"In Hell I'll Be Good Company" by The Dead South

Another one of my son's favorite songs. He insisted on watching this video on YouTube one day - turns out this band is awesome. And my three-year-old's music street cred has been solidified. I'm a big fan of the Southern Gothic genre in general, but the music has this haunting quality that you can't get anywhere else. I don't know if it's the banjo or the honky-tonk piano (or the "jankily" piano, as I like to call it) but there is something about the genre that is extra spooky. Like you're going to meet the devil at the crossroads while carrying a six-string on your back. Or you'll run into a bar full of ghosts in that small town where your pickup truck breaks down. I love it so much.

Dead Love couldn't go no further

Proud of and disgusted by her

Push shove, a little bruised and battered

Oh Lord I ain't coming home with you

My life's a bit more colder

Dead wife is what I told her

Brass knife sinks into my shoulder

Oh babe don't know what I'm gonna do

I was thinking this week about the phrase "American Gothic," which is a misnomer. The truth is that there are so many sub-genres of what we call American Gothic, that it is necessary to differentiate. I ran across a tweet a while ago which sort of enumerated on the distinctions between the sub-genres. I've taken it a step further in my head and added some categories of my own. The United States, in comparison to other countries, is huge in terms of land. It encompasses multiple climate types and geographic layouts, so boiling all if it down into only one specific type of spooky is nigh impossible. You add the distinctive cultural make-up of each region in the US, and it gets even more complicated. I've attempted to identify the most obvious sub-types of American Gothic, as a helpful reference for myself and other writers everywhere.

• Southern Gothic - This genre comprises all the spooky parts of the South. Common themes/tropes include Civil War ghosts, haunted/cursed plantations, and Voodoo. The terrain is either the bayou or plantation fields - either way, it's very green. A lot of Southern Gothic revolves around New Orleans and Louisiana, because of it's rich, diverse culture, but it does extend into Eastern Texas and across to the Atlantic Ocean (below the Mason-Dixon Line, of course).
• Midwest Gothic - This genre subverts the wholesome image of the American farmland. Think empty cornfields and creepy scarecrows. Rusty farm equipment and creaky barn doors. Locals who keep to themselves and are hiding dark secrets behind their polite smiles.
• Southwest Gothic - This genre uses the typical Western landscape. Ghost towns in the desert with nothing for miles except Russian thistle (aka tumbleweeds) and bleached cow bones. Characters are the beautiful saloon girl ghost with the tragic back story and the gunslinger who failed to save her. Common themes/tropes include hanging corpses in the town square encircled by buzzards, Native American chants being heard mysteriously on the wind, and Brujeria.
• Appalachian Gothic - This is very similar to Southern Gothic but it takes place in the area encompassed by the Appalachian Mountains, which is most of the Northeast. The forest is thicker and greener, the terrain is more mountainous. I always think of the Hatfields and the McCoys - an American Romeo & Juliet story. So naturally, a trope would be young romances that ended tragically - ghostly young women in white wandering through the forest to meet their lover, dark shadows everywhere among the trees. The folk magic used (Pow-wow) is more based in Native American lore and old German customs, rather from the mishmash of Catholicism and Voodoo that is synonymous with Southern Gothic.
• Key West Gothic - This genre infuses paradise with dark history. The setting is white beaches and hidden caves filled with blue water (and possibly sea monsters). Common themes/tropes include dead pirates, cursed buried treasure, sunken ships, bloody slave revolts, and hoodoo. It's the beautiful young bride standing on the Widow's Walk as she looks out to sea for her missing husband. We'll throw abandoned lighthouses in this category, too, but it depends on the setting.
• Urban Gothic - This is a catch-all category for spooky American cityscapes. Think abandoned malls, dark alleys, drug-addled parties where there is just something off about the people you meet.
• Hollywood Gothic (aka L.A. Noire) - There's a specific category for this because of the tragic history surrounding L.A. and the development of the movie industry. It was a price paid in the blood of young girls with big dreams and mobsters with no limits. The setting is an abandoned Art Deco hotel well past its heyday. It's haunted by moviestars, aspiring actors, and their admirers. It's a waft of expensive perfume a waitress smells as she closes up a restaurant for the night. It's the Black Dahlia, bisected and with a fresh Glasgow Smile, being found on a crisp morning as the sun rises over California. It's a juxtaposition of opposites - glamour with gore, ugly scaffolding hidden beneath velvet fabric, fake smiles while a knife slowly goes into someone's back. Common tropes/themes are secret affairs, haunted hotels with ghostly parties, and cursed movie sets.
• Northern Gothic - This genre capitalizes on the desolation of the frozen North. The landscape is blindingly white, there's so much snow. Bodies get preserved in ice. And blood on snow makes quite an impact. And there's absolutely no one around to save you when you fall through the ice while ice fishing.
• Pacific Northwest Gothic - The genre involves thick forest full of unknown creatures. It's always misty here. Common themes include grizzly bear skeletons, glimpses of Sasquatch, and sparkly vampires (just kidding....) The Pacific Northwest is basically the American response to the Scottish Moors. Think packs of roving werewolves and camping trips that go horribly wrong. Rocky beaches with abandoned lighthouses (this genre also gets lighthouses).

I'm sure that's not everything. Perhaps I'll expand on this more later but I think this is good for now.

"In Hell I'll Be Good Company" Video