Germany's Project Pitchfork are veterans of the goth scene, combining electronic dance with ominous industrial flourishes since 1989.
Since the band's inception, vocalist Peter Spilles and keyboardist/programmer Dirk "Scheubi" Scheuber have been at the fore. They debuted in 1991 with Dhyani and proceeded to release album after album -- almost yearly -- for the next decade. In 1992, they released two LPs: Lam-'Bras and Entities. An extension of the latter, the Souls/Island EP was released in 1993 and included additional parts of their Mirror song series. Their digitally produced Io appeared in 1994 and resulted in Pitchfork's first German chart appearance, as well as its first American release. 1995 was another prolific year for the band. They released a pair of EPs (Ch'i and Corps d'Amour), an LP (Alpha Omega), started their own label, Candyland Entertainment, and embarked on a European tour with then-newcomers Rammstein. By 1997, the rise of industrial music in the mainstream resulted in the addition of more guitar riffs and heavier synths on their NIN-fluenced seventh LP, ¡Chakra: Red! At this time, they also added Jurgen Jansen as an official member of the lineup and toured the United States for the first time.
The trio released Eon: Eon (Warner Music Group/EastWest) in 1998, backed by the single "Steelrose," which was the band's first music video. A period of relative quiet followed, as the band took a few years off before releasing Daimonion in 2001. The effort included the club hit "Timekiller" and was their highest charting album to date. The following year, they released the NUN Trilogy, a triptych of releases that included the Inferno LP and the View from a Throne and Trialog EPs.
A few years of silence followed before the band released the ominous Kaskade LP in 2005 and the accompanying Wonderland/One Million Faces EP in 2007.
2009 turned out to be yet another big year for the band, as they released Dream, Tiresias! (Prussia Records) -- a sharply produced and more dance-oriented album -- and a remix album, before their second tour of the United States. The next year, they released Continuum Ride, and followed the year after with the more accessible Quantum Mechanics, which became another German chart climber. In 2011, the band remastered 31 songs and compiled them into a massive two-disc collection, First Anthology
The two-disc LP Black was released in 2013, furthering the band's staple sound. The concept album Blood arrived in 2014, making it Project Pitchfork's 17th LP in 25 years. A second compilation collection, Second Anthology, was released in 2016, celebrating nearly three decades of Project Pitchfork's dark electronic dance. ~ Neil Z. Yeung