A smash hit breakthrough album like Noah Kahan’s Stick Season is a really hard act to follow. I've never stepped foot in a megachurch as an adult, but seeing Kahan perform at the Hinterland Festival twice on the heels of that record was like mass worship — the packed crowd had tears in their eyes, arms extended to the sky as they sang and swayed along to the songs they knew like gospel music.

On his fourth album, The Great Divide, Kahan has crafted yet another holy grail, especially for those whose life stories mirror Kahan’s. Anyone who's left their small hometown, deconstructed the religion they inherited from their parents, made something of themselves and come back home to a familiar place they seem to have outgrown will relate with this album. It's perfect for anyone who only slips into their childhood twang when they’re back for a bittersweet homecoming.

The Great Divide‘s title track was an excellent choice for a lead single, and is the first of many literal and figurative conversations Kahan has with characters from his childhood throughout the album as a whole. This song’s conversation is held with an old connection, burdened with religious trauma, that Kahan wishes freedom upon as he sings “I hope you throw a brick right into that stained glass,” and more bluntly, “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” — note the capital H in that last line about damnation.

I could quote “The Great Divide” for days on end, but on what must’ve been my twentieth listen, I kept coming back to the pre-chorus and the genius simplicity of how Kahan describes the everyday tragedy of religion-based self-suppression: “You know I think about you all the time / And my deep misunderstanding of your life / And how bad it must’ve been for you back then / And how hard it was to keep it all inside.”

Not every conversation Kahan has in The Great Divide is with the person who's left the small town. Songs like “Haircut” and “Dashboard” seat Kahan across from people who think the hometown is better off without him, with scathing lines like “You grew your hair out long / Now you think you’re Jesus Christ” and “Change your ZIP code / Turns out you’re still an asshole.” Kahan, an outspoken mental health advocate forced to reckon with a meteoric rise to fame, juggles insecurity, regret, shame and disappointment so eloquently throughout this album.

Despite the difficult nature of some of these talks, Kahan is eager to have them. He points out the elephant in the room with his family on “Willing And Able” and “Deny Deny Deny.” Substance abuse and Kahan’s broken childhood home has come up plenty in his discography before, but he’s face-to-face with his old demons more than ever on The Great Divide. An early track on the album, “Doors,” vulnerably approaches his trauma and anger. Later on the record, “All Them Horses” poetically tackles the imposter syndrome that he still experiences today. Keep in mind, Kahan is now a now-Grammy-nominated, multi-platinum musician!

You can’t visit your small hometown without getting a little Americana about it. “American Cars” postures Kahan’s characters in a blue collar light as if he was Bruce Springsteen, and “Paid Time Off” is a coming-of-age leaving-home love story à la Simon and Garfunkel’s “America” or The Avett Brothers’ “I And Love And You.” “Paid Time Off’s" description of getting high at the outlet mall is a narrative that small town natives like myself know all too well. Memories of my rural upbringing particularly hit during the hypocritical small town gossip in “Headed North.” There are plenty of people I’ve said my own version of “It’s gone to shit without you / It was shit before, but at least I had you” to, and the Coexist bumper sticker shoutout gave me a laugh. I once felt like mine was the most radical thing my little Iowa town had seen!

Even after you’ve had your coming-of-age, rags-to-riches tale in the big city, there’s nothing quite like coming home and sharing a drink with the people who you grew up with. Kahan seems to treasure those conversations the most on “We Go Way Back” and the touching closing track, “Dan.”

“Let’s talk about high school and let’s talk about death,” Kahan tells his best friend Dan, reminiscing over campfire beers he compares to heaven. Kahan calls out in the song that, in many ways, he has changed so much from the insecure kid who drove those country roads so many years ago. There are plenty of differences between who he is now and the many different familiar faces he talks to in this album, including Dan. But, despite the very complicated relationship he has with this place and its people, Kahan’s upbringing is at the core of who he still is today, and he sums up coming to terms with that realization perfectly.

The record’s producer, Aaron Dessner, has possibly become better known for his esteemed Long Pond Studio than his monumental work in the band The National. Long Pond Studio has birthed recent indie folk great albums like Taylor Swift’s folklore and evermore, Mumford and Sons’ latest Prizefighter album and now, The Great Divide. Sonically, The Great Divide features Kahan’s unmistakable signature sound, something I like to call “softcore stomp and holler,” complete with grand indie folk crescendos and major "y’allternative" moments throughout. Kahan also worked with Stick Season collaborator Gabe Simon on the new album and even Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon.

The Great Divide is beautiful, and I knew I would love it from the very first sound of the opening track, “End of August.” Kahan starts the album off with the sound of cicadas at dusk in late summer, a sound that instantly transported me back to the farm I grew up on in rural Iowa. My mind and my heart remained in my small town as Kahan told me all about his. I know plenty of people’s lives have followed a similar path, and for those whose paths are different there's still something to connect on in The Great Divide.

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is one of my all-time favorite movies, and “Black Sheep” by Metric is its anthem. Envy Adams, played by Brie Larson, performs this song with her band Clash at Demonhead before Scott Pilgrim, played by Michael Cera, must battle Envy’s boyfriend to the death. I fell in love with “Black Sheep” but didn’t feel the need to explore Metric any further.

Luckily a recommendation to listen to Fantasies landed in my lap in 2023 when I was doing a theatre internship in Steamboat. I finally delved a little deeper. And I loved what I heard.

Metric is new wave, through and through. They take the bright, bold parts of synth-pop and meld it beautifully with the dark, arty parts of post-punk. The sounds of Fantasies are industrial and natural, electronic and acoustic, all at the same time. I loved the blend of rock and punk and alternative with synthesizers. Metric flirts with dark wave constantly.

Their latest album, Romanticize the Dive, stays in theme. I hear many other artists within these songs: Daft Punk (Random Access Memories era), Charli xcx (BRAT era, specifically the song “I might say something stupid”), Lorde (Pure Heroine era), and Molchat Doma (Этажи era). It’s like Metric is throwing a party at a dystopian nightclub in a brutalist concrete building. The guests of honor? A drum machine march, a chorus guitar pedal and a hollow synth, gifts from these legendary artists.

“Victim Of Luck,” which we've been spinning in heavy rotation here at Studio One the past several weeks, starts the album off strongly. It sits you down in a spaceship, its beeps and rocket whistles floating wistfully among the steady beat of the drums. It’s bright and vulnerable and moves smoothly throughout. It naturally pulled me in and prepped me for the rest of the album. It's also proving to be a hot single, and has been climbing the charts since February.

“Crush Forever” (track four) is where Metric crammed most of their electronic inspirations. Emily Haines shapes her voice to emulate electropop standards. It’s easy to compare her to Ladytron or Lady Gaga here. It’s futuristic in the way 2000s house/dance music had a futuristic vibe.

Metric has a habit of building up their verses into “good enough” territory instead of “holy crap, this totally exploded.” I hear it in “Time Is A Bomb” and “Tremolo” (tracks three and five), where the choruses don't hit quite like I’d like them to, so there’s no complete release — although maybe that's the goal. “As If You’re Here” and “Loyal” (tracks seven and eight) give their choruses a bit more oomph, with the pre-choruses building them to open up like a window on a bright spring morning.

Track nine, "Antigravity,” drew me in the mos, I think because it has the angst my little high school self loves. The synth reminds me of “Kids” by Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein, written for Stranger Things. Haines molds her voice to match the airiness of the guitar and drum machine, making for a seriously dreamy piece of music.

I have nights where my foot is itching to press down on a gas pedal. A highway or an empty backroad always soothes this itch, but not without a proper playlist. Dark wave is usually my pick for these kinds of drives; I need something echoey and cold and foggy to achieve full isolation and focus on the road. Romanticize The Dive fits the bill perfectly without being boxed into this one situation. It’s a lighthouse in a sea of black. It’s Metric.

The band Friko has grown to become one of Chicago’s most alluring musical exports, which is saying a lot with bands like Beach Bunny, Ratboys and Briggitte Calls Me Baby in the mix.

The band’s last album, Where we’ve been, Where we go from here, was a great listen and was their first after signing with ATO records. Now, with the arrival of Something Worth Waiting For, they've leveled up, and are proving that they know what they're doing.

I'll admit that when I first heard "Seven Degrees," which is Something Worth Waiting For’s lead single, I wasn't immediately hooked. My first thought was “this sounds a bit like a middle of the road Bright Eyes.” Now, after listening to Something Worth Waiting For in its entirety, my opinion has completely changed. “Seven Degrees” is a great track. So is “Alice,” “Choo Choo” and “Hot Air Balloon.”

Weak links are few and far between on this record.

Now, Friko is a little tough to nail down sonically, but there are definite influences from groups like Bright Eyes, Mitski and throwback groups like The Kinks, The Modern Lovers or even T.Rex. They combine a lot of these sonic resonances to create a unique sound in an oversaturated indie rock landscape. That isn’t easy to do.

Take “Choo Choo.” This is the most rocked out Friko gets on this record, and they almost sound like an in-their-prime Sonic Youth. This is an album standout, and I can only imagine how fun it will be to see this song performed live. Also, the tune has some insightful musings about modern transportation. The track is earnest in its feeling, much like the rest of the record, and it proves to be one of Friko's strongest tracks to date.

"Alice" is a melancholy song that puts Niko Kapetan's lyric writing on full display. My best guess is that this is a love song focusing on longing, and when you look through "the keyhole" you might find you're more similar to someone than you thought. Or maybe it means you should have never looked through "the keyhole," because now you know more about someone than you bargained for! As with many song lyrics, it's open to your interpretation.

"Hot Air Balloon" continues the same feeling that "Alice" established but enhances it, and this track is bursting with feeling. We interviewed Friko last year and they spoke a bit about this song's inspiration — a hot air balloon festival that appeared overhead while they were on tour in New Mexico. As you listen to this track, imagine waking up to hot air balloons drifting by. You can feel the awe in the music. After a couple listens of Something Worth Waiting For this song has my vote for best song on the album. The guitars are strong and Kapetan sounds assured in his delivery.

During the journey of Something Worth Waiting For I kept thinking about how great the music would sound as the soundtrack to a Wes Anderson movie. Something about their music just channels the same feeling as watching The Royal Tenenbaums or Rushmore. I mean this in the most complimentary way of course! Put on "Seven Degrees" and play Rushmore on mute and tell me it doesn't work perfectly.

Another thing I'd like to mention about Friko is that they’re nice, approachable people, which we learned during our interview before their xBk show. Their kindness goes a long way in an industry that is incredibly cutthroat. If their trajectory continues, Friko will likely be remembered not for a single breakout moment but for a steady accumulation of albums that rewards close listening. Friko is on their way to becoming one of the greats.