Day: November 5, 2010

I’m half tempted to work some of these up.

Black Lipstick Rodeo: 7 Goth Songs That Would Make Great Country Songs :: Blogs :: List of the Day :: Paste

It’s hard to name any two genres that seem more innately opposed than goth and country. Country celebrates wide open spaces, the stylized echoes of cow culture, shared mythology and sketches a seemingly-firmly-rooted mode of simple mainstream American living that resonates with much of its wide audience base. Goth music is intentionally arch and occult in its trappings, naturally celebratory of social outliers and intensely nocturnal as it indulges in chilling introspection, and tends to draw listeners from iconoclastic corners.

Pare it down, though, and you’ve got parallel and maybe even complementary traditions of songwriting. Swap out some synthesizers for mandolins, take the vocals up an octave, kill the reverb, put some fringe on the vampire jacket, and suddenly the transformation is complete.

Here, then, are seven goth songs that would actually make great country songs: