Pepe Deluxe "Queen of the Wave" (2012) / breaks, electronic, experimental, funk, progressive.rock, psychedelic, rock

Queen of the Wave is the fourth album by Pepe Deluxé. It’s an esoteric pop opera in three parts, with the libretto based around the mystical 19th Century novel A Dweller On Two Planets by Frederick S. Oliver. The novel was supposedly channeled by its American author from a cosmic entity called Phylos the Thibetan, who details life in Atlantis and on Venus, sci-fi futurism and reincarnations

Jari Salo (aka James Spectrum) used a range of bizarre and old technologies to get the sound he wanted for the album, including an Edwardian telephone amplifier, a lethal 500000 volts Tesla Coil Synthesizer, a hidden “thunder” effect on a baroque pipe organ, and even an Edison inspired Psychical Predictor.

For Queen of the Wave, Jari Salo was joined by the long time musical collaborator Paul Malmström, a Swedish ex pat who became an official full-time member of the band in 2008.

The album was delayed by two years because of the The Great Stalacpipe Organ, the world’s largest musical instrument. Built in 1956 in an underground cavern in Luray, Virginia, the organ triggers rubber-tipped mallets that strike stalactites to create music throughout a cave system. It took a total of six years to renovate the organ, after which Paul went to Luray and recorded "In The Cave," the first ever original composition for the organ.

Queen of the Wave also includes extensive collaboration with a host of musicians such as Samuli Kosminen of Múm, master heavy metal drummer Kai Hahto and the Czech Film Orchestra, as well as a variety of vocalists: vocal group Club For Five, opera singer Kirsi Thum, Moomins actress Sara Welling, Australian rocker Boi Crompton, and Chris Cote, a native of Boston.

All the profits from the sales of the album will be donated to the John Nurminen Foundation to be used in the Clean Baltic Sea project, one of the most endangered and polluted seas in the world.