Enchanted by Darkness, Once Again

Last weekend it was again time for Lumous Gothic Festival, Finland’s biggest festival that presents gothic and other types of dark music without incorporating any metal in its program. In my opinion, this is the most beautiful summer festival there is if you look at the people. The traditional historical black lace style is of course the most popular. One of the most popular styles nowadays is cybergoth – a style that utilizes futuristic outfits and huge collections of neon-colored hairpieces. However, there are practically no limitations to gothic style. Lumous doesn’t even try to be a meeting place only for goths. The festival organizers hope to reach different dark subcultures by offering a variety of performers – from industrial music and dark electronica to neo-folk.

The word lumous, according to my Finnish-English dictionary, means ‘enchantment’, ‘charm’, ‘bewitchment’, and ’spell’. I think there really is some kind of an enchantment at hand when it comes to gothic aesthetics. It’s the sublimity, the wildly adventurous, seductive punk-meets-graveyard dresscode.. And the thing with black eyeliner! I love it. I would probably put (lots of) it on everyday if I already didn’t look scary enough without any makeup..

Even though I still haven’t turned into the most eager gothic rock listener (there was a time when I listened to it quite a lot, though), I will definitely not miss a good nearby gothic festival or its performers. I attended Friday’s main concert at Klubi with a friend and friend’s friends. The performers were all interesting. The first one was called Grunt, a one-man Finnish band performing industrial noise –type of music. I’m not completely sure if it should be called music, since it really doesn’t sound like anything I would characterize as music. The experience was refreshing. For some reason, I always seem to like hearing stuff that doesn’t sound a bit like anything I tend to listen to… I can’t complain. The second act was Deviant UK, from The United Kingdom, a band that performed dark, electronic, and danceable music. It sounded good, excitingly dark, and occasionally the melodies were actually quite catchy. The gig was memorable not least thanks to their demonic-looking frontman who definitely had a plenty of charisma and energy.

The main attraction of the evening was Inkubus Sukkubus, the world’s most popular pagan rock band. The band’s music sounded to me like a mix of rock, dark pop melodies, and machine drum sounds. The band performed a nice set of songs from their 20-year-old career and some graphics presenting European pagan rituals and imagery. This band I will probably check out some time later.

The festival was again a big success. All of this year’s main concerts were sold out. I and my friend even managed to get to the national media… Ilta-Sanomat, one of Finland’s two main tabloid magazines captured us onto an internet video that dealt with the festival. Lumous is always a great experience for me – this year was the third time in a row.

Goth Business

Just like last year, I attended Lumous Gothic Festival, the biggest goth happening in Finland. On Saturday, I put on some black lace and lots of eyeliner and headed towards Klubi, one of the best live venues in my hometown Tampere. When I arrived, I bought a ticket, stepped inside the club and sighed with delight.. The place was full of goths! It was so beautiful a sight that I couldn’t believe it for a while..

The first act was Desiderii Marginis alias Johan Levin, a one-man band from Sweden specializing in dark ambient. The gig started with the biggest and loudest bass sound I’d ever heard. The whole place was trembling.. It was wild. Levin performed many interesting songs and sounds, and in the background you could see an old gothic mute film. I’m not much of an ambient expert but the music sounded quite good to me.

Belgian Star Industry was the second band. Their music was indeed traditional modern gothic rock. It reminded me of The 69 Eyes, a nice Finnish goth band. I liked Star Industry’s music very much. There were catchy choruses and lots of energy. Lead singer Peter Beckers performed excellent low vocals and wore a black cowboy hat. The whole concept of rock music with a much darker approach soundwise was very refreshing and exciting to me. The band also performed a couple of songs with electronic elements, such as a very beautiful song called Like a Ghost that can be heard on their MySpace page.

The third act was Canadian synthpop group Psyche lead by Darrin Huss. Psyche is already a 25-year-old band and I’d say their sound is very modern these days. There are gothic elements in the music but it is also suitable for any dance music club, I’d say. Again, there were catchy choruses and energy. Lead singer Huss has a very strong voice. He sounds quite a lot like Bono and his appearance has something in common with Dave Gahan. You could really see that he is a skilful and experienced performer. This gig was all about dancing, and that’s what I like..

This evening was intense. The music was good and the people looked amazing.. If only I hadn’t got so tired sometime between the end of the second gig and the beginning of the third, I would have enjoyed the gigs even more. I really don’t know what it was – summer flu, general holiday fatigue or what..

However, this experience gave me some encouragement so that I just might start checking out some newer gothic stuff at some point – instead of sticking to The Cure and other 80s and late 70s bands. In fact, I still have a lot of those bands to listen to, too.

Lumous Website