Meanings
gothic rock1
alternative Gothic rock
- uncountableentertainmentA style of music that developed out of punk rock in the late 1970s, with lyrics and imagery often referring to morbid, spooky or mystical ideas.
Since the 1980s, several goth substyles have mixed the Batcave heritage with other musical genres into new goth substyles. New wave was gothed into darkwave, classic rock into gothic rock, and metal into gothic metal.
2015, Isabella van Elferen, Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock, Goth Music: From Sound to Subculture, Routledge, →ISBN, page 25Synonyms: positive punk, gothic, goth
Gothic rock2
- alternativeuncountableAlternative spelling of gothic rock.
Synonyms & antonyms
nounA style of music that developed out of punk rock in the late 1970s, with lyrics and imagery often referring to morbid, spooky or mystical ideas.
Origin
First coined by John Stickney in reference to The Doors in 1967 and used by the late 1970s to describe the musical scene that gave rise to the goth subculture, both from a supposed aesthetic similarity to dark and moody 19th century gothic fiction and earlier gothic art and architecture.
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
gothic rock. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gothic%20rock
“gothic rock.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gothic%20rock. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “gothic rock,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gothic%20rock.
Source: gothic rock on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.