DENIZ CUYLAN - No Such Thing As Free Will

Just the sparse piano and guitar notes of "Clearing" are enough to fall in love with "No Such Thing As Free Will". Deniz Cuylan raises philosophical questions about free will and romantic happiness, through bucolic soundscapes sparkling with light and color, where even when the minimalism of Steve Reich is chosen as a source, harmony prevails over chaos ("Flaneurs In Hakone").

Cuylan carefully avoids the more typically academic technical preciosity, placing his artistic sensibility and instrumental skill at the service of a sonic fabric with inexhaustible melodic developments, drifting and interweaving layers of acoustic guitar, ambient modulations and velvety percussion ("She Was Always Here").

There is also room for loosely jazz-inflected rhythms and bossa nova touches in the trickle of fingerpicked notes that stirs "Purple Plains Of Utopia", while space-ambient sounds keep everything firmly anchored to experimental solutions.

Each track has its own breath and emotional fervor: the few cyclical folk chords of "Object Of Desire" are pulsing material, a moving harmonic landscape where synths and electroacoustic tremors resonate as if in a house of gleaming mirrors.

After making a name for himself with varied projects, from hip-hop to jazz, after travelling far and wide – Moscow, Stockholm, Athens, New York and finally Los Angeles – the Turkish musician has consciously embraced the language of John Fahey and Robbie Basho. At the same time he pursued a career as a composer for films and TV series ("El Chapo" for Netflix), finally finding a personal artistic and creative language, which the slightly more melancholic and introspective notes of the title track sum up with great elegance and restraint. Two qualities that run through a short and intense album.