Southern Gothic
Southern gothic, as a music tag, covers dark, brooding Americana and alternative music that draws on the folklore, religion and decay of the American South.
The name comes from the literary tradition of writers such as William Faulkner and Flannery O'Connor, and in music it is often used as another name for gothic country. Songs set dark, grim lyrics to country, gospel and Americana backing, often with banjo, fiddle and guitar. The style took shape in the late 1990s around Denver bands such as 16 Horsepower, and the term gained new attention in the 2020s through the singer Ethel Cain.
Artists it is known for: Ethel Cain, 16 Horsepower, The Handsome Family.
- Family
- Alternative & Indie
- On Spotify
- A current genre
- What it is
- A genre
- From
- United States, late 1990s
- Also called
- gothic country, gothic americana
- Trackify listeners who play it
- 4%
About 3,200 of 83,000 Trackify listeners with public profiles have southern gothic among their top artists of the last four weeks. Rounded; updated 13 November 2026.
Southern Gothic artists
Ethel Cain
Colter Wall
Sun Kil Moon
Poor Man's Poison
Solya
Nicole Dollanganger
Dead Man's Bones
Tom Waits
Chelsea Wolfe
The southern gothic artists most Trackify listeners have in their top fifty. Each opens on Spotify.
Sources
The definition is written for this site from open sources, and was checked against them on 13 November 2026.