After four years, Noah Kahan is releasing a new original album. “The Great Divide” is set to come out on April 24, a long-awaited album by his over 27 million monthly listeners. As a sneak peek, the namesake of the album was released on Jan. 30.
The pre-release single is already trending on social media. Like his previous music, it is an extremely vulnerable song, carrying heavy topics of growing distant from friends, religious trauma, and overall pain.
Starting the song with looking back on shared memories of rebellious acts and shared pain, “We got cigarette burns in the same side of our hands, we ain’t friends. We’re just morons, who broke skin in the same spot,” speaking about the trauma they endured as a shared experience. Kahan is a great lyricist, and one of the most heart-wrenching parts of the song is the pre-chorus, “You know I think about you all the time. And my deep misunderstanding of your life. And how bad it must have been for you back then. And how hard it was to keep it all inside.” This relays the guilt of looking back and seeing the pain in someone you cared about, only after it is too late to help. The song even mentions how Kahan responded to the situation at the time, saying they pretended like everything was okay, “And I’m finally aware of how shitty and unfair
It was to stare ahead like everything was fine,” which, in response, the pre-chorus becomes even more impactful.
The topic of watching someone you care for go through something you can’t comprehend is incredibly painful, and looking back and wishing you did something is difficult to process. Kahan communicates the side of the situation extremely well, wishing the absolute best that he can for his friend, “I hope you settle down, I hope you marry rich. I hope you’re scared of only ordinary shit. Like murderers and ghosts and cancer on your skin. And not your soul and what He might do with it,” noting that the best that he can manifest for his friend is not succeeding in life, with tons of money and material items, but only being afraid of the ordinary things. He is hoping that the basic scary things are the only things the friend has to worry about, because they have gone through so much.
One last layer of depth that Kahan writes into his song is the outro: “I hope you threw a brick right into that stained glass. I hope you’re with someone who isn’t scared to ask. I hope that you’re not losing sleep about what’s next. Or about your soul and what He might do with it.” Touching on the topic of religion, mentioning an omnipotent being, ‘He’ will decide what to do with a soul after death, alluding to God. Adding that Kahan hopes the friend is with someone who isn’t afraid to ask continues the idea that he regrets how he handled the situation with his friend.
This single has a lot to unpack. I am looking forward to the upcoming album. Kahan has played this song at several live shows, but recording it has given his fans the ability to come back to it and really appreciate the song for what it is.
In an article by Consequence, “Noah Kahan Announces New Album ‘The Great Divide,’” Kahan explains his point of view of the song, “From a long silence forms a divide, a great expanse demanding attention. I stare across it. I see old friends, my father, my mother, my siblings, my younger self, the great state of Vermont. I want to scream these feelings, to gesticulate wildly at the figures on the other side, but my voice has grown hoarse and muted after years of climbing a ladder towards the wild, spiraling dreams that have materialized in front of me. The songs are the words I would say if I could.”
Overall, I give this song a 5/5; it is incredibly vulnerable and can resonate with anyone who has watched loved ones go through difficult things and can resonate with the lyrics. I am looking forward to the upcoming album and seeing what else Kahan is going to share.