In 1970, Meltemler Orchestra, of which he was a member, won the first place in Marmara Region at the High School Music Contest organized by the Milliyet newspaper.
[3] During this period, he received offers from many professional music groups in Istanbul, but he preferred to stay in Bursa until 1972.
"Havalar Nasıl", "İşte Hayat", "Son Selam", "Ayrılık Akşamı", "Sen Bilirsin", and "Bal Ağızlım" all became number-one hits on music charts.
After the publication of "Bezgin" which consisted of his compositions in 1981, he released the symphonic rock trilogy, which was the product of a seven-year work in 1983, and was prepared in three separate albums Pencere (1983), Köprü (1985), and Ve Ötesi (1987).
[11] In 1987, the final album from his trilogy Ve Ötesi and a second book titled Uzaklarda Biri Var were released.
[12] The invective that he had written following Khomeini's death fatwa for Salman Rushdie was released after 19 years on 29 October 2008 during the Republic's 85th anniversary.
[13] İlhan İrem, participated 3 times in Turkey's domestic finals for the Eurovision Song Contest.
To be able to compete in the finals, although İrem was given special permission from the Turkish Armed Forces, but the record company disqualified the artist.
In this period, he started to wear black outfits in response to the issues in society and the art environment, and completely withdrew from public concerts between 1992 and 2006.
"[30] İrem was continuing his new album works and he had been giving concerts every year since 2006 in big cities such as Istanbul, Ankara and İzmir.
[32][33] Many magazines and newspapers including Hey and Ses have named him "artist of the year" a number of times.