What’s a Divorce Between Friends: An Interview with Tiger Cohen-Towell from Divorce 

With a relationship much more harmonious than their name suggests, it’s no surprise that an album, opened with laughter between friends, was a collaborative process between members of the Nottingham-based 4-piece band. Their debut album Drive to Goldenhammer (2025) weaves through an Indie Pop landscape with country twangs and grungier edges that have received acclaim as a fresh take on, what I often find to be, a stale genre. 

The album has often been compared to some sort of journey to an unspecified or “irrelevant” place. It’s difficult to tell if they are joking or paying homage to their roots when they suggests that the location of the fictional ‘Goldenhammer’ probably “exists in the East Midlands”. In my imagination Goldenhammer was more like Oz or Narnia but then again, I do not know the East Midlands very well and maybe, in some way, Nottingham is not that dissimilar to Neverland. 

Discussing their songwriting process, Tiger (vocals and bass) describes a joyful experience of building and adapting songs around each other before seemingly surprising themself with the sincerity in which they claim that “collaboration is the highest form of art”. When probed regarding any conflict of opinion between band members, Tiger expressed that they were all very open to compromise and appreciative of different thought processes and ideas. The fact that they are all close surely helps with this as they describe a way in which tension can be diffused by trust between friends. 

Employing a raw vocal style, it’s apparent that their love of “scrappy” vocals has influenced their delivery, citing influences such as Belle and Sebastian and The Velvet Underground. Praising Fiona Apple’s vocals as “incredible … but I love how much you hear it break”, they expressed a desire “to see the finger-marks”, a notion that is evident in the band’s discography, giving the album a very genuine edge despite some of their more polished “pop sensibilities”. 

Vibrant music videos accompany several of the band’s song as a useful tool to “accentuate the songs”. A chaotic kitchen scene is depicted in the video accompanying ‘Lord’, influenced by HBO’s The Bear, Anthony Bourdain and Marco Pierre White. The band uses this “new vogue cuisine” to embrace a metaphorical comparison between chef and musician, comparing the creative process to “putting yourself on a plate”. Tiger lovingly describes the process of filming their directorial debut for ‘Hangman’ as a “time restricted scramble” but great fun to make. This is the same song that they claimed would be Gromit’s favourite on the album (of Wallace and Gromit fame), referencing one of Divorce’s most valued inspirations. Written by Felix Mackenzie-Barrow (co-vocalist and guitarist) about his experiences working in the care industry it’s no surprise that an underappreciated and over-worked Gromit would relate to this. 

I spoke to Tiger in May before festival season (apologies again for my snail-paced writing skills) in which they were looking forward to playing Glastonbury, Green man and All Points East, amongst others. I was lucky enough to attend their set at Truck festival in 2024 which they now describes as “life affirming” and beams at a blissful memory of a show unplagued by technical issues. There is still time to see their incredible live set at Live at Leeds on Saturday the 15^th November, get yourself there or an animated dog will be very disappointed in you! 

Words by Cassia Bennett.