Some took the whole thing very far. Hosein once lived in Headingley, Leeds, UK. He remembers that students would enroll at Leeds university specifically because the town housed gothic kingpins (and his neighbors) the Sisters of Mercy. One night, Hosein saw a fog descending over the area and commented that lead singer Andrew Eldritch was around -- then looked up to see him entering his doorway.
Indeed, there is a certain dry humor about goth that is often overlooked amid tales of black-clad youths worshipping Satan and, in one case, carrying out the Columbine massacre. "That wasn't goths," insists Brill. "The guys who did it always wore black trench coats but they listened to Marilyn Manson. There's an academic article: Why Marilyn Manson Isn't Goth." Brill insists that goth is a non-violent subculture. "They're like hippies. I don't know any goths who are into graveyard destruction or cat slaughtering. They like their graveyards and they love their cats."
Nor do drugs seem to be much of a problem. "Speed is a goth drug because the ideal is to be skinny," says Unsworth. "But for most of us it was Blue Nun wine because Wayne Hussey from the Mission drank it."
So perhaps parents shouldn't be too worried that a new generation of goths is cropping up again. There's a goth couple on British soap opera Coro-nation Street. Hosein's bands include Black Wire, who wear black eyeliner, winklepickers and sound a lot like the Sisters of Mercy, although they had never heard them until they started rifling through his record collection. For some goths -- who run T-shirt businesses or enterprises such as Whitby's biannual Gothic festival -- goth can become a livelihood as well as a way of life. But most simply drop back into the mainstream.
Louise (she prefers not to give her surname) works in credit risk in Leeds, UK. Aged 34, she got into goth music 17 years ago and now has tickets for the upcoming Sisters of Mercy tour. She reckons about "four or five people" at her workplace are former goths. "There's a kind of gaydar that lets you spot them." Goalard the dentist is now 39 but refuses to wear the white smock, preferring to top his boots with a black uniform. Faithful to the last, he plays Nine Inch Nails and Killing Joke songs as he drills.
"It never entirely leaves you," says Unsworth. "I still look at the world of beer boys and Tories [Conservatives] and feel a beating heart of darkness."
As for Porter, she's just undergone "flashbacks" visiting Gothic Nightmares, Tate Britain's study of the supernatural themes in the work of Henry Fuseli and William Blake. However, this goth-turned-PR-woman is adamant that as goths grow up, they are advised to modify the look.
"I see them now where I live and think: `Fine in your twenties. But when you're 30? Sorry -- you look like a twat."'
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