Altin Gün

From an Amsterdam idea to a global audience

Altın Gün took shape in Amsterdam in 2016 when bassist Jasper Verhulst, fresh from touring with Jacco Gardner, set about forming a group to reinterpret the 1960s–70s Turkish repertoire he’d fallen for. He found singer/keyboardist and bağlama (saz) player Erdinç Ecevit Yıldız and singer/keyboardist Merve Daşdemir via open calls, and early line‑ups included guitarist Ben Rider, drummer Nic Mauskovic and percussionist Gino Groeneveld. Their debut single arrived in 2017; the first album, On, followed in March 2018, introducing a live‑wired blend of electric saz, fuzz guitar and analogue keys that carried Anatolian rock into contemporary rooms without turning it into pastiche. The second album, Gece (April 2019), travelled further still, leading to a nomination at the 62nd Grammy Awards for Best Global Music Album, a marker that this was no longer a Netherlands‑only story but a band speaking to diasporic and non‑Turkish audiences alike.

The studio path zig‑zagged after that early rush. In 2021 they issued two records — Yol and Âlem — bringing drum machines and synth textures to the fore, then, in March 2023, Aşk, a return to a brisk, percussion‑driven approach that again centred traditional material. All along, the group’s project stayed constant: reimagining folk and popular songs from Turkey’s modern repertoire with a rhythm‑section heft built for clubs and festival tents as much as small theatres.

A new chapter and the record that defines 2026

On 14 February 2024 the band confirmed that co‑vocalist Merve Daşdemir was leaving after eight years. Spring shows doubled as farewells in several cities. The departure mattered — Daşdemir’s voice and onstage presence had become a cornerstone of their concerts — but it did not stall the group’s momentum. With Yıldız as sole vocalist on the frontline, and the core quintet of Yıldız (vocals/saz/keys), Verhulst (bass), Thijs Elzinga (guitar), Chris Bruining (percussion) and Daniel Smienk (drums), Altın Gün moved straight into their next phase.

That phase is Garip, released on 20 February 2026 on Glitterbeat/ATO. It is a focused concept: an album‑length engagement with the work of Neşet Ertaş (1938–2012), the pre‑eminent aşık (folk bard) of modern Turkey. Rather than museum pieces, these are fully re‑scored, groove‑forward versions of Ertaş’s repertoire and other related standards: the opener Neredesin Sen picks up a motorik pulse under a sinuous saz line; Zülüf Dökülmüş Yüze leans into late‑night funk; Benim Yarim reframes an Ertaş melody on synthesisers. Contemporary reviews read it as the band finding sharper focus post‑line‑up change, praising the balance between dancefloor propulsion and the emotional clarity of the vocals, and noting how the group’s electric bağlama sits naturally among bass‑and‑drums architecture.

The Proms debut: orchestra, saz and a different frame

On 28 August 2026 Altın Gün made their BBC Proms debut at London’s Royal Albert Hall, joined by the BBC Symphony Orchestra under Jules Buckley with special guest Derya Yıldırım. The booking placed the band inside Britain’s flagship orchestral season, but the fit was less odd than it might look on paper: Buckley has a track record of reframing popular music in symphonic settings, and the band’s catalogue is already built on the canon of songwriters such as Ertaş, Zülfü Livaneli and Arif Sağ. Reviews from the hall reported that the orchestrations expanded the tunes without smothering the band’s rhythmic engine — timpani and brass underlined climaxes, strings widened codas — and that Yıldırım’s lead turns added a fresh vocal colour alongside Yıldız, a helpful contrast since the group has performed without a female vocalist since 2024. Time Out’s season preview had flagged the booking as part of a broader Proms tilt towards modern styles in 2026; on the night, specialist critics judged the experiment to have landed squarely, with the hall responding in kind.

The work that matters

Altın Gün’s catalogue breaks cleanly into eras. On (2018) and Gece (2019) lay the foundations: a fuzz‑smeared, organ‑rich take on 1970s Anatolian rock that travelled well outside the Turkish‑speaking world and earned the group its Grammy nomination. Yol and Âlem (both 2021) broadened the palette — more synthesisers, more programmed drums — while keeping the repertoire rooted in traditionals and 20th‑century songwriters. Aşk (31 March 2023) was treated as a course correction in some quarters, re‑centering live rhythm section interplay and electric saz in arrangements that tried to bottle the band’s stage feel.

Garip (20 February 2026) is the hinge. Where previous albums ranged widely across sources, Garip focuses on Ertaş and adjacent material to show what the band can do within a single songwriter’s orbit. It also captures the post‑Daşdemir line‑up with a clarity that live photos and festival footage suggest is now the baseline: Yıldız front and centre with bağlama and vintage keys; Elzinga on wiry and occasionally slide guitar; Verhulst’s bass as the through‑line; Bruining and Smienk driving an unflashy but mobile groove. The critical consensus since February has been that the record is not a holding action but an advance — a sign that the songwriting filter has narrowed while the musical language has expanded.

Right now: Proms done, North America next

With the Proms in the book on 28 August 2026, the band pivots immediately to a September North American run. The itinerary begins in western Canada — Vancouver’s The Pearl on 6 September — and reaches the U.S. west coast, with Seattle’s Showbox SoDo on Tuesday 8 September and San Francisco’s Regency Ballroom on Friday 11 September. It then crosses the Midwest (Minneapolis now moved to the Fine Line on 15 September) before heading east for Big Night Live in Boston on 22 September and Brooklyn Steel on 23 September, with Union Transfer in Philadelphia on 24 September and the Howard Theatre in Washington, D.C. on Friday 25 September. Ticketing pages list Alex Maas, co‑founder of The Black Angels, as main support across the tour, a pairing that makes aesthetic sense and should harden the psych‑rock audience crossover the band has courted since its earliest U.S. plays in 2019.

The run follows a full European summer, and the presentation in clubs will be the band in its default format rather than the orchestral Proms build. Promoters’ blurbs emphasise the touring history — repeated sell‑outs in North America, Europe and the U.K.; festivals including Coachella, Lowlands, Primavera, Fuji Rock and Iceland Airwaves — and that context now meets a set built substantially from Garip with judicious picks from earlier albums.

What the show feels like in 2026

The best available snapshot of the current set comes from a club night in Villeurbanne on 1 July 2026, where the band played just over two hours and leaned heavily into the Ertaş songbook now associated with Garip: Gönül Dağı, Neredesin Sen, Niğde Bağları, Öldürme Beni, Kırşehirin Gülleri and Çiçekler Ekiliyor all appeared, along with Altın Gün staples such as Vay Dünya (from Aşk), Maçka Yolları and Süpürgesi Yoncadan. The structure resembled earlier tours — a quick lift‑off, a mid‑set stretch of longer grooves, a sprint to the finish — but the front line has shifted. Without Daşdemir’s call‑and‑response vocals and tambourine breaks, the focus sits more tightly on Yıldız’s singing and saz, with Elzinga’s guitar answering lines and Bruining adding congas and small percussion to thicken the pulse over Smienk’s kit. Reviews of the Proms show in August reported that this frame scales; with the BBC Symphony in the pit the group’s dance instincts survived intact, and the additional voice of Derya Yıldırım brought a different timbre to songs that once relied on a female lead. Together, the summer evidence points to a band stepping into a consolidated identity after a year of change, bringing a repertoire that feels both newly specific and, in its rhythmic intent, squarely aimed at the room.