Hi, thanks for reading!
Mediterranean Minimalism is a newsletter about experimental music, focusing mostly - but not exclusively - on Italian avant-garde records of the 70s.
My name is Marialuisa, I am the pen behind the newsletter and MM is my heart project.
I am a former philosophy scholar who researched extensively Adorno’s philosophy of music, which, as you can imagine, ended up feeling quite suffocating. I ditched the academia, realised I was missing the writing, and after a very long hiatus I finally bit the bullet and started this newsletter.
The inspiration for Mediterranean Minimalism came from a string of experimental albums produced in Italy in the 70s to which I found myself returning to over and over again: Battiato’s early avant-garde records, Giusto Pio’s Motore Immobile, Lovisoni & Messina’s Prati Bagnati Del Monte Analogo and many others you can read about here. Not all the records I am writing about are strictly minimalist, but most of them balance experimentalism with a distinctive melodic sensibility. In this regard, Mediterranean Minimalism is an avant-garde form of pop music.
Of course, Mediterranean Minimalism is just a title. Still, I thought it sounded better than the “Spaghetti insert genre” label often used for Italian music. Don’t get me wrong, I am Italian and I love spaghetti, but the Mediterranean feels way more evocative than a piatto di pasta.
