At first I thought, a tribute to Albert Ayler? But no, this is 'Aylar', Turkish for "moons" or "months" (sometimes words have more than one meaning) but even Albert would get excited of these 10 tracks in global Turkish psych-funk.
We first came across Şatellites a couple of years ago on the compilation 'Middle Eastern Grooves' on Batov Records (see review HERE) but they are now a fully fledged band that tours (Ed. In them flares?) with a space-mod-out there vibe; like I say Albert would love to jam along to this.
At times they can sound prog-rock like Jethro Tull, 'Bak, Gör' or quite poppy, 'Tisladi Mehmet Emmi' or traditional folk-psych-grunge 'Yok Yok'. You can see why DJ's as far apart as BBC 6 Music's Gilles Peterson and Seattle's KEXP had them in session after their first album tfrom 2022.
And now they're even better! 'Gizli Ajan' is amazingly like a Incredible Bongo Band vs. The Tornados and with vocals Rotem Bahar on 'Midnight Sweat'. Whilst instrumentals like 'Hot Jazz' are typical and easier to say than the Rotem tracks, at time she can hold some Plant-like phrasing whilst the band touch on 'Kashmir' showing that there's more to this band than the next Altin Gün or Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek hype.
It so happens Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek have their own album out next week, 'Yarin Yoksa', but don't overlook 'Aylar' as these guys are at the cutting edge; not only in trouser length - or you could even say, "over the moon!"
Artist: Şatellites
Title: Aylar
Release date: 7th March, 2023
Label: Batov Records
Cat. No: BTR
Format: Limited LP / Digital / Bandcamp
.jpg)
