As they announce their long-awaited debut album, Divorce talk to Wonderland about its making, meaning and deeper intentions.

There’s a daring individuality to Divorce’s evolution. Only forming in 2021, with two previous EP’s written swiftly amid an onslaught of touring across the past few years, the band have found a fully-fledged yet ever-changing artistic identity. It’s a sonic mode that will truly reveal itself with their March-set debut album, Drive to Goldenhammer. 

The Midlands outfit traverses through idiosyncratic country, grandstand alt rock and gothic chamber pop in already shared teaser singles “All My Freaks”, “Pill” and “Antartica“, exploring sentimentality, personal progression and overwhelming emotionality through a playful and acute lyrical lens. There’s a richness to the trio of cuts, one which emits a sonic assuredness that was still being chiselled on their EPs. Now, poised to impact the UK guitar music space on a significant scale, the four-piece know their worth, and will only continue to grow from here.

Announcing the record, which will be shared on 7th March via Gravity/Capitol, Divorce’s songwriter and bassist Tiger Cohen-Towell take Wonderland through their early origins, define their seamless connection, and delve into the making and meaning of their forthcoming inaugral album.

Listen to new single “Pill”… 

Read the Q&A…

How do you reflect on your 2024?

For us, it was a year for making. For the very top of January 2024 we began pre-production for Drive to Goldenhammer, and spent basically the whole year immersed in creative decision-making for it. It’s been the most fun we’ve ever had, I personally love the time that you get to keep the songs for your ears only and hope people will love them as much as you do.

Talk us through the origins of the band? How did you get together as a band? Where does the alias come from?

We all met in Nottingham, through various creative scenes. Felix and I were in a band together prior to the formation of Divorce, a duo; when lockdown happened we assessed our situation and decided it was a good opportunity for a rebrand and a couple more members. The name came from a long lockdown walk across from Sneinton Boulevard over the bridge to Lady Bay retail park to get a Costa (to feel something), we were just spitballing and Divorce came up and felt like a good fit.

What works so well about you as an act? Where does the chemistry stem?

We have all been mates for a long time, and have immense admiration for each other’s respective projects. Nottingham has a small but very robust scene, but it feels very cut off from the industry at large. As much as we saw the potential in our peers, it didn’t feel like there were many outside eyes on us. Some of that naïveté has really informed our sound though, we try very hard to do our own thing and not get too bogged down with what the national scene are up to. We just try to listen to eachother; that makes for our best stuff.

How do you define the essence of Divorce?

Adam once said “Getting dressed up to the nines and then rolling down a grassy hill,” I like that juxtaposition, I think it sums up the band pretty well. We all contribute creatively and have different tastes, which I absolutely love because it makes the sound unique.

How do you reflect on your previous EPs, “Get Mean” and “Heady Metal”?

We learnt so much! We made so many mistakes! Both of the EPs did a lot for us, they pushed the band into a position to record the debut album in such an inspiring way. I think they taught us that people can tell when you’ve had fun making a track, I would personally say that’s the biggest lesson I’ve learnt from that process. A positive association makes us play a song better live, and a song should continue to inspire you after it’s been recorded, at least for a while anyway. Additional lessons were sometimes less is more, sometimes a good idea isn’t always the right idea and having a Tesco meal-deal for lunch every day just because it’s near the studio will make the songs worse.

Where does the name, Drive to Goldenhammer, originate? What does it represent?

We decided on ‘Drive to’ a long time before we decided on ‘Goldenhammer’. In many ways, the drive is the real meat. The name represents the importance of the journey and seeking home within life’s motion.

Why does now feel like the right time to be unveiling your debut album?

These songs feel like they exist in the same space. It took up until their development for us to get into a room together and write in the way we wanted to for the debut album, everything up until these songs felt like a scramble; in a good way, mostly. But these songs are braised, I guess? And they’re definitely ready.

What inspired the sonic approach of the LP? What are the key influences?

Many, many musical artists. But otherwise, the East Midlands, Wallace and Gromit, The Royle Family, Barry Lopez, being in the car, country lanes and motorways (always).

What has been the creative process of the album been?

Felix and I wrote all the lyrics, either separately or together, and brought them to Kasper and Adam during our trips to a beautiful farmhouse just outside Wetherby, where we demoed from morning until night. We went into pre-production in January 2024 and then had the pleasure of recording the whole thing at Real World Studios. The studio is perfectly tailored for the artist experience, i’d never been anywhere like it. We felt exceptionally lucky to do it there, the atmosphere there imprinted very strongly on the songs.

Why did you decide to work with producer Catherine Marks across the record? How was the experience? What did she bring to the table?

Catherine is a tour de force, but she is also a warm and compassionate person. She cared deeply about the integrity of the record, and our happiness in the studio, her positivity was very infectious. I particularly liked how much she put emphasis on the ‘sparkle’; which I concluded was a few integral elements of a track that induce a certain hard-to-put-into-words feeling of pleasure and certainty that something is special. She put that sparkle all over the record.

In terms of lyricism, what are the central themes and ideas?

Felix and I tend to write about the same things at the same times somehow, I think the subconcious plays a big role in how we write, this is definitely all over the lyrics on the album. We found ourselves in an interesting position while writing this album, heavily focused on the relentless push of keeping on top of things as they happened (always more quickly than expected). As I mentioned before, the album ended up being largely about journeys and the trials that come with sacrificing so much personally to do what you love, yet finding place and home amidst the chaos. There’s also a song about Karen Carpenter.

What does the album mean to you? What do you hope it’ll achieve?

I think what we all want is to be able to carry on doing this for a living. Boring answer but a stark reality that looms constantly, I know many musicians that do just as much work as us but still keep a part time job, I hope one day artists are valued enough to be paid properly for the cultural impact they have. On a lighter note, I hope the album enables us to tour extensively, I really want to go to East Asia, particularly cities like Seoul and Tokyo, I know the others do too. And New Zealand!

What else is to come from you in 2025 and beyond?

In the words of Charity Shop Sue: we’ve got big plans for this place (the whole of the human race’s ears and eyes), and we’re not gonna stop… until we get there (everyone loving our tunes and crying at our shows).

Debut album Drive to Goldenhammer is out March 7th via Gravity/Capitol. The band’s headline UK tour begins March 27th, tickets here.