Turkish Freakout: Psych-Folk Singles 1969-1980

Like wow. And then some. The variety of music here - from wigged out dervish drones to kif-influenced attempts to electronically update traditional music there is something here for anyone who likes the sound of music, even if they don't understand the words. That, incidentally, is a reference to sonic adventurers, as opposed to Rodgers and Hammerstein.

thanks...

The Turkish music scene of the late 60's and 70's has had a huge resurgence over the past 5-10 years, with the UK's 'Finders Keepers' label and South Korea's 'Word Psychedelia' label re-releasing some of the key albums of the era. There's also been upwards of half a dozen quality compilations released with this being one of them. And the compilations play an important role - much of the work by the main artists of the era (particularly Baris Manço) has either never been released on CD or if it has, it's been done using recordings made directly from original vinyl copies - buy anything from the era on CD in the records shops of Istanbul and the sound quality is invariably average or below.Unusually, this compilation ignores some of the big players on the scene - Selda, Mogollar and Edip Akbayram don't get a look in - but the two heavyweights - Erkin Koray and Baris Manço, along with Cem Karaça, are present. However, there's not a single bad track to be found here and it's much more than a Turkish Freakout; it's a Turkish Trip. I don't know what these musicians and producers were putting in their çay but on the evidence here it may have been more than just sugar at times - some of the sounds produced here sound like nothing else ever recorded. The Psych-Folk subtitle is a little misleading. Whilst its overflowing with psych vibes there's very little folk in a traditional sense on offer, however there's plenty of traditional Turkish music in the mix and the fusing of this with rock, psych, funk and jazz influences from the West is what makes Turkish music of the era so unique.It's almost impossible to select highlights as almost every track here is five star worthy. The bass is always prominent and there's plenty of fuzz guitar, baglama and that unique Turkish / Middle East back of the throat vocal delivery (particularly the female vocals). As with all Turkish music, the percussion plays a lead role and there's an abundance of Turkish clarinet vibes.Housed in a digipak and accompanied by an excellent booklet that provides descriptions of each track and reproduces the original 7" covers (all the tracks were originally released as 7" singles) which is almost worth the admission price alone.