Tim, I’m worried about your brother Kevin. I was doing his washing yesterday and I found a pair of black fishnet tights and a mohair jumper from Topshop. Is he entertaining girls in his room?

No Mum, Kevin’s never even spoken to a girl. He’s a Goth.

A Goth?

You know, black hair, scary make-up, Bela Lugosi.

Good grief, do they still exist? I thought they died out after The Cure split up.

Nope. Alive and well and listening to Dark Light, the new album from nordic Goth sensations HIM.

That explains why I keep losing black eyeliners. Oh dear. I suppose I’ll have to tell your father.

I wouldn’t bother. It’s a good sign.

I don’t know about that, Tim. I mean, your father and I have always prided ourselves on being open-minded, but I fail to see how a 13-year-old wearing vampiric make-up and listening to pseudo death rock can be a “good sign”.

Relax, Mum, it’s better than you think. Sussex University — the spiritual home of all Goths — has conducted a study. According to a professor, Dunja Brill, Goths are among their best students. “Most likely to grow up to be doctors, lawyers or architects,” she says, and “middle class to the core.”

Really? What, no vampire sex orgies?

No. Poetry, books and the arts, apparently. Obviously they’re still very annoying.

Obviously. That eyeliner was from Bobbi Brown. Not cheap, you know.

Do say: Yeah, man, my mum used to hang out at Gossips nightclub in the Eighties. She met Nick Cave there once. In fact, Nick Cave might even be, like, my dad. Spooky, huh?

Don’t say: Siouxsie Sioux? Isn’t that a Native-American craft shop in Lewes?