Sunfear

Sunfear

All At Once

Dark Entries

Sunfear returns to Dark Entries with All at Once, her sophomore LP. Sunfear is the project of Turkish multidisciplinary artist Eylül Deniz. Since 2017, Deniz has been working as a composer, performer, and DJ, with a focus on different facets of ambient and experimental music. Deeply steeped in both music theory and history, Deniz explores electroacoustic techniques, utilizing piano, guitar, voice, and synthesizer. Her aim is self-expressive; these experimental tactics are her narrative and worldbuilding tools. All at Once shows Deniz deepening her connection to the guitar, her voice, and the Sunfear project as whole. Deniz says, ”I drew inspiration from Dante's ‘Love That Moves the Sun and Other Stars’, poems by Pessoa, and the works of Lale Müldür, a significant Turkish poet.” All at Once is a darker album than its predecessor Octopus. Its somber atmospherics and brooding tones were informed by the loss of friends in Istanbul, many of whom took their own lives. On “Above,” sparse guitar riffs meet swirling electronics in a doom-laden reverb chamber. “Bright and Wild” unleashes brittle blasts of feedback over its lush drones. Deniz’s voice, drenched in textural processing, intermittently peeks through the murk, like on the quietly despairing “Littleness.” Optimistic glimmers are still to be found, though, like on album-closer, “Form Changed,” which veers into aquatic pop territory with a softly sauntering beat undergirding its ethereal melodies. The artwork was designed by Eloise Shir-Juen Leigh, and the album includes an insert with liner notes and lyrics. All at Once reflects the...

Sunfear

Octopus

Dark Entries

Sunfear, the project of Istanbul-based multidisciplinary artist Eylül Deniz, debuts on Dark Entries with Octopus. Since 2017, Deniz has been working as a composer, performer, and DJ, with a focus on different facets of ambient, jazz, and experimental music. Deniz is deeply steeped in both music theory and history. She explores electroacoustic techniques, utilizing piano, guitar, voice, and synthesizer. These are her tools for self-expression, the means to tell her story to the world. Octopus is a rumination on loneliness, memory, and Deniz’s childhood fondness for aquatic creatures. The ten songs on the album are static and turbulent, mournful and optimistic, grounded and otherworldly. A field recording of a gently flowing stream undergirds instrumental album opener “Dokun.” The stream begins by soothing us, but as tension builds throughout the song, its presence becomes unstable, uncanny. On “I Don’t Know Why I’m Crying,” a repeating motif serves as the canvas for Deniz’s majestic, reverberant voice. While the source of sorrow remains unknowable, her catharsis is pure and real. The penultimate track, “Octopus,” breaks into an unexpected trip hop-esque beat, which only enriches the album’s introspective terroir. With Octopus, Deniz gently guides the listener to places unknown. All songs on Octopus were mastered by George Horn at Fantasy Studios. The sleeve, designed by Eloise Leigh, features a manipulated photograph taken by Deniz, which contrasts textures and colors in a non-representational fashion. Also included is an 11 x 11 insert with lyrics and a photo.