Adelaide quintet Broken Waves are making the indie-funk genre their own, and we are stoked today to have the first listen of “The Divide”, a track full to the brim with funky guitars and joyous hooks.
We landed upon Broken Waves last year when we premiered “Drag Me Back”, the first single from their debut EP and have been following them keenly ever since. “The Divide” is a fresh-faced summery jam. From the opening beats, we are swept along in a sea of emotive groove-laden rhythms. The chorus of “Don’t Push Me Away” swells into an irresistible anthem. This new track demonstrates growing confidence in their songwriting, with a funky instrumental outro.
About the track, the band writes: “After a few years of exploring ideas and experimenting with our sound, it feels like we’ve really hit our stride and found our voice as a band. We’ve always seen ourselves as a groove-oriented band but “The Divide” has been an important step in our development. It is the first song we’ve written that displays our funk influences while sounding like an original take on those styles. It explores the experience of being in love with someone whose life circumstances are causing them to push you away and trying to be there for them in any way you can.”
“The Divide” was produced at Island Studios, where it was mixed by Joseph Cheek and mastered by Tom Wormald. The band has been a strong supporter of mental health charities, and raise funds for Black Dog Institute via their merchandise sales.
The songwriting process is clearly a democratic effort for Broken Waves: “The writing process for this song was easily the freest and unburdened we’ve had yet; every member of the band contributed equally, and we all had a shared vision of the direction we wanted to take. We’ve always made a habit of rewriting all our songs from scratch multiple times and this one was no different, but this time we focused on speeding up that process as much as possible. Every session was a free-for-all as ideas, parts and even entire sections were scrapped or repurposed to find the core of what we wanted to say. We’ve become much more comfortable letting our ideas speak for themselves without overcomplication.”
The band will be launching the single at a show in Adelaide at Jive Bar on the 14th January 2023.
Enjoy our first listen of “The Divide”, before its release tomorrow.
You can keep up to date with Broken Waves on Facebook and Instagram.
Header image credit: Chandler Feddern
