Exotically Sacred

Tonight’s contribution comes courtesy of Corwin, a dark dose reader with apparently musical taste that align with mine. My knowledge of the artist he contributed did not exist prior to being introduced a week ago. Nevertheless, the two or three songs I’ve managed to get my hands on have thoroughly impressed me to inquire into obtaining one of their albums, as it’s undoubtedly something I will enjoy.

The group for which I speak is called Deleyaman. From the few songs I’ve heard, one reviewer aptly described their sound as “… charismatic, shifting, sensual ambiance … it’s gypsy cathedral music, exotically sacred and nomadically slippery”. Another reviewer continues with these intriguingly bizarre yet entirely appropriate descriptions: “Armenian orthodox chants interwoven with baroque, oriental, multi-cultural ambiance.” What little I know of Deleyaman is they are a four piece — created by a Turkish born Armenian-American and rounded out by members from France, Sweden and Armenia.

All the songs I’ve heard were suffuse with exotic emotional darkness. Among the highest quality ambiance I’ve heard in quite some time, yet the music is active enough to not truly qualify as pure ambiance. The song “The Door” from their “Second” album invokes images of a dark room with individuals sprawled lazily masked in shadows, filled with smoke and the sweet smell of exotic tobacco and a few banes of light piercing the smoke filled darkness. A wonderfully soothing nocturnal escape. Enjoy. -Jesse

Weaving together a musical tapestry that includes threads from both Europe and the Near East traditions of Turkey and Armenia, Deleyaman's second album is sparse, haunting, and gorgeous. Much like Dead Can Dance and even Loreena McKennitt, Deleyaman borrows poetic and musical influences going back as far as Medieval times and blends them together into something that's wholly original, yet somehow timeless. While such instruments as the duduk and the saz give songs like "The Door" and "Yana" a distinctly Caucasian flavor that pays homage to band founder Aret Madil's background--he is of Armenian descent and grew up in Turkey--there's a sort of liturgical feel here that hints at early Christendom as much as Sufi chanting. Deep church organs on "Lei Lei" conjure up images of gothic cathedrals, and the whistling flutes and pounding drums of "Dice" even reveal a hint of Celtic wildness. Madil is brilliant at bringing these often diverse elements together, as on the haunting "Battlefield," which seamlessly combines deep church bells, haunting and otherworldly woodwinds, and dreamy guitar ambience to create a desolately beautiful sonic landscape. This is music steeped in tradition, to be sure, but Madil's own artistic vision is by no means bound in the past. -Matthew Johnson