Interview withChristoph Schauer (music and production) from Morphose
Our last interview with Christoph Schauer we had around two and a half years ago. ‘The Open Shutter’ had just been released and the first release shows had been played. If you’d like to refresh your memory, read the interview here.
Since November 2023, the world has kept turning, quite a lot has happened around MORPHOSE, and in the meantime Christoph has launched another project. On Friday, a new MORPHOSE single, ‘Remembrance’, was released - an instrumental piece that had its video premiere on Thursday. Shortly before the release, Christoph took the time to answer a few questions about the latest developments surrounding MORPHOSE, the forthcoming album, and his newest project, FRACTILES.
Reflections of Darkness [RoD]: Hello Christoph, in our last interview together we already spoke a little about the initial plans for the next MORPHOSE album. With ‘Remembrance’, the next release is just around the corner - not a new album yet, but a good opportunity to catch up again. Before we get to the upcoming release and the next album, I’d like to look back a little on the past two and a half years. At the time, we spoke, among other things, about how challenging it was to bring the concept to the stage - particularly because of the many featured artists involved in MORPHOSE.
In the meantime, you’ve played a number of shows - including support shows for FORCED TO MODE and SOLAR FAKE, various festivals, and your own club-shows, such as the recent appearance at the Black Swarm Party in Dresden. Has it become easier in the meantime to bring MORPHOSE to the stage and coordinate everything, or are you still facing pretty much the same challenges as back then?
Christoph: It took a good two years before the project had evolved into something that could be realised on stage at a larger festival. NCN 2024 was the first time we were able to pull it off in that form, and after the show I realised that the setup was now working well from a technical standpoint. That was, so to speak, our trial by fire, and we passed it with flying colours. [RoD reported to the show here]
RoD: I’ve had the chance to see you live in a variety of different line-ups by now. What always impresses me in particular is the way the singers who are present also perform songs originally sung by others who aren’t part of that specific show. I think it’s great that this allows songs to be played that one might not necessarily have expected from a given line-up, and it’s always a real pleasure to see how much everyone enjoys it. Do you experience it in a similar way?
Christoph: The fact that other singers also take on songs originally performed by someone else came about out of necessity. In the beginning, we simply didn’t have that many songs. From that, something developed that hadn’t been planned at all: the principle that everyone is completely fine with singing one or two songs by somebody else. There was actually never any discussion about whether that was a good thing or not. It just evolved naturally. For me, it’s genuinely remarkable that it works so effortlessly, and it’s a huge compliment to the singers that they adapt to it so well.
It also reflects the spirit of this kind of live performance and the very friendly, respectful, and collegial way everyone interacts with one another. No matter who’s there, from the moment everyone comes together, it doesn’t matter whether someone is supposedly more well-known than someone else. It simply plays no role. Everyone is equal - whether it’s Marius on drums, Max, Lennart, Christian, Morten, Andi, or Sven. [Editor’s note: In addition to Christoph himself, the current MORPHOSE line-up consists of Marius Lürig, Max Filges, Lennart Salomon, Christian Schottstädt, Arc Morten, Andreas Pospiech, and Sven Friedrich.]
RoD: When I spoke with Lennart in March, we also talked a bit about working with MORPHOSE, and he described it in a very similar way. When you’re standing in front of the stage watching you perform, that’s exactly how it comes across as well - it’s simply a bunch of guys getting together, making music, and genuinely enjoying themselves. That feeling carries over to the audience too - at least that’s always how it feels to me - this sense of simply having a good time together.
Christoph: That’s exactly how it is, yes. What you have here are people who appreciate one another and then come together on stage to put on a concert for the audience. We don’t rehearse together, because from an organisational point of view that’s simply not possible.
RoD: I think you can feel that particularly strongly during ‘Surrender’. The song seems to have established itself as something of a closer by now, with everyone coming back on stage together at the end. Whose idea was it to perform the song collectively as the finale?
Christoph: No one, actually. Nobody ever said, “Right, we’re going to do it this way now.” It just happened at some point. I can’t say exactly when it started - whether it was at NCN or WGT, but certainly by the Eastside Festival last year. Suddenly I noticed that everyone was up on stage during the last song, jumping around, celebrating together, and sharing that moment with the audience. It was never discussed or agreed upon beforehand. It simply developed completely spontaneously.
RoD: That’s a really lovely development, and one you’re more than welcome to keep. In our last interview, you said that one of the most important aspects of MORPHOSE for you was connecting and exchanging ideas with other people - meeting up, sharing thoughts, and collaborating. You wanted to deepen and expand your work with other artists, not only with singers, but also with other musicians, co-producers, and studios. Have those plans become a reality for the new album? What does the work on the new record look like at the moment? Tell us a bit about what you’re currently doing, how the process works, and where it’s all heading.
Christoph: The first time I really started thinking about new music was during two studio sessions at Marius Lürig’s production studio, which I did together with Marius and Max at the beginning of 2025. We recorded drum ideas for two or three tracks based on ideas that Max and I had produced in Athens in 2024. But at that stage, we weren’t working towards the specific goal of necessarily creating new material from them.
After that, I went to the Institut für Wohlklangforschung - the recording studio of Willi Dammeier, who, among other things, provides MORPHOSE with technical audio support. There, I spent two days experimenting extensively with guitar sounds. That eventually led to the track ‘Broken Glass’. Last year, I also travelled to Greece twice and used the time there to collect ideas. Some of the material that came out of those trips may well find its way onto the album, while other ideas could develop beyond that. I’ll be continuing this process over the coming months - naturally in cooperation and close exchange with the people currently involved.
RoD: When we last spoke, the working title for the next album was still ‘Fusion’. Has that changed in the meantime?
Christoph: Yes, exactly. That has changed. The original idea simply didn’t develop any further conceptually. Then, some time ago, I kept coming across the word “Gravity”, and it really stuck with me.
RoD: We’ve already touched a little on the current line-up. What personnel changes and new influences have found their way into the project? I’m thinking, for example, of Andi, whom we mentioned earlier. And you also had recording sessions with Peter M. Glantz?
Christoph: Peter is a good friend and fellow musician of mine. At the beginning of 2025, we sampled classical and percussive instruments at the Landesmusikakademie in Wolfenbüttel. From that, I’ve built up a sound library that I’m now using for new MORPHOSE ideas. Andi is an exceptionally talented person - as a musician, a singer, and also as a producer. I think it’s fantastic that, through MORPHOSE, he’s now also gaining attention for his own project and his own music. Andi is going to achieve quite a lot over the coming months. I was absolutely delighted to see PULL OUT MIND make its live debut at a festival.
RoD: I’m very curious to see how he gets on with PULL OUT MIND at the Devil Stage Festival. I’ll definitely be checking it out.
Christoph: Oh, you’ll be there as well? That’s great.
RoD: Absolutely, I’ll be there, and my lovely colleague Katja is planning to join the festival as well and report on it. As for the new album, you also spoke about your dream of making a film alongside it and documenting the creative process. The idea was to release the film together with the album. Is that still something you’re working on? Is it still part of the plan?
Christoph: Yes, that’s still an idea I have in the back of my mind. I’ll have to see whether it’s feasible in terms of the amount of work involved to document the whole process on film. At this point, I simply can’t judge that yet.
RoD: You have a strong interest in macro and black-and-white photography and have experimented quite extensively in that field. You also wanted to make films of your own. That brings me neatly to the current release and its accompanying video. Before our conversation, I only had the chance to listen to ‘Remembrance’ once, and afterwards I watched the video. I think that affinity for macro imagery and black-and-white cinematography comes across very clearly. Visually, I found it fascinating because at first you don’t really know what you’re looking at.
You play with backlighting and soft focus, and there are only brief moments when the image becomes sharp. Then you start to recognise plants - grasses, blossoms, and branches. Particularly when the image is blurred and indistinct, it creates incredibly beautiful visual effects. To me, the impression is that the video isn’t trying to tell a story, but rather to convey emotions. That’s also what comes across in the track itself, which feels very cinematic, almost like a film score.
The piece somehow evokes a sense of longing and melancholy - like a blurred memory. By that, I mean less the memory of a specific event or person and more the memory of a particular feeling. I find that incredibly interesting and definitely need to listen to it properly later on. Can you tell us a bit about the idea behind ‘Remembrance’ and the concept behind the video?
Christoph: I composed the piece in Greece in the autumn, or rather late summer, of 2025. I’d rented a place for a week in a fairly secluded spot by the sea, brought some equipment with me, and spent the time doing free-form sessions there. I also had my film camera with me. I had the idea of driving around a bit and simply filming whatever caught my eye. By chance, I kept passing the same location. There was a slope there where I noticed certain plants - the same ones that can be seen in the video. I found them so interesting that I stopped the car and took a closer look.
For some reason, I felt the urge to get my camera out and just start filming. One thing led to another, and before I knew it I had spent two or three hours wandering through the vegetation, shooting footage. Later, when I reviewed the material, I realised that it somehow immediately matched the idea behind the music.
RoD: I think it’s quite remarkable to release an instrumental track as a single. What was the thinking behind saying: right, this is going to be the next single?
Christoph: I simply want to use MORPHOSE to create music that moves me personally and, hopefully, resonates with others as well. For me, it makes no difference whether it’s a commercially viable single or an instrumental soundtrack piece. I don’t draw any distinction between the two.
RoD: Would you like to create more instrumental music for MORPHOSE?
Christoph: Yes. That idea has always been there, even before MORPHOSE evolved into the feature-based band it is today. Back around 2016, I was already making recordings that were more instrumental in nature, and I often felt that they could be suitable for MORPHOSE.
RoD: Since we’re already talking about new material, you’ve played several new and as yet unreleased songs at your recent shows. Among them was a new song by Sven. Back in April last year, you had actually announced that one as the next single. Instead, you ended up releasing ‘Right Now’, a CYTO rework. What was the reason for putting ‘I’m Not Enough’ on ice for the time being? With the album still some way off, are you planning to release more singles before then, or haven’t you really given that much thought yet?
Christoph: To be honest, I haven’t really given that much thought yet. What I do know for certain is that ‘I’m Not Enough’, featuring Sven, will be on the album. I simply pushed it back a little because the idea for ‘Right Now’ suddenly came up, and we ended up putting that together fairly quickly. Whether I’ll release any further standalone singles before the album comes out, I honestly don’t know yet. That’s something I’ll only start thinking about in the winter, because at the moment I’m assuming that the album will be released more towards autumn 2027.
RoD: As far as I know - I think you mentioned it on Marc Urban’s Nightcrawling podcast - you’re also planning to do a release show for the album.
Christoph: There will definitely be an exclusive album release show. The planning is already underway. Everything will be announced at the appropriate time and with plenty of advance notice.
RoD: Excellent. In that case, I can only wish you that the venue is packed when the time comes.
Christoph: Yes, we’ll see. These days, that’s certainly not something you can take for granted.
RoD: We’ll be more than happy to support you with that and will certainly be pleased to report on it. In any case, I’ll make sure to keep the date free.
Christoph: Yes, great. There’s one more thing that comes to mind which is really important to me when it comes to MORPHOSE: without the instrumental section - people like Marius, Max, as well as Willi Dammeier and Ronald Knöbl (FOH for FORCED TO MODE) - none of this would be possible. They are, so to speak, the matrix that made it possible to bring a concept like this to the stage in the first place.
RoD: That would almost make for a perfect closing statement, but I’d still like to talk with you a bit about another project that you launched together with Vasi Vallis of FROZEN PLASMA at the beginning of 2024: FRACTILES. At the time, you didn’t really make a big announcement or promote it extensively. You simply posted a photo of the two of you on Facebook and added a release date for the first single. What was the idea behind the project, and how did the two of you come together in the first place?
Christoph: At some point, I was in the studio - it must have been at the beginning of 2024, sometime during the winter - and I put together a demo track. I stepped up to the microphone myself and sang, or rather shouted, something over it. My first reaction was actually surprise, because there was a kind of vocal expression there that I’d never noticed in myself before. It was one of those moments where you think: what’s going on here? I started exploring that feeling, even though I had never really intended to sing again. In my very early days, back in the 1990s, I was a singer for a while. But I’d always assumed that chapter was long behind me.
Then suddenly there was something there that made me think I should pursue it a little further. So I recorded two or three demos and sent them to Vasi, simply because I wanted to hear his opinion. He told me they sounded great. After that, I asked him whether he could imagine becoming involved in the project and working on it with me, because I’d never collaborated with a music producer before. [Editor’s note: In addition to his work in various bands and musical projects, Vasi Vallis also works as a producer and runs a recording studio in Hanover.] Up to that point, I’d always done everything on my own, and I really wanted to work with someone who produces music themselves.
RoD: Apart from the musical direction, what would you say is the biggest difference between FRACTILES and MORPHOSE for you?
Christoph: The biggest creative difference is that, when I’m producing FRACTILES material, I’m simultaneously writing and shaping the vocal melodies and lyrics. It’s a conscious process that essentially runs in parallel and is already part of the composition from the very beginning when I create a track.
The constellation within the project has changed in the meantime. Last autumn, Vasi left the project, which came as a complete surprise to me. At that point, I wasn’t even sure whether I wanted to continue with FRACTILES at all, because I didn’t want to simply bring in just any live musician as a replacement. For me, one of the defining principles of FRACTILES was always that I would produce it together with someone else. Shortly afterwards, however, the opportunity came up to join SIERRA VEINS on a support tour. Max immediately offered to help me out, and during that tour things absolutely took off between the two of us. We got on incredibly well, and Max became completely passionate about the project.
Around the turn of the year, we sat down together and decided that going forward we would be doing FRACTILES as equal partners - as a producer duo with the same creative standing. And that’s exactly how it is now. Each of us brings songs and ideas to the table, and we produce them together. There’s an incredible amount of energy in that process. After Vasi’s departure, I never would have expected things to develop in this direction. But that’s how it unfolded, and I’m genuinely very happy with where we’ve ended up.
RoD: In February, the two of you - Max and yourself - played a concert together at the SubKultur in Hanover. As far as I know, you also wrote quite a number of new songs specifically for that occasion so that you would have enough material for a full club-show setlist. How did that work?
Christoph: We originally had a good half hour of material. But if you want to play your own club-show, you need at least an hour’s worth of songs. So, from January until the middle of February, we produced six or seven new tracks, and most of them actually came from Max. We found a really good rhythm, and in the end it was a perfect landing right on schedule. The show at the SubKultur was also the first time we performed those songs live, and I think that worked out very well too.
RoD: The first single that you and Max produced together, ‘Call Me Slick’ - a powerful yet highly club-friendly Industrial track - was released in April. Is that the direction FRACTILES will be heading in from now on, and are you planning any further releases this year?
Christoph: In March, we spent a week in Athens focusing exclusively on new FRACTILES material. During that time, a number of completely new aspects emerged as well. We’re really only at the development stage at the moment. The next releases will grow out of that process - and there will definitely be more releases this year.
RoD: Are you also planning an album?
Christoph: Yes, that’s definitely in the works. It could end up being an album, but it might also become a larger EP. That’s not entirely clear yet. We’ll have to see how the next few months develop. There are still a number of live dates coming up, and alongside those we’ll be gradually finishing the next batch of songs.
RoD: In addition to the personnel changes, quite a lot has also shifted in terms of label and booking. In summer (August / September), you signed with Danse Macabre Records, the label run by Bruno Kramm (DAS ICH), and also joined Danse Macabre Booking, which was established in 2025 as a spin-off. In February, you moved to Pluswelt Promotion and are also considering making some changes regarding future releases. You and Andi are planning to set up something of your own?
Christoph: Yes, exactly. Andi and I had the idea of setting up our own label. That idea has actually been around for about a year, and towards the end of 2025 it started to take more concrete shape. We then decided that we would launch a label platform during 2026 – towards autumn or winter. For me, it became clear at the start of the new year that I would take FRACTILES with me into that structure as well. That was also the reason for my decision to leave Danse Macabre.
RoD: I’d like to come back once more to the topic of live dates. With both FRACTILES and MORPHOSE, several shows have already been announced for this year and also for next year. Is there anything in particular you’re especially looking forward to?
Christoph: Honestly, I’m really looking forward to everything that’s still to come.
RoD: With FRACTILES, you’re first up at the Devil Stage Festival on 13 June, where Andi will also be celebrating the live premiere of PULL OUT MIND. In autumn, you’re on tour with FADERHEAD, playing the 20th anniversary shows in Hamburg and Oberhausen. And you’re also set to appear at the E-tropolis Festival next year.
Christoph: Yes, that was quite surreal actually. Sami was backstage at the Molotov in Hamburg - we hadn’t known each other before - and we just ended up talking there. He then got in touch again in the new year and offered us the slot. For us, it’s a huge honour to be supporting the anniversary shows, because I’m a massive fan of his project. Getting the opportunity to support that is really great. And being invited to play E-tropolis is just insane. We’re basically still a newcomer project and haven’t been around that long. So getting the chance to play at such a big festival is simply amazing.
RoD: With MORPHOSE, you’re also on the road again. You’re supporting ROTERSAND at their Heimspiel at Kulttempel in December, and you’re playing at the second Berlin Dark Nights Festival in January.
Christoph: Exactly. Those are also two shows we’re really looking forward to. And of course to the ROTERSAND guys, and to the Kulttempel as well.
RoD: That’s all of my questions. Thank you very much for this once again very pleasant and insightful conversation. I really enjoyed it.
Christoph: Thank you, same here.
RoD: I wish you all the best and every success with your projects, and I hope that we won’t wait another two and a half years until the next interview, but that we might catch up again sometime next year.
Christoph: Next year would be great, or at the latest around the album release, or even before that.
RoD: We’ll definitely do that. I wish you a pleasant evening.
Christoph: Great, I wish you the same and we’ll see each other in Friedrichroda.
Next live-dates (MORPHOSE)
18. Dec. 2026 - Oberhausen / Kulttempel (ROTERSAND Heimspiel)
29.-30. Jan. 2027 - Berlin / Festsaal Kreuzberg (Berlin Dark Nights Festival)
Next live-dates (FRACTILES)
12. Sep. 2026 - Hamburg / Markthalle (FADERHEAD anniversary concert)
17. Oct. 2026 - Oberhausen / Kulttempel (FADERHEAD anniversary concert)
20. Mar. 2027 - Oberhausen / Turbinenhalle (E-tropolis Festival)
Website: www.facebook.com/Morphoseproject / www.morphose-music.com / www.facebook.com/fractiles.official
Band-Pictures FRACTILES by: Christoph Schauer
Live-Pictures: Daniela Vorndran, Aileen Ritter
