En Kötü Iyi Olur

Turkish trio Lalalar are a pretty convincing example of how oppression can cause unruly bursts of refusenik artistic expression. The group’s entire history has unfolded under the increasingly authoritarian rule of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Turkey’s president since 2014. That was the year vocalist and songwriter Ali Güçlü Şimşek first worked with guitarist Barlas Tan Özemek, while both were playing on the debut album of singer Gaye Su Akyol. A few years later, in 2018, the trio formed with the addition of electronicist Kaan Düzarat and, starting with ‘İsyanlar’ in 2019, released seven singles, collected last year, together with B-sides and remixes, on their debut album, Bi Cinnete Bakar.

During the half-decade they’ve been active as a band, Lalalar have developed a reputation for energetic and volatile live shows that have placed them at the vanguard of Istanbul’s underground music scene, spearheading a youth culture that’s grown up under Erdoğan’s rule. At the beginning of 2022, they were chosen to kickstart a series of events organised by Kültür AŞ, an organisation with links to the social-democratic political party that stands as the main opposition to Turkey’s right-wing government.

So it’s unsurprising that a boisterous energy – somehow at once both optimistic and world-weary – broadcasts from their second album, En Kötü Iyi Olur. The title translates as ‘At Its Worst, It Will Be Good’, offering a ray of hope, and a curative for Şimşek’s often bleak and angry lyrics. In ‘Aynı Bokun Mavisi’ (Same Shit, Different Asshole), he offers a barbed critique of blinkered capitalist society, “… flying in the gilded cage / Like turkeys voting for Christmas.” In ‘Yarın Yokmuş Gibi’ (As if There is No Tomorrow), he takes aim at political corruption in Turkey: ‘Cronyism, siphoning, payola / Oh, what a clusterfuck of a country.’

Musically, Lalalar present a gloomy, glowering electronic sound that’s nonetheless melodic, catchy and no doubt aiming for both radio play and dance floor action. Think of late Depeche Mode’s heavily tattooed, stadium-industrial sound and you’re getting close. Yet, embedded within the album are several strands of rebel music that underpin its anti-establishment stance: ‘Aynı Bokun Mavisi’ rides a late-80s outlaw acid house bass line. ‘Göt’ (Ass) has a pumping tempo like an aerobics VHS on fast-forward, and a rapidly spoken commentary with a snotty punk energy. On several tracks, samples of swooning strings connect Lalalar’s music to Arabesk, the mid-20th century soundtrack to the disaffection and frustrations of poor rural Anatolian migrants flocking to big cities in search of a better life.

And, crucially, among this magpie mix, Anatolian folk remains a constant. Opening track ‘Avucunu Yalıyor’ (Whistle for It) features a tightly coiled saz wrapped around a lumbering bass thump. ‘Grejuva’ (Greek Fire) is a climate-change lament with a kanun zither pinwheeling crazily through a lurching folk-dance break-beat time signature. Perhaps it’s not too fanciful to position Lalalar in the lineage of the ancient aşiks, the saz-playing, pre-Ottoman bards who roamed from village to village, spreading the news through song and holding the powerful to account. Maybe they’re just what Turkey needs.