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When gearing up for the follow-up to his breakout album Stick Season , Noah Kahan and his team knew there was a lot riding on the project. “Expectations were otherworldly, and pressure was palpable,” says his manager, Drew Simmons at Foundations.

But that new album, The Great Divide , has met and exceeded those expectations: Following its release on April 30, the set flew to No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with 389,000 equivalent album units, making it Kahan’s first chart-topper and best week ever. What’s more, The Great Divide ’s debut marked the third-biggest week for any artist of the year, the biggest week for a rock album since 2014, the largest streaming week for any album this year and, at 118,000 vinyl units, the biggest vinyl sales week for a rock album in the modern era, dating to 1991.

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The album, which was preceded by a Netflix documentary and will be followed by a stadium headlining tour, is a big moment for Kahan.…