Happy Wednesday, Yol!

 

Altın Gün is the kind of band you would typically discover one night in a Berlin club — when you were still able to go to a club, that is. And go to Berlin, for that matter. Here’s to hoping both of those things will soon be possible again… Now back to Altın Gün: that band became an instant success within the underground, hip multicultural scene that can be found in places like the aforementioned Berlin, London or New York. And they hail from Amsterdam, of all places, even though their entire catalogue is dedicated to reinventions of classic Turkish Folk-Rock tunes. Again, that’s a thing… insofar as Altın Gün made it one: ever since their first 2018 album On and its lead track “Goca Dünya“, they created this unique formula of picking 70’s Turkish tunes and making them impossibly trendy. Respect.

And they kept on going: 2019 brought second album Gece, which earned itself a Grammy nomination, before the pandemic we all know far too much about brought their projects to a halt. And then, during said pandemic, they started working on the band’s third album, Yol, released earlier this year. In other words, these guys (and girl) don’t really know how to stop working… Interestingly, and perhaps logically, Yol is a somewhat less upbeat collection of songs, introducing instead a more contemplative aspect of the band’s musicality. The exoticism of Turkish Folk-Rock is largely replaced here with subtly experimental Electro-Funk takes on the same old tunes, now with a new perspective…

Lead single “Ordunun Dereleri”, based on a traditional Folk song, is the perfect example: the intro beat would fit right in in many a La Roux / Kavinsky / Dua Lipa-style production (although that’s admittedly casting a wide net). The rest of the song hinges more towards the Turkish Folk tonalities we’d been more accustomed to from the gang, albeit always with a Time Impala / Parcels feel to its production. We’ll stop with the name dropping here: that’s probably enough for 2 reviews. Suffice to say, the band successfully reengineered their sound, an interesting achievement given that their work was already based on reinvention…

The rest of the album is on par with this, with special attention to be given to “Bulunur Mu”, which adds a playful 80’s Electronica feel to the whole thing (serving great vocals from the band’s sole female member, Merve Daşdemir) and “Kara Toprak”, perhaps the best blend of the band’s old and new influences, from Oriental tonalities on one end to Funk and Electronic layers on the other, with a bunch of experimental elements in-between… And that’s how you get yourself the best of what Altın Gün circa 2021 has to offer to the world!

Lockdown or not, we can’t wait to see where the next couple of years take the band this time…