Il duo degli Aurora (Peter Spilles e Patricia Nigiani, entrambi membri dei Project Pitchfork) ha coniato una delle lingue piu` colte e creative del gotico teutonico.

The ambient ballads of the album The Land Of Harm And Appletrees (Cleopatra, 1993) express a vision of the world that is dark yet majestic, conveyed through chameleonic collages and ancestral atmospheres.
The opening track, Regression, with its delicate and solemn pace, is the best proof of their sublime melodicism, worthy of new age, which often soars into memorable romantic choruses. The title track transports this model into the most fairy-tale-like medieval setting, thanks to an electronic arrangement that on one hand injects a tinkling crackle and on the other repeats another moving melody in waltz time. This visionary art flashes both with wild surrealism (the echoes of a caravan in the desert on Dream) and with subtle impressionism (sunlit sea glimmers on Floating Dolphins).
The album boasts moments of rare suggestion and intensity, such as the martial dance of Posen 1793, driven by a stormy roll and ethereal warbles, or the combination of a thunderous martial cadence and a continuous drone of monks on Hereafter. Although they achieve their best effects when using minimal resources, the duo is capable of dressing their grandiose lieder with synthetic polyrhythms, symphonic syncopations, and minimalist trills. Their polyphony reaches Wagnerian heights in the triumphant grand finale of Crusaders and the driving counterpoint of its double choir.
Autora’s songs rely on an exceedingly classical structure, anchored in two fundamental principles: the constant choral nature of the electronics, which at every moment forms a single whole, and the almost spatial centrality of the vocals, which nonetheless do not play a spectacular role. A synthetic and baroque work, Aurora builds on the intuitions of Dead Can Dance but ventures into ever darker and more indecipherable labyrinths, seeking a Teutonic path to understanding the future.

Their intensely religious and gothic variant of cosmic music lends itself well to the metaphysical arc of Dimension Gate (Hyperion, 1994). The album is essentially a collection of solemn lieder of the apocalypse, yet it also contains a carefully calculated emotional narrative.
A convulsive sea of tragic and obsessive keyboard chords, along with Nigianii’s piercing, almost “Brechtian” recitative, creates a spasmodic tension in the opening Solar.
The spirit of the medieval mass overflows in Legend Of Our Origin, opened by percussive minimalism in the style of gamelan but then dominated by the grave (cathedral-like) mellotron theme and the voices: the high, noble soprano carrying the epic hymn, the female voices providing counterpoint, and the male voices in the Gregorian choir register.
The full arsenal of medieval music (madrigal, saltarello, treble choir, martial drums) is deployed in Garden Of Temptation. A post-nuclear wind sweeps through the bleak mantra of In Search Of The Unity, before the track drifts into its swamps of Arabic chants. A frightening percussiveness drives the bolero of Egypt. Nigianii sings with ever more solemn tones on Shadow Land, while Spilles’ orchestration brushes against excesses worthy of Verdi’s Requiem in The Marriage Of Heaven And Earth. The funereal madrigal of Firenze, in a riot of flute, viola, and percussion, closes with the immortal epigraph “Chi vuol esser lieto sia…”
The intensity of these lieder arises at the intersection of the dramatic arts of Foetus, Laibach, Dead Can Dance, and Art Bears.
The instrumental suite Fire/ Earth/ Water/ Air, which closes the album at the border of cosmic music, techno, and new age, consecrates one of the most metaphysical records of the era, a worthy heir to the masses of Popol Vuh.

In gothic industrial music, Project Pitchfork has few rivals. It is essentially the duo of Peter Spilles and Dirk Scheuber. The album IO (Metropolis, 1994) collects their first cassette recordings: Nuclear Attack (1986), The Damage (1986), Demonial Puppets (1987), and Landscape (1987). Renascence

After the demo cassette Killing Nature Killing Animals (1990), they released Dhyani (Hypnobeat, 1991), featuring Vietnam and the single Psychic Torture. Conjure, from Lam` Bras (Hypnobeat, 1992), became their first hit. Meanwhile, their sound had become more melodic and less harsh.

Entities (Hypnobeat, 1992) is a sophisticated album, with songs separated by interludes. It is also their most esoteric work. The success of Souls, their romantic pinnacle, definitively launched Project Pitchfork into German clubs.

Carrion (Off Beat, 1993) and Renascence, also included on IO (Metropolis, 1994), continued to make waves.

In 1995, Peter Spilles left Patricia Niagiani, but the love songs on the EP Corps D’Amour (Candyland, 1995), including the title track and Bodies, seem dedicated to her. The sound was further refined: the keyboards weave an atmospheric backdrop for Spilles’ fragile tales.

Alpha/Omega (Candyland, 1995) recycled the same ideas without conviction and failed to replicate the earlier successes. It was already time for a retrospective anthology, The Early Years (89-93) (Candyland, 1996).

Preceded by the single En Garde!, !Chakra:Red! (Candyland, 1997) emerged, overflowing with stylistic hybrids thanks to new age, heavy metal, and hip hop influences.

Project Pitchfork's industrial music became more accessible on Eon:Eon (EastWest, 1999), thanks to Juergen Jansen's samples and a more organized sound. The band now sounds like a melodic and danceable version of Nine Inch Nails.