TRICK009
WHEN Writercakebox (1983-1998)
Experimental/cut/collage
Released 1999
WHEN Writercakebox (1983-1998)
Experimental/cut/collage
Released 1999
Release info/Press release
Given the privy of the riddled collagist's résumé you may understand the behavior - prone to avoidance at the pursuit of clarity, to stop him in a frame for a glimpse of his processes - illogical. What then can be suggested by the would be portraitist? An attempt at truth would be an act of insolence. In the unblessed world of When truth is transitory and performs in a ring of mockery as it's caricature flees the senses. Time, reminded by the pendulum clock that plangently suggests the fleeting, weaves past, present and future's veins into an organism designed to collect moments, empty their instances and reseed them with an alien purpose. When is not a moment, at least not one you'd recognize in your wake. Time is empty.
Inception, an irreducible ambiguity. Although particulars are quite blurred due to lack of documentation or simply the criminally neglected body of work forged by those involved, the activity can be traced to what is thought to be its big bang... By 1981 the primordial soup had cooled and a Norwegian/Polish union known as Holy Toy released their "Perfect Day" maxi-single/EP, initiating what would soon become one of the most intense and imaginative assemblies to ever exist in the experimental music macrocosm (Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore has acknowledged Holy Toy as "one of the most important bands of the experimental school"). An enigmatic amalgam from its formation - Holy Toy were a twilight zone of the New Wave, a battlefield on the topography of the avant-garde - a place where ideas not only coalesced but activated their causes and contentions in a cold war orchestrated in futurisms and romanticisms.
By 1983 Holy Toy percussionist/organist/sample magician/Beach Boys obsessive Lars Pedersen had developed new concepts apart from his work within the band, later resulting in the first recorded material for When... 1987's "Drowning But Learning" took a few more strides into the left field where the suggestive footsteps of Holy Toy had been treading. Recorded between '83 and '86, "Drowning..." did more than just suggest that When wasn't merely an extension of Holy Toy. Although, its association was inevitably augmentative and its veins as interwoven in complexity, its heart pumped a new plasma, its lungs a new breath. "Drowning..." was brimming with the apparitions of alien voyeurism, cartoon frenzy and warfield terrorism - When had become an interface with dissolved boundaries, the glue smeared discordant lines with a pasted caustic mischievous smile. In these early years of When Pedersen had remained a component in Holy Toy throughout the course of the 80's taking part in many poignant works such as the masterpieces "Panzer and Rabbits" and "Czemu Nie W Chórze" (to name only a couple).
In 1988 the release of the 12" "Death In The Blue Lake" became one of Pedersen's most challenging endeavors and quite possibly his most celebrated as well. "Death In The Blue Lake", the piece itself, was a twenty-one minute suite of haunting anxiety and in the same instance a passive surveillance of the same fear. It was a moment of cosmic absorption and the alleviation that resulted was highly intensive. The B side of "Death..." (now an extreme rarity) was a freakish hybrid of new wave, R.I.O. (Rock In Opposition), folk, cartoon, manipulated sampling and a palette of colors in which the pigments had never mingled before.
The release of 1990's "Black White and Grey" marked the first time When had seen extensive distribution. Long time friend and fan Chris Cutler (of the legendary R.I.O. initiators Henry Cow, and numerous other projects) not only collaborated with Pedersen for the lyrical content of "Black White and Grey" but also thrust its accessibility into a market of experimental enthusiasts by releasing the album on his communive experimental label RéR Megacorp. "Black White and Grey" delved even further into the field of the surrealist composite soundscape by not only representing "Death In The Blue Lake" to a previously untapped audience but also the creation of a new long play collage suite entitled "Grey" (which consisted of two separate compositions, one over twenty minutes the other a little over nine minutes). "Grey (Part I & II)" was a web of loosely structured suggestions and escapist anticipations into streets, factories, warzones and nebulae. Pedersen's streamlined vocal lay atop jagged percussives and rhythmic retardation, a marriage of industry and psychedelics. Shortplay classics such as the marching band fantasism of "Fellini's Hat" and the choral ambiance of "Heart Of Rage" and "From White To White" adjust the equilibrium for the eccentric whole of the album with their adherent characterism.
After "Black White and Grey" Pedersen then moved on to Norway's Tatra Records, who would later re-release "Drowning But Learning" as well as three more When albums. The first of which was 1992's "Svartedauen (The Black Death)". "Svartedauen", inspired by Theodor Kittelsen's body of artwork with the same name, is quite simply the most terrifying of Pedersen's material (and as far as I am concerned the most eerie stimuli that's ever toyed with my nervous system). A thirty-eight minute singular suite forcing its listener into a horrible past, The Black Plague in Norway. Every instance, baleful and grim, a pestilence encompasses each movement. The feral eye of Pesta, a greenish-yellow ghoul of a woman spotted black with plague, surveys your every motion - voyeuring undetected in decrepit queer gesture. Traditional Norwegian folk etches the timeline in horrible inflections with a haunting pulse of the clock motif counting away the tension with a disturbed perversity. A band of flagellants dance by in the throes of self affliction whilst the fiddle mimics a halling tune in a mirror of grotesque penance. In the span of thirty-eight minutes the intensity constructs only suggestions of relief through the illusion of an ebbing pursuit. "Svartedauen" is considered by many, Pedersen's most evocative moment.
Pedersen's next album under the When moniker was released in 1994 by Tatra, entitled "Prefab Wreckage", it was perhaps his most dynamic and adherent work to date. Orchestrated in a haze of competing clock rhythms, abstract fauna and industry, a string section performs in Pandemonium concert, such as the one conducted by Bosch in the sleeve design. "Hands of Orlac", in its bewitching tribal rhythm ebbs into the gossamer nebula that serves as the environment of the album, - a folklorish hell - ambiguous and illuminant in the same stroke. The clockwork motif webs "Dark Abyss" to the previous juxtaposition like the encrypted silk of a writing spider's tapestry clings to temporary constructs. The strings' vibrato weave with the nerve endings of a fairy tale's "boing bong" percussion developing a circus of majestics, the synthetic brass: like a neon light fluctuating in the deep chiaroscuro of perdition. The clock's web extends assimilating into the structure of the title piece. "Prefab Wreckage" plays on the linearity of strings strewn as a blanket across the rising clockwork percussion that's subdued eventually in a quiet dynamic only to erect to its pinnacle in a blink. Pedersen's vocals are at their most effectual, like a chimera, transient and illusory. The clock ceases and an acoustic passage introduces "Evoe", perhaps the most accessible moment in When's catalog up to this point (it has slight similarities to Pedersen's late 80's electro/acoustic pop band Last James, excellent melodic yet psychedelic pop with tremendous adherency). "Evoe" has the spine of pop but its content is depthful and its veins are varicose with surreality, one of When's most potent injections. "Ghosts" is a carny tempest, as frightening as it is playful, it turbulently extracts the viscera of "Prefab Wreckage's" character like an uncased blender spewing the innards of fruit. A nerve disassembly line draws the intensely illustrative trip to a close through this Bosch-ish hell by mechanically withdrawing the spectator's nerve endings in "Hieronymus (Four Sins)".
The last When album released on the Tatra label was '97's "Gynt", a satyric play on the Ibsen inspired "Peer Gynt Suite" by Edvard Grieg. As burlesque as it is tributary, "Gynt" is a cut up of rapid caricatures and theatric silhouettes cooperating sporadically with the truths of Grieg's work. The dynamics are stark in contrast to the relatively soft transparencies in layering present on albums like "Svartedauen" and "Prefab Wreckage", supporting it as scenes of fractured instances. A host of voices tell the tale, from the fantastically absurd and cartoonish (one sounding remarkably like a voice from Devo's "Pink Pussycat") to the finishing abrasive tone as the album drops into an orchestral maelstrom before the wistful ebb of its exit.
Enter the Jester... In 1998 Norway's Jester Records were just beginning to blossom and Pedersen, seeking a new home, found himself in business with long time When enthusiast and Jester Records founder Krystoffer Rygg. The resulting album from this union (and re-union with former Holy Toy member Bjørn Sorknes joining Pedersen on the performance), 99's "Psychedelic Wunderbaum" [trick004], was undoubtedly Pedersen's most curious work since "Svartedauen". "...Wunderbaum" was like an animated snuff film score, Wile E. Cyote orchestrating sabotage on "The Magical Mystery Tour", intensely fun and as dangerous as faulty ACME explosives. Clearly the most 'pop' oriented of Pedersen's When material thus far, but there is not a moment of conventional sensibility to be extracted from it, he's far too much wit to allow that little trick to explode in his face. There is a violence on "...Wunderbaum" unlike anything Pedersen has attempted before, the dynamics are impassive and a static corrosive through the scope of the album (omitting the psycheballad "Kali"), a vertigo between acidic illusion and automotive collision. Compositions rarely come more adhesive than those found on "...Wunderbaum", once it dissolves it insures permanent damage.
In all that I've said, it still cannot reveal any truths into the empty moments that When fills, no matter how inaccurate, it's never a trip you return from seeing, listening or thinking the same. With over seven-teenyears of conceptualizing and realization Pedersen has been far overdue for such a comprehensive study of his incredible imagination. "WriterCakeBox - The Unblessed World Of When" [trick009] is doubtlessly the most necessary summary of one man's genius contributions to a comparatively mundane world of music.
David Wills
Given the privy of the riddled collagist's résumé you may understand the behavior - prone to avoidance at the pursuit of clarity, to stop him in a frame for a glimpse of his processes - illogical. What then can be suggested by the would be portraitist? An attempt at truth would be an act of insolence. In the unblessed world of When truth is transitory and performs in a ring of mockery as it's caricature flees the senses. Time, reminded by the pendulum clock that plangently suggests the fleeting, weaves past, present and future's veins into an organism designed to collect moments, empty their instances and reseed them with an alien purpose. When is not a moment, at least not one you'd recognize in your wake. Time is empty.
Inception, an irreducible ambiguity. Although particulars are quite blurred due to lack of documentation or simply the criminally neglected body of work forged by those involved, the activity can be traced to what is thought to be its big bang... By 1981 the primordial soup had cooled and a Norwegian/Polish union known as Holy Toy released their "Perfect Day" maxi-single/EP, initiating what would soon become one of the most intense and imaginative assemblies to ever exist in the experimental music macrocosm (Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore has acknowledged Holy Toy as "one of the most important bands of the experimental school"). An enigmatic amalgam from its formation - Holy Toy were a twilight zone of the New Wave, a battlefield on the topography of the avant-garde - a place where ideas not only coalesced but activated their causes and contentions in a cold war orchestrated in futurisms and romanticisms.
By 1983 Holy Toy percussionist/organist/sample magician/Beach Boys obsessive Lars Pedersen had developed new concepts apart from his work within the band, later resulting in the first recorded material for When... 1987's "Drowning But Learning" took a few more strides into the left field where the suggestive footsteps of Holy Toy had been treading. Recorded between '83 and '86, "Drowning..." did more than just suggest that When wasn't merely an extension of Holy Toy. Although, its association was inevitably augmentative and its veins as interwoven in complexity, its heart pumped a new plasma, its lungs a new breath. "Drowning..." was brimming with the apparitions of alien voyeurism, cartoon frenzy and warfield terrorism - When had become an interface with dissolved boundaries, the glue smeared discordant lines with a pasted caustic mischievous smile. In these early years of When Pedersen had remained a component in Holy Toy throughout the course of the 80's taking part in many poignant works such as the masterpieces "Panzer and Rabbits" and "Czemu Nie W Chórze" (to name only a couple).
In 1988 the release of the 12" "Death In The Blue Lake" became one of Pedersen's most challenging endeavors and quite possibly his most celebrated as well. "Death In The Blue Lake", the piece itself, was a twenty-one minute suite of haunting anxiety and in the same instance a passive surveillance of the same fear. It was a moment of cosmic absorption and the alleviation that resulted was highly intensive. The B side of "Death..." (now an extreme rarity) was a freakish hybrid of new wave, R.I.O. (Rock In Opposition), folk, cartoon, manipulated sampling and a palette of colors in which the pigments had never mingled before.
The release of 1990's "Black White and Grey" marked the first time When had seen extensive distribution. Long time friend and fan Chris Cutler (of the legendary R.I.O. initiators Henry Cow, and numerous other projects) not only collaborated with Pedersen for the lyrical content of "Black White and Grey" but also thrust its accessibility into a market of experimental enthusiasts by releasing the album on his communive experimental label RéR Megacorp. "Black White and Grey" delved even further into the field of the surrealist composite soundscape by not only representing "Death In The Blue Lake" to a previously untapped audience but also the creation of a new long play collage suite entitled "Grey" (which consisted of two separate compositions, one over twenty minutes the other a little over nine minutes). "Grey (Part I & II)" was a web of loosely structured suggestions and escapist anticipations into streets, factories, warzones and nebulae. Pedersen's streamlined vocal lay atop jagged percussives and rhythmic retardation, a marriage of industry and psychedelics. Shortplay classics such as the marching band fantasism of "Fellini's Hat" and the choral ambiance of "Heart Of Rage" and "From White To White" adjust the equilibrium for the eccentric whole of the album with their adherent characterism.
After "Black White and Grey" Pedersen then moved on to Norway's Tatra Records, who would later re-release "Drowning But Learning" as well as three more When albums. The first of which was 1992's "Svartedauen (The Black Death)". "Svartedauen", inspired by Theodor Kittelsen's body of artwork with the same name, is quite simply the most terrifying of Pedersen's material (and as far as I am concerned the most eerie stimuli that's ever toyed with my nervous system). A thirty-eight minute singular suite forcing its listener into a horrible past, The Black Plague in Norway. Every instance, baleful and grim, a pestilence encompasses each movement. The feral eye of Pesta, a greenish-yellow ghoul of a woman spotted black with plague, surveys your every motion - voyeuring undetected in decrepit queer gesture. Traditional Norwegian folk etches the timeline in horrible inflections with a haunting pulse of the clock motif counting away the tension with a disturbed perversity. A band of flagellants dance by in the throes of self affliction whilst the fiddle mimics a halling tune in a mirror of grotesque penance. In the span of thirty-eight minutes the intensity constructs only suggestions of relief through the illusion of an ebbing pursuit. "Svartedauen" is considered by many, Pedersen's most evocative moment.
Pedersen's next album under the When moniker was released in 1994 by Tatra, entitled "Prefab Wreckage", it was perhaps his most dynamic and adherent work to date. Orchestrated in a haze of competing clock rhythms, abstract fauna and industry, a string section performs in Pandemonium concert, such as the one conducted by Bosch in the sleeve design. "Hands of Orlac", in its bewitching tribal rhythm ebbs into the gossamer nebula that serves as the environment of the album, - a folklorish hell - ambiguous and illuminant in the same stroke. The clockwork motif webs "Dark Abyss" to the previous juxtaposition like the encrypted silk of a writing spider's tapestry clings to temporary constructs. The strings' vibrato weave with the nerve endings of a fairy tale's "boing bong" percussion developing a circus of majestics, the synthetic brass: like a neon light fluctuating in the deep chiaroscuro of perdition. The clock's web extends assimilating into the structure of the title piece. "Prefab Wreckage" plays on the linearity of strings strewn as a blanket across the rising clockwork percussion that's subdued eventually in a quiet dynamic only to erect to its pinnacle in a blink. Pedersen's vocals are at their most effectual, like a chimera, transient and illusory. The clock ceases and an acoustic passage introduces "Evoe", perhaps the most accessible moment in When's catalog up to this point (it has slight similarities to Pedersen's late 80's electro/acoustic pop band Last James, excellent melodic yet psychedelic pop with tremendous adherency). "Evoe" has the spine of pop but its content is depthful and its veins are varicose with surreality, one of When's most potent injections. "Ghosts" is a carny tempest, as frightening as it is playful, it turbulently extracts the viscera of "Prefab Wreckage's" character like an uncased blender spewing the innards of fruit. A nerve disassembly line draws the intensely illustrative trip to a close through this Bosch-ish hell by mechanically withdrawing the spectator's nerve endings in "Hieronymus (Four Sins)".
The last When album released on the Tatra label was '97's "Gynt", a satyric play on the Ibsen inspired "Peer Gynt Suite" by Edvard Grieg. As burlesque as it is tributary, "Gynt" is a cut up of rapid caricatures and theatric silhouettes cooperating sporadically with the truths of Grieg's work. The dynamics are stark in contrast to the relatively soft transparencies in layering present on albums like "Svartedauen" and "Prefab Wreckage", supporting it as scenes of fractured instances. A host of voices tell the tale, from the fantastically absurd and cartoonish (one sounding remarkably like a voice from Devo's "Pink Pussycat") to the finishing abrasive tone as the album drops into an orchestral maelstrom before the wistful ebb of its exit.
Enter the Jester... In 1998 Norway's Jester Records were just beginning to blossom and Pedersen, seeking a new home, found himself in business with long time When enthusiast and Jester Records founder Krystoffer Rygg. The resulting album from this union (and re-union with former Holy Toy member Bjørn Sorknes joining Pedersen on the performance), 99's "Psychedelic Wunderbaum" [trick004], was undoubtedly Pedersen's most curious work since "Svartedauen". "...Wunderbaum" was like an animated snuff film score, Wile E. Cyote orchestrating sabotage on "The Magical Mystery Tour", intensely fun and as dangerous as faulty ACME explosives. Clearly the most 'pop' oriented of Pedersen's When material thus far, but there is not a moment of conventional sensibility to be extracted from it, he's far too much wit to allow that little trick to explode in his face. There is a violence on "...Wunderbaum" unlike anything Pedersen has attempted before, the dynamics are impassive and a static corrosive through the scope of the album (omitting the psycheballad "Kali"), a vertigo between acidic illusion and automotive collision. Compositions rarely come more adhesive than those found on "...Wunderbaum", once it dissolves it insures permanent damage.
In all that I've said, it still cannot reveal any truths into the empty moments that When fills, no matter how inaccurate, it's never a trip you return from seeing, listening or thinking the same. With over seven-teenyears of conceptualizing and realization Pedersen has been far overdue for such a comprehensive study of his incredible imagination. "WriterCakeBox - The Unblessed World Of When" [trick009] is doubtlessly the most necessary summary of one man's genius contributions to a comparatively mundane world of music.
David Wills