About

CRAYON PHASE is a progressive rock band from the ruhr area and was formed in 2008 by Frank Wendel (vocals, keys), followed by Wolfgang Bähr (guitar, bass) , Arne Gröschel (drums) and Frank Brommer (keys). Peter Damm (bass) joined in 2012 after the recording of their debut album “Within my Recollection”, which was released in 2013. Frank Brommer left the band in 2015 and Frank Wendel focused on keys only when they started to write the songs for their second album.

In 2019 the second album “Two hundred pages” was released as a concept album. Each song reflects the spirit of the individual chapters and takes you through the story with atmospheres changing from dark to epic, from catchy to deep, from mystic to aggressive, but still stays tight and cohesive as one piece of music. The band developed towards a more energetic progressive rock sound, with their own blend of Neo Prog, New Art Rock and Melodic Prog Metal by utilizing the experience the members gained over the years in a number of different projects.

While searching for a new vocalist the vocal lines and lyrics for the new songs had to be created by Wolfgang Bähr with some support from Frank Wendel. Finally the band found Raphael Gazal on vocals for the recording of the album, whose strong and variable voice supports the new songs and the musical development of the band very well. Unfortunately Raphael was not available to join as a long term band member so the search went on to find a permanent singer for the band..

After the release of “Two Hundred Pages” and many good (also international) reviews also in well-known German print prog magazines like “Ecplipsed” or “Empire”, the plan was to look for a live singer to bring our music finally on stage. But unfortunately the search for a singer became more and more difficult because COVID-19 arrived and caused massively and worldwide lockdowns. So we started working on new songs in our home studios because it seemed neither concerts nor rehearsals were possible for a long time.

The final recordings of the third album were done in middle of 2025 and our focus has once again been on studio work. Therefore also Raphael will be part again as the main singer, that means also no line-up changes in terms of the strong album before. The new album will be called “Synthetic Mind” and contains all known musical elements of the Crayon Phase sound like complex structures and cinematic arrangements, but also some straighter and more energetic parts with heavy Guitars and massive Keys. It was released on 30th September as digital album and because of some cover “printing challenges” some additional days later as physical CD also by Progressive Promotion Records.

ALBUM LINE-UP

Raphael Gazal – Vocals
Wolfgang Bähr – Guitars
Arne Gröschel – Drums
Frank Wendel – Keyboards, Synthesizers
Peter Damm – Bass Guitars, Bass Pedals