Kimene: Cicek Pasaji
So I have this Turkish friend (not a record dude at all) from Istanbul that brings me random records whenever he comes to the states to visit his brother (a colleague of mine). I usually don’t get my hopes up too high for very good reason, as I have received more Turkish pressings of Salt N Pepa and Nazareth than OG Baris Manco LPs (none, but fingers still firmly crossed!). This visit of his seemed to be no different, and after I inspected the small stack of LPs he said he found for free on the street my imagination turned to the Anatolian Psych masterpieces he’d surely deliver on his next trip.
It wasn’t until I came home and dropped the needle on the one Turkish LP out of the bunch that I realized all was not lost. The overflowing chalice of cheap pilsner beer and trio of funny lookin dudes on the cover of this LP (called Kime Ne) says it all: utter wastedness. It sounds like it was recorded in some random basement tavern at 4 AM after everyone had had one too many Efes Pilsens. Check out “Unda Gaga Cu”.
“Mihrabim Direyek” is also quite good.
Thank you, Enes!
3 Comments
Is there anyway to rip these records to mp3? What you said sounds so exciting, now I wanna listen to it :-)
You are more than welcome Adam. I’m glad you enjoyed your records. I’m listening “Unda Gaga Cu’ right now. I learned that the English translation for “Kime Ne” is “That’s Just My Bag”
Kimine is a very funky resto in the very funnky Cicek Cicek Pasaji. In the evening a Gypsy band comes to play, and everyone in the entire resturant sang together. Everyone knew all the lyrics, except of course me. :-) And successfull professoinal women – I remember one who worked for the Ankara government – get up to dance the best belly dance, better than any that you would see in the cabarets.The food is quite good. The ambiance is one of the best in the world, right up there with Barcelona’s Cal Pep.