Into The Music
Noah Kahan became one of the more unlikely success stories of the last few years, a Vermont singer-songwriter who wrote songs about place and mental health and family with enough specificity that they traveled far beyond the regional context they came from. Stick Season in 2022 established him; the expanded editions and relentless touring built an audience that surprised industry observers who hadn’t been paying attention.
His new album The Great Divide is out April 24, and it arrives with the weight of expectations that his previous success created. The challenge for artists in his position is real: the songs that break through are so often about a specific time and place that the follow-up has to either deepen that specificity or expand away from it, and both choices carry risks.
The singles released ahead of the album suggest Kahan has chosen to expand, reaching for a broader sonic palette while keeping the lyrical specificity that made “Stick Season” and “Northern Attitude” resonate. His writing is strongest when it’s most concrete, when he’s naming the particular kind of winter light or the specific feeling of being from somewhere that people leave. The question The Great Divide will answer is whether he can maintain that quality at a larger scale.
The Vermont detail matters for his work in the way that Irish landscape matters for Dermot Kennedy’s or Texas matters for Charley Crockett’s. Geography as emotional fact rather than background.
The Great Divide is out April 24.