GIARDINI DI MIRÒ
Punk...not diet!

Long misunderstood, it took Giardini di Mirò a string of EPs and the excellent long player Rise and Fall of Academic Drifting to shake the constricting postrock tag they had been labelled with. To the Italians, their music was always about creating their very own take on pop: expansive, epic, orchestral, but always with a focus on the underlying melodies.

For last year’s Soft Touch EP, GdM therefore invited various guest singers to add a new dimension to each of the instrumental compositions. Very happy with the results, they decided to repeat this experiment on Punk… not Diet.

With Alessandro Raina, a friend and long-term fan, GdM discovered a singer whose voice and vocal parts perfectly matched their intricate sound. Initially invited for just the odd song, the early recordings proved so convincing that he ended up supplementing six of the tracks, one of which is only available on the single Revolution on your Pins!. Scottish Soft Touch contributor Kaye Brewster, too, was re-invited to join GdM on the microphone. Together with sister Christy, her voice can be heard on Last Act in Baires.

Joining the list of guest musicians are Arne van Petegem (Styrofoam), Thaddeus Herrmann (of Herrmann & Kleine), as well as Christophe Stoll (Nitrada), who, with a lot of sensitivity and understanding for the band’s unique sound, added electronic elements to some of the tracks.

For the first time since their inception (nigh on seven years ago), the band took their time in the studio to truly explore their sound for Punk… not Diet!. Many of the guitar parts spawned by absentminded experimentation during nightly recording sessions found their way onto the album. “‘Punk… not Diet!’ probably comes closest to the sound we had envisaged in our heads,” says guitarist Jukka Reverberi. “It simply took some time to get it all down on tape.”

Tracklist:
01. Too Much Static for a Beguine
02. The Swimming Season
03. Given Ground
04. Connect the Machine to the Lips Tower
05. Once Again a Fond Farewell
06. The Comforting of a Transparent Life
07. When You Were a Postcard
08. Last Act in Baires
09. Dolphins Are Here to Watch Your Blue Blood Flow