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Croatia Records Release Information

We have been waiting for more than a decade – Dino Merlin raises the bar again with his new album

Sarajevo’s musical wizard Dino Merlin meticulously, carefully and in silence, as always, in introspection with his own bare emotions and spiritual challenges with the world around us, has completed a new artistic journey of his own heart.

With intimate lyrics that delve into the most hidden corners of his soul, he sang and set to music his true life story, sharing joy, sadness, worry, memory, faith, togetherness, hope and struggle with his audience.

““Mi” (We) is my 12th album. It is special in that it has been “simmering for a long time” due to objective and subjective circumstances. It took a little more time because of everything that has happened in the last five, seven years to bring this story to an end. And when something has been simmering for a long time, you have the opportunity to constantly check where you are on that path, how much what you are doing is worth. You are a little older, maybe a little wiser, so you don’t pay attention to those fleeting things like current fashion, but you have the opportunity to feel the flow of time through your songs and when something lasts five, six or seven years, then there is a high probability that it will last another ten years and that it will withstand the judgment of time,” Dino Merlin pointed out ahead of the album’s release.

And his musical story is a story about all of us – about loves that last, wounds that heal, people we don’t forget. The album was announced in 2020 with the hit single “Mi” (We), which has become a symbol of togetherness in a time of global uncertainty. In the years that followed, this singer-songwriter revealed fragments of his great mosaic to the audience through the singles “Dođi” (Come), “Jedan dan, jedan noć” (One Day, One Night), “Krive karte (Wrong Cards)”, “Kako da ti kažem” (How Can I Tell You), “Skoro će zima” (Winter Is almost here) and “Ne radujemo se” (We Are not Looking forward), building layer by layer of the narrative that he is now finally completing with the release of the complete material.

This deluxe edition brings a total of 18 songs – eleven completely new along with seven already released singles. Each song is a special story, and together they form a diary of a decade – stories based on the universal themes of love, transience and belonging. A special gem of the album is the duet with Halid Bešlić, a historic meeting of two musical legends of our time. In addition to already well-known collaborations with Senidah and Marko Louis, Merlin confirms his ability to connect generations and styles, always remaining true to himself – and yet constantly new.

For the first time in his career, the Sarajevo artist Dino Merlin gives each song on the album a visual dimension, as it was directed by the Slovenian-Macedonian artist Kukla. The album is also available as a 48-minute video film that flows through the songs, transforming them into a series of powerful, symbolic images. With its production reach, “Mi” goes beyond the usual standard in the Yugoslavian region.

Behind the complex production are years of work in music studios around the world – from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, Italy, Turkey, Sweden and the United Kingdom, all the way to the US America. This global diversity, combined with Merlin’s authentic poetic vision, has resulted in a sound that is both locally rooted and universally recognizable.

For many, “Mi” is more than an album – it is a collection of stories, emotions, portraits and paths, which together form one big “Mi”, giving the audience the opportunity to immerse itselve in the world that the musical wizard Dino Merlin has been creating for almost ten years.

Tracklist

1. Prvi 4:50
2. Briga 3:35
3. Rudar 4:21
4. Zbog tebe, femme fatale 3:42
5. Neka bude đula 4:46
6. Muškarci 4:31
7. Mogla si biti… 4:09
8. Sito 4:15
9. Godino vrela 3:59
10. Zauvijek ovako 3:55
11. Mi 3:53
12. Dođi 4:52
13. Krive karte 4:37
14. Skoro će zima 4:24
15. Jedan dan, jedna noć 5:02
16. Kako da ti kažem 3:41
17. Ne radujemo se 4:32
18. Prvi (acoustic) 4:44