Formed in Amsterdam in 2016, Altın Gün specializes in updating Turkish folk music with modern psychedelic sounds, sometimes flavored with a dash of funk. While a member of Dutch musician and producer Jacco Gardner’s touring band, bassist Jesper Verhulst went crate-digging in Turkey and became enamored with the sounds of Turkish folk music, and set out to form a band to celebrate its special energy. Other members of Jacco Gardner’s band filled out the lineup, as well as singer/keyboardist Merve Dasdemir, percussionist Gino Groeneveld, and multi-instrumentalist Erdinç Ecevit. The group’s debut, On, arrived in 2018 on Swiss label Bongo Joe, and appealed to audiences interested in left-field Western rock as well as Turkish psychedelia. The album’s version of “Goca Dünya” by Anatolian rock pioneer Erkin Koray earned special attention and remains one of the band’s most popular. A performance at a festival put on by eclectic Australian band King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard earned Altın Gün a deal with ATO Records, which released the band’s sophomore set, Gece. The album made further waves critically and commercially, as its songs racked up millions of streams and the band earned a Grammy nomination for Best World Music Album. In 2021, they released Yol, which introduced synth-pop elements in combination with their traditional sound. Later that same year followed Âlem, released exclusively online, with proceeds benefiting environmental non-profit Earth Today. The band, which featured in the soundtrack of the video game Star Wars Jedi: Survivor under the name Altın Lazer Blaster, released the albums Aşk in 2023 and Garip in 2026.
