Kintsugi - which follows 2011's Grammy Award-nominated Codes And Keys - marks Death Cab for Cutie's first new album since the departure last year of founding guitarist/keyboardist/producer Chris Walla, who recorded the album with the band before announcing his departure. Recorded in Los Angeles with Rich Costey (Franz Ferdinand, Muse, Interpol) behind the board, the album takes it's title from the Japanese art of repairing broken ceramics with precious metals like gold, silver, and platinum, highlighting cracks rather than hiding them. As such, kintsugi represents a compassionate aesthetic philosophy in which damage and wear are embraced as part of an object's history. 'Considering what we were going through internally, and with what a lot of the lyrics are about, it had a great deal of resonance for us - the idea of figuring out how to repair breaks and make them a thing of beauty,' says bassist Nick Harmer, who suggested the name to singer/guitarist Ben Gibbard and drummer Jason McGerr. 'Philosophically, spiritually, emotionally, it seems perfect for this group of songs.'