. The cover of Tainted Love far inferior to Soft Cell's and Sweet Dream which I recalled being passable actually has about 30 seconds which are alright ruined by the rest of the song. As for their Johnny Cash cover what were they thinking trying to do an electro cover of a country classic!
I was rather disappointed to find out our Brian wasn't actually the sidekick in the Wonder Years. I think I would actually have rather more of an affinity to him if he was.
Update - it is quite apparent my assessment of him as a dick was spot on. I would possibly exorcise the entry entirely if it weren't for the fact that one man doth not make the band even when named one and the same.
Marionettes
When the Screaming Marionettes stopped screaming they simply became the Marionettes. As SM I thought they had a couple of half decent tunes as Marionettes they had “Absolution,” which is stunning. I seem to think i still owe my mum £1.99 for the Rise album bought from Rockaboom in Leicester 2 shops ago.
Martoc
Have I mentioned these before? Someone who can afford the technology devoid of the talent, might be a bit of a looking in the mirror job this. Lyrics as piss poor as Athamay, in fact he may have even nicked them from them.
Maruta Kommand
Hard electronic industrial which would not have sounded out of lace mid-nineties although “Holocaust Rites,” comes slightly later released in 2000. The overall imagery in both titles and artwork would suggest a concept album around the world wars either collectively or one of. At times drifts into more minimalistic dungeon music territory. Very intense and quite unnerving at times.
Marx, Gary
Nineteen Ninety Five and Nowehere isn’t the lost Sisters album but is sort of part of it possibly. Musically more in keeping with Type-O and Neil Young, but Damage Done was apparently influenced by the Neil Young track "The Needle and the Damage Done."
M.A.S.
Vehicle for Henry G. Kohler the 3rd. Musically alright but not as impressive as the artists real name!
Mass
Hi-temp sleazy bar (Goth)rock
reminiscent of the Vaynes et al.
Released on Abstract, NMAs
former label at least “Medusa (version)” shows a subtler more
sophisticated
sound.
Kind of remind me of the Bolshoi struggling to find the accelerator pedal.
Massive in Mensch
MiM refer to themselves as Dark Rave and frankly I can’t come up with a better description than that. They thank DJ Lazarus for the term so I by default extend thanks. Predominantly full on hard industrial techno but with blasts of far more textured poppy bits to add contrast.”Menschdefekt,” is early noughties. You get the odd sinister sample then its back to the banging beats. There have been ghostly echoes of amongst others, Chumbawamba, Afro Celt Soundsystem, Dreadone and Derriere Le Mirreure haunting the mix.
Maudlin
Quite early Siouxsie style grooving with that scratchy guitar early 80s sound
Max M Corporation
Some kind of concept thing with a dubious “data” track being track one which is white noise on a CD player but i don’t recall data ever registering on hi fi so not sure quite what is going on there. Alright euro sounding electro industrial. Apparently there’s also a graphic novel but as mentioned previously a bit dubious about the data. Some kind of multi-media affair. The music is perfectly good European industro-pop.
Meat Beat Manifesto
Subliminal Sandwich indeed. MBM were always in the Selecatadisc industrial section and me and Mrs used to catch a bus next to a house with a MBM window sticker when we first entered the world of work. Imagine a more ethical sheep on drugs with less vocals.
Mechanical Cabaret
Imagine if Sheep on drugs really liked Manuskript’s song writing and filled their sound out at the same time.
Mechanical Horizon
“Hate is a shield,” leaves me thinking my synth has that setting too. Perfectly adequate early 00s electro with slightly growly shouty vocals
Medicine
Sound like the Cocteau Twins and appeared in the Crow. I think these have earned their place in Gothapedia
Medicine Factory
A kind of blustery Goth n roll not unlike Rose of Avalanche or Balaam and the Angel. Reminded my wife of the Horatii but I don’t see it myself.
Medicine Rain
The Cult meet Bon Jovi having hired John Hughes session saxophonist. Could it get any better than this?
Megadump
Normally I decide I have to love a band because they have a fantastic name, Autumn’s Grey Solace, Black Tape For a Blue Girl, Blue Birds Refuse to Fly etc. but this lot are a rarity in that I have to say I was positively put off by the name only for them to turn out to be pretty ace. I was dubious to say the least about the name but the “alles, was du wilst…” album drifts between quite enjoyable poppy electro industrial and really quite enchanting electronics. They seem to do themselves most justice on tracks where the titles are in English and I don’t think that is me being Xenophobic as some of my favourite tunes are sung in French by a chap called Hubert Felix Thiefaine and I have no clue what he’s singing about for the most part but being rather pragmatic I suspect they have tried to record their best tunes in the international language of pop because of the markets it opens up. ”Let You Down,” is the absolute standout track which is one of those dark brooding atmospheric numbers that Depeche Mode could have written.
Megaptera
This
lot appear on a compilation called “Death Odours,” which is pretty much
wraparound dead bodies of the sort often found in museums having been
preserved in peat. There two contributions are “Shadow land” and “Sodom
part I-II.” They appear to be atmospheric dark ambient type stuff.
Perfectly acceptable background music but not an awful lot happens
might be one for my Halloween haunted house megamix though
Mekano Set, the
In
their own words the Mekano set aren’t a Goth band but they seem to keep
getting booked to play Goth nights. As they don’t expect anyone to like
them they don’t bring CDs to sell but fortunately when Mrs Gothapedia
approached them they were thankfully able to whip a CDR demo out of
nowhere and you do have to suspect anyone with a track called “You make
me feel like a Cure song,” must be a bit that way inclined. They
perhaps aren’t Goth in the way that Visage aren’t Goth or Soft Cell
aren’t Goth in that they produce sublime 80s electro and if they simply
badged themselves with the G word no one would bat an eyelid. Vocals
are quite DM in places and Goths do seem to like them so perhaps they
should bring a few CDs to sell next time. My only criticism of
“Maastricht Circle,” is that there is only limited differentiation
between the tracks which is not obvious when listening casually but
becomes more evident if focusing on the disk. At the time of recording
(2010) they were a duo comprising of Milk and Lee but I think they may
have expanded at least for their current live line up.
Melanchoholics
Intense scary dungeon music
Melanoia
One of those Goth/American alt-pop cross over acts.
By the sound of it very nice though.
Melotron
Competent electro. Not dissimilar to Colony 5 et al
Memory Lab, the
Industrial break beats. Italian I believe and a very good vibe, until it all gets a bit too processed
Mena Brinno
Spirited Gothic metal with a touch of medieval folk for good measure. The original intention was for some members of Royal Anguish to rework acoustic versions of existing material for a European tour that project morphed into the band who stand before us now.
Mental Destruction
Swedish? Teutonic. Ruthless
Mentallo and the Fixer
Sinister electro with thick echoey beats but with quite atmospheric vibes
Men That Will Not Be Blamed For Nothing, the
Imagine
the horrible histories songwriters focussing on the Victorian Era and
you’ve got “Steph(v)enson,” which is pretty ace and manages to
combine a well produced tune with catchy and worthwhile lyrics..
For the rest of it imagine songs rejected by CBBC. Make of that what
you will but as self proclaimed pioneers of the british scene I was
somewhat disappointed as I’d always imagined Steam Punk should be Alex
Harvey and Sex Gang Children.
Mercurine
Byron Brown (presumably) looks like a Gothic Thomas Dolby. The synthtasticness of Mercurine could indeed by Mr blinded by science himself although vocals are rather more enchanting dreampop style musings presumably from Mera Roberts who I am guessing is the crimped haired lass on the back sleeve of “Waiting for another fall.” Real tinges of my fave Derriere Le Miroir too
Dark pop duo with hints of the cure. Tag themselves on bandcamp as New Romantic amongst other things
The Merlons
Slightly odd this lot. Compared not unfairly to Dead Can Dance. Slightly medieval thing going on. Bouncy folk Goth. The “Salamander” EP was bough off ebay from a bloke that turned out to live down the road from my parents. Small world!
Merry’s Funeral
Might be from Istanbul (go on you want me to say it - not Constantinople) but sound like the Cure if Bob Smith had a German Accent
Merry Thoughts
If any band seemed like it might lead the charge of the Goth
brigade in the mid 90s it was these. Their interpretation of Vision Thing era
Sisters was sufficient to lead to rumours that this was in fact Eldritch’s way
of shaking off his contract and after debut album “Millennium Songs One,” there
were a chunk of misguided Goths from a certain corner of
The Sophomore set was significantly less catchy and the Thoughts' moment has been lost. That said "Heat," has been uploaded to Youtube as a Sisters of Mercy song and viewed 32,000 times without comment so presumably some people still can't tell the difference.
Mescaline Babies, the
Quite mid-90s sounding guitar and drum driven with an 80s aftertaste.
Mesh
Perfectly average electro Goth with laser like synth
refrains and building drum rolls, repeat as necessary. Bit of a nod to Erasure
and New Order too.
On
“In this place forever,” Mesh sound like full on “Get the girl...” era PWEI
albeit without the apparent sense of humour when they are not being broody
Depeche Mode.
Meszada
Rather like a Spielberg/John Williams soundtrack albeit with a doom metal slant (or Cinderella apparently)
Metallspurhunde
I’m afraid I don’t know how to do umlauts so the name
is underrepresented. This is kind of a Nuclear Blast type gothic metal band
playing a bleepy computer game type track. Imagine Therion doing a Castlevania
karaoke. That’s not to say its bad. It also kind of reminds me of Tottenacht.
“Rhythmus nder Gefuhle,” then finishes with another big epic soundtrack flourish
that could have even made it into Braveheart
“Ou Iras Tu,” is pleasant enough, solid beat, nice synth line, slightly whispered/hissed vocals with an upbeat chorus. Nothing particularly stand out though
Metal Monkey Machine
Musically cock rock of the highest degree. Not sure why I thought they might be worthy of inclusion other than the sleeve looking a little bit old school industrial. I’ll leave them in until I have justification not to. On the pretty cool sounding “Black Burst,” label. Away from the title track seem to be a little more 80s industrial in their approach with samples and everything. “Wrench,” EP includes an 808 State cover
Meteors
“Don’t
touch the bang bang fruit,” is typical ropey, rough bass lead punk. I
think they did the seminal “Daddy is a vampire,” mind.
Method Cell
Quite uplifting trance-goth. Kind of like Inertia at their better points but with an almost Pet Shop Boys delivery.
Miazma
Swedish guitar heavy Goth with typically growly vocals. Quite atmospheric and chilled though
Mice
AAE released one near perfect album and spent the next three years producing ever decreasing returns on a theme before having one last stab as shoegaze before deciding what to do next.
Unfortunately for us all Julianne decided what she would do next was square up to the next generation of Britpop pretenders and form Mice.
Thankfully she got that out of her system and after a brief period in the wilderness and a quick stint with This Burning Effigy she got the Eve back together.
That did however leave us with one album which at times at least reminded us why we liked AAE and at others reminded us why we didn’t like Elastica.
The tracks that were Julianne and Andy Cousins held their own and sounded like they could have been written for AAE 5.
A couple of tracks rope in Mr Wilson-Piper too and you begin to wonder what that fifth album could have been like if they stuck with it.
Micronaut
Micronaut release space inspired electro through Positron Records, or at least did between at least 1998 and 2005. Quite ravey and something of an Eat Static vibe at times perhaps in part conjured by the Alien imagery. Even a touch of the Mike Oldfield about it, thinking more around the time he was letting the Orb remix him. Side project of one of Sister Machine Gun I understand which explains why they are listed as publishers.
Midnattsol
“Where twilight dwells,” apart from sounding like an ace name for a Projekt band looks exactly like it ought to be a Nuclear Blast Gothic Metal album. They appear to be four geeky looking long haired blokes embarrassed to be around two rather pretty young ladies. Musically they are a softer Nuclear Blast act with touches of AOR/Folk to them. Hints of madrigals and trad folk before the big metal guitars and sweeping choruses kick in.
Midnight
Configuration
If you believe the sadly defunct Nightbreed catalogue Midnight were the most significant British band since the Beatles. If you believe anyone else they re a comedy Goth band with horror samples and over the top growly vocals. To give them their due though they are still going strong after 15 odd years.
Based around Trev Ghost formerly of ENDG
Bands like the Cure and New Model Army have mellowed their sound over time as they grew out of their youthful angst but if their contribution to Gothic Sound of Nightbreed 5 is representative Midnight have admirably stuck to their guns.
Midnight Syndicate
Midnight Syndicate are a rather dubious looking duo who appear to score horror films that probably only exhist in their own imagination (actually a trio for 1998s “Born of the Night,” before trimming down.) Very grand and theatrical Gothic in the Hammer horror style of the word. Sound effect heavy their tracks are short and thematic meaning they average over 20 per album. Deserve to be the incidental music of radio plays, or indeed perhaps are. An excellent soundtrack for Halloween. Based in Ohio one is lead to believe.
Milchmann, Tyler
Poppy bleepyness with guttural Germanic vocals. Singer reminds me of… well pretty much every German electro band really. “With bare hands,” soon kicks into a Colony 5 kind of vibe
Militia Christi
Atmospheric Italian’s which seem to be what they do best
with religious imagery on the sleeve and quite ecclesiastical chanting backing
up the music. I can’t say I don’t like it. Becomes a lot more shouty German as
it progresses
Miller, Trent and the Skeleton Jive
I have to say I got quite excited by the sound of these from the brief description before I heard this CD however in reality it is really rather uninspired country murder ballad type fare sung in a sort of Bob Dylan/Nick Cave hybrid style but with too much of the former. Might have worked better with fuller more brooding arrangements and instrumentation.
Mind Drop
I’m minded of a late era Church album filler. Not bad but not something you’d go straight to in the CD pile. “Dark Wish,” is nice enough but doesn’t need to be nearly seven minutes long.
Mind Walk
Rather nice Ultravox style 80s synth pop albeit of the Germanic variety (using Germanic in a wider non-geographical sens+e given the CD booklet is buggered and I can’t see where they are from). I’m rather fond of “die fessel.”
A friend once tried to sell Therapy? to me as a British Ministry but whilst I have loved Therapy? for years I never quite got what he was talking about until recently relistening to Dark Side of the Spoon. Of course Dark Side was released at least 8 years after our conversation so he was either a visionary or misguided.
Having begun life as a perfectly acceptable but fairly anonymous electro band Ministry developed into industrial metal gods hitting their zenith with the Psalm 69 album and it is fair to say without Al and Pals we would probably never have had Nine Inch Nails (a bad thing) and Marilyn Manson (a good thing)
Jesus built my hotrod and one fix will probably never be bettered.
In later years Ministry disappeared up their own veins with noisy rubbish freeform jazz where once there would have been proper industrial metal.
Minor Victories
This album is probably the only one I own that incorporates grease proof/tracing paper in the CD sleeve. I’m not sure these would have made it into Gothapedia, but then for that matter I’m not sure I would have bought it if they weren’t on Play it Again Sam. But they were so I did and they are. This is kind of post-guitar industrial (possibly). Quite a shoe-gaze feel but given I’ve just Googled them and turns out they are a bit of a super group including members of the Editors and indeed Slowdive no bloody wonder they sound sheogaze. There are elements of big sweeping strings and epic intents but all in all it just sounds lovely.
Mira
Ethereal alt-country Goth. Reminds me of Mazzy Star with touches of Derier le Mireur
Mirabilis
Folky,
female fronted acoustic Goth. When I put the “Pleiades” album on my
wife presumed I had bought a new Mediaeval Baebes album which gives you
a fair indication of what they are going to sound like. Personally I
think they have a bit more range than being straight Baebe’s copyists
and vocally for me there is quite an Enya feel and I would go as far as
to say some tracks are remarkably close to Hildegard Von Bingen. Another
of the new Projekt bands taking a less trad Goth direction.
Once upon
a time there was a band called
Miranda
Sex Garden who
released an album called Suspiria which was no more the inspiration for
the
MSG could
produce waves of noise to rival the best indie shoegazers
of the time but they could also knock out high quality neo-classical
material
such as their interpretation of “Rush forth my tears.”
Eventually
the band threw off their Sex Garden chains and metamorphasised
into the
Mediaeval
Baebes
thus ensuring the loss of an army of lusting teenage Goth’s was
replaced by a
legion of lusting middle aged radio four listeners instead.
I seem to
think the
Stars of lockdown, front woman, Katharine Blake, he daughter and husband have performed a number of live streams currently badged as Mediaeval Trio I believe.
M.IRE
Another 3 track CDR. Perfectly good guitar based Goth. Slightly Nickelback vocals.
Miserylab
New project of Rosetta Stone’s Porl King and his previous work is quite evident with a very “Nothing,” era feel to much of this material and the other obvious Rosetta comparison is to their re-imagined album Chemical Emissions
The reinterpretation of Shirley Bassey’s “The Living Tree,” available here makes you appreciate how influential the welsh valley sound was to Goth when you consider that Tom Jones is known to do an industrialled up cover of the Wolfgang Press “A Girl Like You.” and this track shows how lacking many Goth bands are with their vocal delivery relying instead on cheap distortion or reverb to hide a weak voice.
A recent Rosetta Stone retrospective from Cleopatra records actually contains more material released under the Miserylab moniker than RS whilst the Rosetta Stone comeback album "Seems Like Forever," were re-recordings of Miserylab material.
Misery Loves Company
Scandinavian metal with a Gothic slant. Would have probably got away with a Nightbreed distribution in the late 90s.
Misfortune 500
Misfortune 500 are very much at the indie guitar end of the Goth spectrum reminiscent of bands like the Chameleons and even a bit of early U2.
Seem to be a fairly principled lot with a list of weblinks in their booklet to organisations like Warchild. Or they are trying to get in with the supreme leader Lord Von himself as one of them is Amnesty.
Remind
me of a less punky slightly more melodic ENDG. You can write to them in
Michigan although after 22 years I’m not sure if there’ll be anyone in
to reply. The “Wonder Why,” 7” even came with a groovy sticker and mini
poster insert. It’s the little touches I always think. A nice little
slab of vinyl
Mission, the
From the remnants of First Last
and Always era Sisters sprang a number of bands, one lead by Wayne
Hussey and
taking fellow Sister Craig Adams with him began performing under the
name the
Sisterhood until a certain Mr Eldritch rushed out an album under that
name
entitled Gift and featuring an old bloke out of Suicide and James Ray.
The
Sisterhood being cup tied Hussey et al switched to the
First album proper “God’s own
medicine” featuring the wonderful Severina and Dance on Glass
apparently
originally recorded with the Sisters was an early high tide mark with
subsequent struggling to match early promise. Only with 1992s Masque a
much
poppier affair did the Mish manage to exceed that early form.
The Mission finally called it
quits following an announcement at Rock City on the 6th
July 1996
apparently (I missed it I’d just nipped to the loo) before rising
Phoenix like
in the new millennium dragging All About Eve and Crazyhead out of
retirement
for a glorious nostalgia soaked come back tour once again taking in
Nottingham
Rock.
Releases as Mish mark 2 Aura and God is a Bullet have refound some of their former glories after their production line like mid 90s when albums like Blue and Neverland were them going painfully through the motions.
Mistle Thrush
Quite American alt pop. Probably should be signed to 4AD and possibly not one of us. NuRockgaze anyone?
Mlada Fronta
Big thick sounding industrial with an almost In the Nursery feel to the percussion
MNPLTR
Up tempo industrial in the “Play it again,” vein.
Mobiles
(the)
very well dressed bunch of characters that had clearly
been listening to Siouxsie.
signed to Rialto Records Amor Amour, sounds like the sisterhood before
the sisterhood existed (with a pop vocal.)
Model Kaos
Competent mid-90s sounding electro Goth rock with an 80s vocal feel
Mona Mur En Esch
Enjoyable Germanic beat heavy electro-industrial
Monkey Farm Frankenstein
Obvs MFF have a brilliant name. Musically “Twitch of the Def Nerve,” is Ministry circa 1992 albeit with a slightly dancier bent to the drums and some PWEI type rapping at times.
Monochrome
Very
atmospheric albeit with some bleepy bits over the top. Female vocal lead
electronics
Mono Inc
Remind me very much of the first two
Judith albums
Moonchild
Despite
their name Moonchild were never
Nephilim wannabe’s instead early on in their careers they produced
powerful
emotive songs with sweeping operatic choruses that allowed them to
shine as one
of the stand out acts on 90s comp, New Alternatives 2. later releases
kept the
sweeping vocals but with more traditional song structures.
As
a starting point check out Lunatic
Dreams but Susan
D'Iavollo has one of those voices that
would be enchanting singing football results,
a
shopping list or the phone book
Moon lay hidden beneath
a cloud, the
Slightly
sex-gangy introduction to
everything that is wrong with World Serpent.
Crashing
percussion, droning synths,
moaning vocals and bedsit poetry.
The CD I have is quite nicely packaged although silver on grey coupled with the illuminationesque fonts make reading the limited text rather tricky
or
All the ingredients of a world serpent act. Crashing percussion, droaning synth and whinging chanty vocals mixed with crap poetry bits.
Moonrise
“Crucify,” is sadly not the Tori Amos song which is a shame because I think this particular brand of electro/guitar driven alt-pop could make a pretty good fist of that tune. Chorus goes decidedly down the Type O rabbit hole.
Moonspell
Fairly standard Goth metal but with
quite a DM vocal with a hint of ALF
Morgana’s Kiss
This is the band that Court of the
Star Chamber clearly want to be. Ace mysterious name, arty CD covers and a good
balance between synths and guitars. Appear to hail from
Morgue
“Sweet apology of death,” is pretty run of the mill 90s industrial. Did I say shit and derivative?
Moriarti and the Sith
One of the more recent Nightbreed Bands.
Quite a traditional emotive synths/metal guitar combo that would not be out of place on an Orkus compilation but with more traditional 80s Goth rock vocals.
One is sometimes finds oneself thinking what would have happened to Goth if Metallica hadn’t released the black album.
Proudly not afraid to tackle crap doom metal.
Morrison, Patricia
Ex-Gun Club, ex-Sisterhood, ex-Sister does a nice line in atmospheric darkwave as a solo outing. Her vocals are a little Siouxsie and overall she has a similar vibe to the Danse Society now they have a female vocalist.
“
Their presumably eponymous album also features a photo of a semi-clad nun which you can’t really complain about.
Mortal
Nice dark ambience. Quite Orby at
times
Mortal Love
“Adoration,” kind of has a similar feel to HIM’s cover of “Wicked Game,” albeit with an All About Eve vocal line over the top
Mortis
He of latex troll mask fame produces atmospheric rocking Goth metal.
Mortok
Crap
I
kind of want to leave this as a one word review but there is a risk
that someone will think I was in a bad mood or didn’t give them/him
sufficient consideration so I will insist on elaborating.
Mortok are
clearly electro. They/He has lots of exciting boxes that go bleep and
can afford to put stuff out in pretty professional packaging. Having
said that it’s all very derivative
Motion Control
Released a limited 7” which is one of those offers where you can’t help thinking that limiting it to 50 copies was probably 40 odd too many
Weird noises and a few break beats I’m not even clear whether this should be a 33 or 45 or indeed that it matters that much. The brief snatches of it’s most listenable material reminds me of the Ochre bands. Not for the faint hearted.
Motionless in White
I have been umming and aahing about whether to include these for a while but I think there is a guitar industrial feel to this lot a la MM so I am going to include them
Mr Jones Machine
“Hypersleep,”
is one of those really bouncy uplifting electro tunes that makes you
wonder where the reputation for being glum comes from. There’s even a
nice dreamy sample that makes it seem a bit little fluffy clouds for a
few minutes
Mr Presto
There’s a bit of a sinister computer game thing going on but in an 80s synth pop kind of way as well as fairly traditional crashing guitars that almost wants to be the good song out of Lost Boys
Mshaa
No idea how you pronounce this lots name. If there was a w in it, it might be the onomatopea of a cartoon villain as they rub their hands together. Musically they are very standard electro industrial that could have been recorded anytime from the mid 90s onwards.
Mundanus Imperium
Big powerful Nuclear Blast Gothic
metal band with crunchy guitars and pseudo medieval keys and builds. Very much
like a more metal Avalist.
The
Most people reckon Bela Lugosi’s Dead was the first Goth record whilst I’d always wondered if Boys Don’t Cry could claim to have slipped in under the wire but the Monsters were a decade earlier. A band dressed like characters out of a hammer horror movie singing about dark and supernatural themes.
When I first picked up the LP I presumed it was the TV show’s soundtrack but what I had discovered was much much more (but yes they do also play the theme tune)
Murder by Death
Alt-country with a very American Gothic kind of feel. Despite a very Goth name they are actually named after a comedy film (ungoth)
Murder Capital, the
Although this lot seem
to be lumped in with much hipper neo post punk acts of recent years musically I
have to say if it sounds like Goth and sings like Goth .. a mix of bass heavy
early Bauhaus and into a circle type stuff with bits of nick cave thrown in but
it is the Cure and Joy Division who seem most often sighted
Mur, Mona
Electroninca with a Lydia Lunch feel. Songs from a digital dungeon?
Murnau’s Playhouse
A bit Bauhaus, even a bit Garden of Delight
Murphy, Pete
Another Bauhaus casualty further proving the band is more than the sum of its parts or they have all run out of steam by the time they split up. Mediocre 80s electro pop clearly chasing the lucrative John Hughes soundtrack money whilst failing to do anything progressive musically. Apparently performed better promoting Maxell tapes than he did as a solo artist and I think he may have appeared on some regional artshow performing interpretive dance which to be fair he deserves absolute kudos for because to be honest can you imagine Wayne or fat Bob doing that?
Capable of being rubbishly funky as well.
Electro Goth band that released an album that is
virtually
the prototype for mid-90s Nightbreed bands, who in 1988 released the LP
“to the
pink period.”
One of the best albums of the year and “Lively Art,” as a
label deserve a
nod for this lot alone.
Lyrically they are clearly influenced by Depeche Mode even if musically they are more like the Cure meet the Psychedelic Furs in Slowdive’s kitchen.
Muza, L’ahka
A
bit early Moonchild. Appears to be Slovakian. Words are in the native
tongue but there are translations in the CD booklet of “The Roads of
Light flow through darkness.” Bit of a World Serpent eastern type thing
going on as well. Even hints of Siouxsie, particularly in the vocals at
times.
My Black Light
Very atmospheric female fronted Gothic metal with quite an electronic punch to their guitar driven sound
Imagine Danny Elfman arranging Evanescence
My dying bride
I
have to say, on “Feel the misery,” MDB are much more tuneful than I was
expecting. I or indeed they must be getting old. Atmospheric, heavy (insert sub
genre you are most comfortable with here).
My Insanity
Good solid electronic Gothic rock from the turn of the
millenium
My Life With the Thrill Kill Kult
I think this lot have survived a number of incarnations but “I see good spirits and I see bad spirits,” which I think is one of their earlier efforts circa 88 has that real British 80s industrial feel with a bit of apocalyptic folk thrown in. I suspect as Ministry shifted from b-list electro to industrial rock gods they were probably listening to this kind of thing. There are even touches of the Orb and good old Jean Michelle in there. Hell, I’m even reminded of Paul Hardcastle.
My Ruin
when
this arrived and I realised what I had bought I did wonder whether I
had slipped into the trap of trusting Amazon genre descriptions and not
really paying attention to what I was buying and certainly from my
vague recollection of people in My Ruin t-shirts I feared
disappointment. However despite the sleeve notes of “ruined and
recalled,” constantly talking about metal there is a real early 90s
Play it again Sam kind of industrial feel to the music and Tairrie B
can certainly look the (Goth) part albeit in a slightly scary Joolz
meets the long haired one out of Shakespeare’s Sister kind of way.
Album would be quite listenable if I didn’t have to keep jumping up to
skip the sweary ones when Dante is in the room. Someone in the sleeve
notes seems to think their version of Tainted Love is the definitive
and whilst I admit it pisses on that gobshite Manson it’s not a touch
on Soft Cell.
My Silent Wake
This
started rather aptly as I began designing a woodland adventure for my
son to role play and this medieval style whistle lead tune would be an
ideal introduction to such things if it were to be played with a
narrated audio track.
“Hunting Season,” is a fairly epic 11 minutes long. Dark ambient but in a breathy female vocals, twiddly guitar kind of way. Reminds me of my favourite Mazzy Star song and my wife of “Sabrina,” by that German band I can’t spell the name of. Eventually a male voice joins in not exactly singing but reminiscent of Nick Cave none the less. A slight Pink Floyd feel to the guitar.
Equally can be very run of the mill Gothic Metal in the droney sense of the genre.
My Suicide
Remind
me of a very depressed REM. The bible that is the Nightbreed catalogue
said powerful mixture of metal and Goth. Which of us is right? I don’t
think you should take the description s a criticism as I adore REM,
there is also a lot of Pearl Jam pushing itself through in “an evening
with a book.”
My Sweet Sorrows
Sounds like a Backworld 33 played at 45. Another band from Finland. Quite nicely poppy and genre defying as they get going. A bit ALF overall.