Noah Kahan - The Great Divide

Noah Kahan announced his new album, The Great Divide, and the first single from it is also called The Great Divide.

In the age of voice assistants, it's a little annoying to have to clarify "Siri play the album The Great Divide by Noah Kahan", but whatever. One of my favourite bands is U2, and I always end up on YouTube. 😆

The music video is full of fun Noah Kahan easter eggs from his previous work (She calls me back phone number, Call Your Mom on the visor, wifi password, orange juice, etc.), as well as a coming of age story of friendship lost and possibly restored.

Direct link to the video

As with all great art, the lyrics leave a lot up to the listener to decide how to interpret them.

I hope you settlе down, I hope you marry rich
I hope you're scarеd of only ordinary shit
Like murderers and ghosts and cancer on your skin
And not your soul and what He might do with it

I hadn't connected that the "he" was capitalized in the chorus, which generally implies God and not a friend or relationship "he" like I'd thought when listening.

It's interesting—and shockingly healthy for YouTube this time?—to wade into the comments on the video to read all the ways people are taking The Great Divide in to their own lives and experiences:

My ex-best friend went through some extremely scarring religious trauma. We weren't good for each other, but this song is exactly what I hope to say to him.

When you are a brown person growing up in a white area you find out as you get older that a lot of your white friends are raised by racists. I lost a lot of friends because eventually they came to the conclusion that my existence is wrong somehow. That's my lived experience, and it's what I think about when he says, "and your soul and what he might do with it."

My best guess is that he had a friend who was deep in the closet because he came from a really conservative Catholic family (stained glass is most closely associated with Catholic churches but could be any Christian denomination), and Noah didn't understand as a kid why he was in so much pain and so angry and it drove them apart but now he gets it and feels awful and he's hoping his friend found peace.

As someone who was closeted, lost, and afraid.. this speaks volumes. Still lost my best friend though..

The friend walking out to “i hope you threw a brick right into that stained glass” whilst not wearing the cross necklace he wore throughout the memories…

"i HOPE YOU'RE WITH SOMEONE WHO ISNT SCARED TO ASK"

As a gay man (and also huge Noah Kahan fan) who grew up closeted, this song hits so hard for me. I grew up constantly wishing that I could have all the ‘normal people’ problems, because as much as those things suck, the ‘problem’ isn’t related to who you are as a person, they’re just difficult things happening TO YOU that you’ll grieve for a while and then move on. But being gay is different because you’re constantly being told, both directly and indirectly, that who you are at your core, your very existence, is disgusting and shameful. Not just other kids, but the grown up people around you who are supposed to protect you even express that hatred a lot of the time. That’s a whole different type of trauma that stays with you for a long long time and literally alters your entire brain and nervous system to feel like you’re in extreme danger (because sometimes you actually are) for literally just existing. Thank you Noah for making this

And one that made me laugh out loud if you remember the chorus lyric:

I like to imagine that Rich is a person he hopes his friend gets to marry lol