AURORA DEEP DIVE Pt.15: Reacting to & Analysing Structure, Texture & Instrumentation

What we've learned so far: AURORA uses a structure of Intro-Verse-Chorus-Verse-Chorus-Bridge**-Chorus* for most of her songs; most also have pre-choruses; many also have a hook added to or replacing one of these main sections; commonly there is an interlude between the first chorus and the second verse; there are often two verses together at the beginning; in many instances the chorus has two separate parts. Each section is mostly made up of 4-bar or 8-bar sections, but sections longer than 16 bars in total are present more often than not. Many songs also make use of pauses.
*The final chorus is the most unreliable section; after the bridge, there is often a section that is either a hybrid of chorus material and other material or a coda/terminal climax featuring new material.
**The Gods We Can Touch has had a different relationship to the bridge especially, and many of the tracks don't have a bridge.
Notable exceptions to this model are Puppet, Through The Eyes Of A Child, Under The Water, Wisdom Cries, Churchyard, Infections Of A Different Kind, Mothership, Exist for Love, Artemis, A Little Place Called The Moon, Hunting Shadows and Your Blood.

AURORA's likeliest approach for texture is to begin sparse and to build towards choruses and drop afterwards, with each successive version of a section having a thicker texture than the previous version; the bridge generally drops suddenly to a very thin texture, then builds considerably towards the next section; often in the outro the texture will be its heaviest, but it will also reduce suddenly before the song ends; there are also sudden drops in other sections, but these normally build back up soon after. Normally, verses are homophonic and outros layer melodies on top of each other, creating a straightforward polyphony. Large textural changes between sections are common, but they stay mostly static during sections other than the bridge.
Notable exceptions to this model are Puppet, Through The Eyes Of A Child, Warrior, Black Water Lilies, Wisdom Cries, Churchyard, Infections Of A Different Kind, The Secret Garden, A Dangerous Thing, Artemis, The Light Beyond and Constellation.

AURORA's instrumental palettes mostly stay consistent through each song, with extra elements being added as the texture thickens. The most common instrumentation choices are:
Solo Voice
Harmony vocals
Piano
Electric Bass
Electric Drums
Acoustic Drums
Distorted, Rough, Grainy Synths
Hollow, Nasal, Woody Synths
Breathy, Fluttery Synths
AURORA also uses big long reverbs all the time.
The songs from The Gods We Can Touch use many more guitars than previous albums.
Notable exceptions to these instrumental palettes can be found in Puppet, The Seed, The River, All Is Soft Inside, Gentle Earthquakes, Infections of a Different Kind, Warrior, Heathens, Artemis, A Little Place Called The Moon, The Light Beyond and Constellation.

Support AURORA:
https://www.aurora-music.com/

I go live on Twitch to talk about music every Tuesday/Thursday. Have a look over there if you like! If you would like to follow me, you certainly can.
twitch.tv/snowballfarming

I also have other links here:
https://linktr.ee/sebfayle

00:00 Intro
07:55 Hunting Shadows (Assassin's Creed)
36:08 The Light Beyond
1:01:15 Constellation
1:14:27 Your Blood