Project Pitchfork

Project Pitchfork
Project Pitchfork at the Blackfield Festival 2013
Background information
Origin	Germany
Genres	Electronic rock, dark wave
Years active	1989–present
Labels	Candyland Entertainment, Trisol Music Group, Karma Records (South America)
Associated acts	Rec IMATEM Santa Hates You Aurora Sutra Jansen Spilles
Website	http://www.project-pitchfork.eu
Members	Peter Spilles Dirk Scheuber Jürgen Jansen Achim Färber
Past members	Markus Giltjes Yenz Schrader

Project Pitchfork is an electronic rock group from Hamburg, Germany.

Project Pitchfork was formed by Peter Spilles and Dirk Scheuber. Having agreed to work together, they then picked the project's name by picking a word at random from the dictionary. The demo K.N.K.A. was recorded. Encouraged by the positive response, they take to the stage for the first time on 15 February 1990 in the scene club "Kir" in Hamburg and thoroughly convince the audience in the sold-out location. In May 1991, the revolutionary debut "Dhyani" is released. It is one of the first border walks between electronic music and Gothic and becomes an often quoted milestone in the history of Dark Electro.

From the very beginning, Project Pitchfork have been fond of improvising, always getting as much out of the given situation as was possible. This method of working is also employed on the coming records. Their second album Lam-'Bras appeared in February 1992. This album yielded the first vocal appearance of Patricia Nigiani. The third Pitchfork album, Entities appeared a mere six months later, from which the track "Souls" was later reworked into an extended version on 1993's Souls/Island EP. These two albums strengthened the bands' visionary role in the scene. Project Pitchfork differ remarkably from other bands in the Gothic scene – not only with their music, but also with the professional attitude surrounding the band. From a very early stage, Peter Spilles decides to make the band his job to solely concentrate on his music. This accounts for the rapid succession of albums as well as for the countless concerts that lead the group to the whole of Germany and even – as the first scene band ever – to former Eastern Germany in the early nineties. The band switched to the "Off-Beat" label for 1994's IO, yielding the singles "Renascence" and "Carrion". It is the first digitally produced Pitchfork work, which underlines their further development. For the first time they enter the German album charts (number 56), for the first time they embark on a lengthy German tour.

In 1995, Project Pitchfork established their own label, Candyland Entertainment, through which they release the majority of their own material as well as the material of other bands.

The next Pitchfork release, the "Corps d'Amour" EP was more sexually-influenced than previous works. In 1995 the album Alpha Omega was released. In the same year, Project Pitchfork's tour was supported by the band Rammstein. The next Project Pitchfork's studio album "¡Chakra:Red!" arrived in 1997, the first album since Dhyani to be written as a group effort rather than by Spilles alone. The extensive use of sampled guitars in this album stands for Pitchfork's urge for progress. Moreover, this record marks the inclusion of Jürgen Jansen as a permanent member and is followed by another rapid succession.