The Great Divide was released on Friday April 24rd and is Noah Kahan’s fourth album. Before the album he released two singles, ‘The Great Divide’ and ‘Porch Light’ and also announced a tour. In addition to the original album Kahan released the deluxe version of his album the next day called “The Great Divide: The Last of The Bugs.”
There’s a few common themes throughout the entire album that have also been brought up in some of his other music. One of those themes is moving away, as Kahan brings up several times how he moved away from his hometown in Vermont in order to pursue music and the challenges that came along with that. Another common theme is relationships with family, as Kahan speaks a lot about his siblings and relationship with his parents in some tracks. Netflix recently released a documentary starting Kahan called “Noah Kahan: Out of Body” where he went more in depth with his relationships with his family and a lot of the songs of the album can connect to some of the things he talked about in it.
My Favorite Songs
The opening track, ‘End of August’ was definitely one of my favorites. Deciding which track will open an album is a hard decision, because you need to be able to reel people in and catch their attention, and Kahan made a good pick here. The song started slow with beautiful piano that continued through the entire track. I think this is one of the best album openers I’ve ever heard, it truly was such a beautiful and emotional track. There was just such a good buildup to the bridge and ending throughout the whole song and the bridge includes one of my favorite lyrics of the whole album, “The feeling of being alive, for the first time in a long time.”
Doors was the second track on the album and another one of my favorites. The track goes into Kahan’s struggle to open up and how he is showing “people doors that they can’t open.” Being able to write a vulnerable song that people can relate to I think is what makes Kahan’s music so good, and as a listener I can always respect when an artist shares some of their deeper stuff on a track. I love the second verse as well, I felt it connected to the chorus well and overall the song just flowed well together.
The Great Divide is the sixth track on the album and was the lead single released on January 30th. This was a great single to release first as it sums up the album’s vibe extremely well. As I mentioned previously a big theme in this album is moving away from a hometown and this song is about the distance that has grown between two childhood friends over time. Just like with an opening track As I mentioned before it’s always important to have a good lead single and a good title track, which is exactly what Kahan did with this album.
Another one of my favorites is Haircut. ‘Haircut’ talks about Kahan’s relationship with an old friend and how Kahan is proud of their changes (their ‘haircut’) and the work they’ve put into themself. The chorus is super catchy and I really enjoyed the lyric “But at least I’ve got a soul still, even if I’m in a bad place” and it is definitely one of my favorites from the album. I also loved the guitar throughout, which I feel is a common theme with a lot of Kahan’s music and it fits his vibe well.
Dashboard is another good one, the song revolves around moving away which as I mentioned earlier is a big theme in this album. Just like ‘Haircut’ I love the chorus of this one and I loved the lyrics all throughout. This song reminds me of a meaner version of “You’re Gonna Go Far” from his last album ‘Stick Season.’
Porch Light was the second single released from the album back in March. ‘Porch Light’ is sung from a mom’s perspective about her hoping her kid will come back and saying she will “leave the porch light on” for them. Just like the last two I loved the chorus in this one and I loved the instrumental part that happens right before the bridge. It’s hard to pick an all time favorite from this album in my opinion however I think it might be this one.
‘Deny,Deny,Deny’ is a tiny bit more upbeat beat-wise but not definitely not lyrically. This song is filled with more frustration and anger than the other ones which I really like. Again the chorus is super catchy.
All Them Horses is another really good one. Kahan released the chorus on social media ahead of its release so I knew a little bit what it would sound like before but I was definitely not expecting it to be so sad. This song talks about the flooding that happened in Vermont in 2023 and Kahan looking back on it. Again this song also ties into the moving away theme this album has with Kahan saying lines like “I’ve crossed the county line I cannot go back” and “Oh, run of bad luck in a nowhere state, I’m high above us now in a big jet plane.”
I enjoyed this album a lot and have been listening to it almost non-stop since its release. While normally I’m someone who enjoys mainly upbeat pop music, I also do enjoy a lot of slower, sadder more acoustic music like Kahan’s. I love how each song is decently long as I believe they each range from 3-5 minutes each. I feel like so many artists are making such shorter albums and songs and I’m glad Kahan is still able to make long songs.
