When

Norwegian composer, percussionist, and keyboardist Lars Pedersen originated the project When, whose output stretches back to the early 1980s and spans dense dissonant orchestral works, sample-driven collages, and Beach Boys-inspired psychedelic pop. Across this stylistic breadth, When has consistently rejected the detached postmodern pastiche typical of many experimental collagists, favoring instead a consistently darker and more morbid sensibility illustrated by album titles such as Death in the Blue Lake, Black White & Grey, and The Black Death.

Pedersen launched When in 1983 while simultaneously performing with the experimental industrial trio Holy Toy, an association he maintained through the remainder of the decade. Several years of work culminated in the project’s debut, Drowning but Learning, issued in 1987 on Pedersen’s own Witchwood imprint. The follow-up, Death in the Blue Lake, appeared in 1988; its title track formed an extended classical-style suite constructed from sampled brass, percussion, and other instruments and drew inspiration from Andre Bjerke’s suspense novel of the same name.

For Black White & Grey, released in 1990, Pedersen enlisted former Henry Cow member Chris Cutler, who supplied lyrics and issued the album on his RéR Megacorp label; Cutler likewise contributed lyrics to the 1994 album Prefab Wreckage. The subsequent three When releases appeared on the Norwegian label Tatra Records. First came the 1992 album-length suite Svartedauen (The Black Death), prompted by the Norwegian Black Plague and ranking among When’s bleakest and most disquieting recordings. Next was Prefab Wreckage in 1994, which edged the project toward a more song-based approach, followed in 1997 by Gynt, prompted by Edvard Grieg’s Peer Gynt Suite. During Pedersen’s tenure with Tatra, the label also reissued the debut Drowning But Learning.

A new phase began in 1998 when the recently established Jester Records—operated by longtime Pedersen admirer Kyrstoffer Rygg, frontman of Ulver and Arcturus—signed When. (A When remix later appeared on Arcturus’s 1999 album Disguised Masters.) Psychedelic Wunderbaum, When’s first Jester release, arrived in 1999 as one of the label’s earliest titles and reunited Pedersen with longtime collaborator Bjørn Sorknes, another ex-member of Holy Toy. Jester next issued the double-disc retrospective WriterCakeBox: The Unblessed World of When, 1983-1998, which collected highlights from all prior When recordings up to but excluding Psychedelic Wunderbaum, plus rare compilation tracks and roughly thirty minutes of previously unreleased material from Pedersen’s archives. After a brief production delay, The Lobster Boys emerged in 2001 as the third Jester album, constituting the most pop-directed entry in the When catalog and extending Pedersen’s reach to wider audiences through Jester’s international distribution.