Days after hinting at a new song Beirut has confirmed the new track and album will share the name, Gallipoli. The band also announced that they will begin a 2019 tour across North America and Europe, after the 12-track record drops on February 1, 2019.
Fans were given hints of a song last week when the band began streaming a loop of a new song on the band’s official website. A few savvy users managed to track the video’s source code and draw clues from an article published in a 2017 Italian publication. This led to the name “Gallipoli”, but it was unclear what the name meant.
Like the band’s name, the title of the album has geographical influences. The band named itself after the capital of Lebanon, Beirut. The name Gallipoli, which means “beautiful city”, comes from a town in southern Italy that the band visited when they were working on the album. The band split the recording sessions between New York City and Berlin, before settling in Italy.
According to the band’s lead, Zach Condon, during recording the band was traveling through Italy until they ended up in the town of Gallipoli one night. According to Condon, he was inspired by the town and what he saw there.
“We stumbled into a medieval-fortressed island town of Gallipoli one night and followed a brass band procession fronted by priests carrying a statue of the town’s saint through the winding narrow streets behind what seemed like the entire town, before returning late to Sudestudio,” Condon said, “The next day I wrote the song I ended up calling ‘Gallipoli’ entirely in one sitting, pausing only to eat.”
This will be the first album for the band since their 2015 release, No No No. In preparation for their new record, the band joined up with producer, Gabe Wax, who worked with the band on their last album.
Despite not releasing any music as a band, members of Beirut have kept themselves busy. Since their last record band member Ben Laz teamed up with Scott and Bryan Devendorf of the band, the National, to form new trio called LNZNDRF.
For a full list of tour dates, fans can visit the band’s official website here.
Along with the title track, Beirut has released a full track list of for the album seen below:
When I Die
Gallipoli
Varieties of Exile
On Mainau Island
I Giardini
Gauze fur Zah
Corfu
Landslide
Family Curse
Light in the Atoll
We Never Lived Here
Fin
Photo Credit: Raymond Flotat
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