Lacrimosa is a duo led by German-born Tilo Wolff, the main composer, and Finnish Anne Nurmi, currently based in Switzerland. Lacrimosa's musical genre originally was Darkwave or rather downright gothic, with occasional metal elements. Since Inferno, their style has shifted much more towards gothic metal. Their musical style mixes heavy metal and gothic rock sounds along with violin, trumpet and more classical instruments, although their musical development throughout the years has also led to changes in instrumentation. Lacrimosa's lyrics are written almost exclusively in German, although since the 1995 album Inferno every album has featured one or two songs in English, generally written by Anne Nurmi. Finnish has also appeared in brief spoken intros to two songs (Schakal on Inferno and The Turning Point on Elodia) and on a bonus track in a limited edition release of Fassade. Their lyrics are mainly about loneliness, sadness, darkness, despair and love.