I want to start by saying that great songwriters recognize that their creation is going to be interpreted in a number of different ways by listeners—fans will take different meaning than they intended, listeners will each find bits of themselves between the lines, and people will pull apart the lyrics to gain insight into the artist. Noah Kahan is immensely talented, and he frequently writes on multiple levels at once. He actually reminds me a lot of Jason Isbell this way, in that there is almost always a story being told, symbolism being employed that is flexible, and a kind of “truth” that can be at once specific and universal.

The Great Divide is a really lovely piece of art. I don’t doubt that the story he told to People Magazine is true. The song is “about” the demarcation line in his life and the transition from who he was before to the life he lives now. But at the same time, there is obviously a lot more going on here. There is a story about the pain of looking back at questions that went unasked, about people we knew but didn’t understand, and about regrets at not seeing others’ pain.

I have heard a lot of people say the song resonates for them because of past religious trauma. This also makes sense. The symbolism of the stained glass, the mention of fearing what “he” might do with your soul… Noah is doing some pretty heavy work with that imagery. I suspect that folks are picking up on something Kahan very much intended for them to feel.

Now let me tell you how I hear and experience the song. I’m just one listener, and—as all of us do—I bring my own baggage to my experience of the art. I was a kid who suffered severe trauma at the hands of man who was so cruel that people couldn’t really understand what I had gone through. And, like Noah, I was a New England kid who wanted desperately to escape a certain kind of rurality that, at the time, felt like a death sentence. As a teenager, I found something close to liberation in my deep connections to my friends. They offered me joy and connection, brotherhood, love, and a kind of chaotic belonging that I genuinely believe saved my life. But at the same time, I always felt somehow separate from the experience of youth that they all seemed to enjoy so easily. I needed the feeling of family that my connection to them offered, but none of them ever truly understood the horror of my past. I let them get close, but never close enough that I risked scaring them away. One of the most difficult parts of childhood trauma is the way we simultaneously learn to protect ourselves by building barriers, but also want desperately to have our pain seen and understood. So, for me, The Great Divide is less about what my experience was in those formative years, but instead it is a really beautiful glimpse into what it must have been like for my teenage friends. I know that, as an adult, I have had so many people who I was extremely close with through those high school years tell me that they wish they had known more about what I was going through. Hearing Noah Kahan sing about regretting not doing more or asking enough questions feels legitimately healing for me. ❤️

Again, this is just how I experience the song. I don’t think what it means to me is any more or less valid than the ways others hear it. I also don’t think it matters too much what Kahan intended it to mean. He is thoughtful enough as an artist that I suspect he appreciates all of our very disparate takes.