Great Divide Announce Debut Release

04/28/2010
. At seven members strong, Great Divide's music fuses soul, roots and blues-rock into a collaborative sound, blending each member's influences and personality to create their enthusiastic brand of earnest, down home rock and roll. It's fitting, then, that members Teddy (guitar, vocals, harmonica), Jeff (piano, organ, Rhodes, Clavinet), Josh (drums, percussion), Joey (guitar), Hiro (bass), Eric (tenor and baritone sax) and Jake (trombone and trumpet) credit listening to their families' record collections as kids for shaping their style. Little Feat, Stevie Wonder, Bill Withers and The Band are just a few of the countless artists Great Divide cites as inspiration.

The band's family approach to their music is equally apparent on-stage, and in the studio on their debut full-length, Reservoir.

Set for release on May 4th, Reservoir was recorded in Detroit, MI in 2008, just before Great Divide relocated to Chicago. The guys quickly realized that tracking together in the live room without isolation naturally captured the raw energy of their on-stage performances and allowed each band member to feed off of one another's input. After laying down the funk infused "Freedom Bell," the soul-drenched "Do Me Right," barroom, bluesy "Rainey Bethea Blues" and the smoky, ambling "Waters Roll In" in that technique at the White Room, Great Divide wrapped up the album's remaining nine tracks at Roshambo Studios in Ferndale, MI. The organic feel of their music is what propelled the session forward, but what sets the recording apart is the sound captured by an arsenal of vintage and boutique gear that Great Divide incorporated into their session.

Reservoir captures the audience-energy that Great Divide played off of at festivals like the Chicago Bluegrass & Blues Festival, alongside Dr. Dog and Bela Fleck at the Congress Theater and venues such as Sullivan Hall in New York, 8X10 in Baltimore and Ann Arbor's Blind Pig � a formative venue for this group of University of Michigan students and alumni.

Continuously working to honor the elements of rock's rich history while exposing a new generation to their brand of down-home music, Great Divide's twelve track debut sounds like it's been somewhere and traveled a great many miles to reach the ears of each and every listener. Great Divide will hit the road this May, in support of Reservoir, with a set that Jambase has described as "tight," "soulful" and possessing a "sophisticated talent."

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