A generation meets its past: Çilekeş back on stage after 16 years

On the evening of Saturday 10 October I walk through the gates of KüçükÇiftlik Park, the open-air concert venue, about to be reunited with songs I have not heard live for roughly 16 years. In front of the stage, a crowd now in its forties is reliving memories with friends before the concert begins. They talk about where they saw Çilekeş for the first and last time, and which songs they want to hear tonight. Some faces show the nerves of going to a concert after a long time, others pure excitement. In a moment, the songs they have kept alive for years in their memories and their headphones will come to life on stage again, played by Çilekeş’s original line-up.

When Çilekeş followed Y.O.K. and Katil Dans with Histeri Çalışmaları in 2010, rock music, which had enjoyed its golden age in the 2000s, was slowly starting to shed its skin. Their third album was almost a stream of consciousness of the band’s state of mind. Most of the songs had no chorus, the lyrics went much deeper philosophically, and the music seemed to have emerged through improvisation. Indeed, many of the songs in the alternative music wave that began to take off in 2015 resembled the tracks on this album. They had seen the future...

That heavy mood on Histeri Çalışmaları was also a sign of the band’s desire for change. Shortly after releasing their third album, Çilekeş gave their last performance on 23 October 2011, at Van İçin Rock, a benefit concert for the Van earthquake, on the KüçükÇiftlik Park stage, and what would be a very long silence began. They never said so officially. The band issued no press statement and never announced “Çilekeş has split up”. So they didn’t really count as split up, did they? They moved on to their own projects without looking back.

The band’s drummer Cumhur Avcil released an album called Lovesick in 2011. He then withdrew from the stage and carried on with his life as a psychologist. Görkem Karabudak and Ali Güçlü Şimşek formed the band Bubituzak and released their first album, Uzay Yolları Taşlı, in 2013. This time it was Ali Güçlü Şimşek we heard on vocals. Later Şimşek became the singer of the band Lalalar. Karabudak played on stage with many musicians, retreated behind the scenes as a producer, and in 2021 released his first solo single, “Akılsız Başın Sürgünü”. It was surprising that Karabudak chose for so long not to appear on stage as a vocalist, but it was worth remembering that artists, too, are sometimes searching for something. While the members built new identities in their own projects, the ghost of Çilekeş did not hover around this work.

These musicians, who never broke their personal ties with one another, never spoke about the reason behind their distance from Çilekeş’s music either. But listeners kept embracing that music as if it had come out yesterday. Online threads with titles like “the legendary generation that listened to Çilekeş” kept appearing, and the band became a symbol of how millennials nostalgic for that era relate to music.

The turning point was the Limp Bizkit concert

In August 2025, Görkem Karabudak opens Limp Bizkit’s Istanbul concert. Karabudak has a surprise in store and starts playing “Y.O.K.”. The crowd recognises the song from its very first note and sings along at the top of their voices. Karabudak shares a recording of the night, writing: “I also want to thank every member of Çilekeş, one by one, with whom I played this song for years, for their support”. Thousands of people begin to write about how they were taken back to their high school years, about why the band never came back, and about the impact this song had on their lives.

The members of Çilekeş must not have been able to ignore this open door either, because early this year they announce that they will return with the original line-up and that on the evening of 10 October, at KüçükÇiftlik Park, they will celebrate 21 years of the Y.O.K. album. Tickets for the 17,000-capacity venue sell out the moment they go on sale.

For the millennial generation, which, unlike the one before it, loved rock not only through foreign bands but also through songs written in Turkish, this proves just how crucial a place Çilekeş’s first album holds.

‘We’re living in the wrong times to be afraid any more’

And then the day of the concert arrives. Those who first discovered the band in the 2000s, and younger fans who missed that era but grew up with these songs, start screaming the moment they hear the opening of “Kendimden Geriye”. And when the transparent curtain in front of the stage opens, the 16 years in between evaporate within seconds. The original line-up of Görkem Karabudak, Ali Güçlü Şimşek and Cumhur Avcil is joined by Ozan Kısaparmak.

This is not a simple night of nostalgia; it is a shared reunion in which we face our teenage years and see how much the feelings we once thought belonged only to us were in fact something collective.

Not every song still has a place in its listeners’ lives even 20 years on. Çilekeş’s songs, however, are not only remembered despite the passing years, they are also being embraced by new listeners. The proof is the fans singing along to every song in unison. And the band’s energy feels as though the gap had never happened... The fact that they have kept working actively as musicians has a lot to do with that. Cumhur Avcil, the member who stayed furthest from the stage, plays his drums at machine speed. Time has taken nothing from his talent either.

After “Akrep”, “Ardıma Hiç Bakmadan”, “Katildans” and “Sorma”, the rapper Fuat Ergin appears on stage for “Gözaltı”. The screams grow much louder. This is also a sign that the musically conservative period of 2005, when rock musicians were criticised for duetting with rappers, is behind us. Fuat being there matters a great deal. During the song he pays tribute to Peyk’s singer İrfan Alış, who is no longer with us.

During “Kürar”, the band’s song that reflects the political spirit of its time, a Palestinian flag is projected onto the stage. That these lyrics still feel so current after all these years is heartbreaking.

Before “Siyah”, massacres that left deep marks on our collective memory are projected onto the stage in chronological order. At the end of the list, it is highlighted in red that 10 October, the date of the concert, is also the 11th anniversary of the Ankara railway station massacre (the 2015 bombing of a peace rally). Görkem Karabudak says:

“You have reminded us of the healing and unifying power of music. Let’s not allow our rebellion to become chronic, though it is far too late for that now. We’re living in the wrong times to be afraid any more.”

Another surprise of the night is Çilekeş’s version of “1000 in the Eastland”, recorded for the tribute album marking 40 years of the Turkish heavy metal band Pentagram. Next comes “Y.O.K.”. Then the curtain closes, and just as everyone thinks the concert is over, they come back on stage and, completely against expectations, launch into a cover of The Prodigy’s “Breathe”. They end the concert with “Hit Dalaşı” and “Kendimden Geriye” once more. The 17 songs they play become part of a collective healing and emotional release.

‘Until we were reunited, I wasn’t even aware how much I missed Çilekeş’

On 10 October, with the visual designs behind them, the atmosphere they created with light and the things they reminded us of, they gave the audience an understated but meticulously prepared show. Görkem Karabudak’s vocals were perhaps not as harsh as they used to be, and the instruments were no longer simply tools of rebellion against the world. But the musicianship on stage carried the mastery that comes with being in your forties and reminded us that they are still fine musicians. In other words, they were not there as middle-aged men imitating the old days. On the contrary, they were proof of how the responsibilities and lived experience of the past 16 years can turn into a mature strength in music.

The Çilekeş reunion was an encounter, not only for their listeners but for the band too, with a part of themselves they thought they had left in the past. Could they have guessed that the adventure that began at Limon Bar in Ankara would one day grow beyond them and become a story belonging to their listeners? Ali Güçlü Şimşek wrote this note in an Instagram post:

“Let me confess right away: until we were reunited, I wasn’t even aware how much I missed Çilekeş. It turns out there was a child inside me, left idle, frozen in snot and tears and stuffed into a time capsule.”

In an interview given when their first album came out, the band said:

“We can only judge fairly whether Çilekeş’s first album was a success 10 years from now. If, when we look back in 10 years, this album is still being listened to and remembered by people, only then can we say, ‘Yes, we pulled it off.’”

That is exactly what we mean by a timeless song... These songs from 21 years ago are a balm for today’s generation too, for all those existential pangs and first heartbreaks. The feelings haven’t changed, and those who listened to the songs have grown up. On my way home from the concert, one question keeps turning in my mind: “Was what I watched on stage really myself, at the age I first heard those songs?” Perhaps, just like the songs, I had missed that younger self too… Thank you, Çilekeş, for not giving us an empty nostalgia.

• Çilekeş play ODTÜ MD Vişnelik Çim Amfi, the open-air amphitheatre at Middle East Technical University in Ankara, on 14 October and İzmir Arena on 18 October.