
Last week, Alex Weber and Max Phelps of EXIST alleged that OBSCURA leader Steffen Kummerer “stole” musical ideas for the band’s latest single, “Evenfall.” Few days later, ex-OBSCURA guitarist Christian Münzner has added to the fire, accusing Kummerer of using riffs he originally composed. Münzner, who was part of OBSCURA from 2008 to 2014 and again from 2020 to 2024, has brought even more attention to the unfolding drama.
Münzner wrote in a social media post: “I just heard more of the new OBSCURA. There are riffs I had written and was guaranteed would not be used, and they are being used 1:1, note for note, stolen, copied, as well as entire song structures. Mr. Tech Death Genius strikes again I would say. If Nuclear Blast releases this they are thiefs as well. I will not let this slide and explore every legal avanue. There are limits to how much s**t we should tolerate. These songs were intended for a solo EP I was planning to do after the OBSCURA split, now I can not do this anymore. This can not go on. Especially if we “agree to disagree” because of creative differences and then you use other peoples work, after you say we are not on the same page what we want musically?
Weber and Phelps alleged that Kummerer appropriated ideas Weber had previously presented to OBSCURA while Weber was a member of the band. Weber claims to have shared these ideas for potential inclusion in OBSCURA‘s upcoming album, A Sonication, but was assured they would not be used after his departure from the band.
In a new interview with Roadie Crew, Kummerer was asked about the situation and responded: “Oh, I think there’s a lot of frustration involved in this story. There’s a lot of unnecessary public slander going on right now. That’s all I have to say. If I have a problem with someone, I pick up the phone and go and deal with it directly with them, I’m not going to go on my social media and start a ‘witch hunt’. I think their intention was a little different, they didn’t want to solve the ‘problems’. I find that very sad, because I worked with those guys for a long time, and we ended up on a relatively good note.
“I sent the entire album, the final product, right away for them to listen to; I have nothing to hide,” he continued. “Now I’m having to deal with someone putting the entire campaign for the new album on hold, which is very sad, but there’s nothing I can do about it. It’s already happened, people have already formed their opinions, no one wants to hear the other side of things anymore, they don’t want my opinion. I’ll deal with it, I’ll resolve it, but it won’t be very nice for them, that’s all I can say.
“It’s sad because it’s so unnecessary,” Kummerer added. “Nowadays, if you point things out like that in public, it doesn’t look good for the person pointing it out, it’s not a very mature approach. In the end, everyone loses. I’m not going to speak out, there’s not going to be an official statement. I’ll talk to people directly if it’s really a problem, but so far, no one has come to me to try to solve it directly, and that’s the good thing. Again, I think there’s a lot of frustration involved in all this, and I’m going to deal with it, but on my own terms, not publicly.”
Reeder, the visionary behind Metal Addicts, has transformed his lifelong passion for metal into a thriving online community for metal aficionados. As a fervent devotee of black metal, Reeder is captivated by its dark, atmospheric, and often unorthodox soundscapes.