Positive Punk

Positive punk was the early-1980s London tendency, named by the music press in 1983, in which bands emerging from anarcho-punk turned towards mysticism, ritual and theatrical darkness rather than sloganeering. Acts including *Rudimentary Peni*, *UK Decay*, *Sex Gang Children* and *Blood and Roses* combined prominent, chorus-heavy basslines, screeching guitars and wailing vocals with eclectic drumming and occult or pagan imagery. Closely entwined with the Batcave club scene, positive punk supplied much of the musical and visual vocabulary from which British gothic rock developed.