Chris Van and Sherlic White founded Dividing the Element in 2012 after connecting through a Facebook group for Zimbabwean rock and metal fans. When Sherlic later relocated to South Africa, Chris kept the project going, bringing in guitarist Archie Chikoti and drummer Nick "Newbz" Newberry from his previous bands, and bassist Mat Sanderson, who joined after an informal jam session that doubled as an audition.
The band's biggest claim to fame is its self-titled debut album, released on 5 May 2018 and widely credited as the world's first metal record with lyrics sung in Shona. The idea, bringing local language and themes into a genre that's rarely sung in African languages, came from a suggestion by Chris's fiancée, and became the band's mission: "metal from Zimbabwe, for Zimbabwe." The album dropped during the Zimbabwean leg of Metal United World Wide, a global underground metal event, and it put the band alongside a small but tight-knit cluster of homegrown acts, Chikwata 263, Evicted, and Acid Tears, that were building Harare's metal scene more or less from scratch after decades of the genre having almost no local footing.
The band did keep putting out music after the album: the single "Pakaipa" ("It's bad" in Shona), about being underestimated and misunderstood, followed in May 2020 with the same settled lineup of Chris Van, Archie Chikoti, Nick Newberry, and Mat Sanderson. We couldn't find any public trace of new releases, shows, or lineup news from Dividing the Element since then, so if you know what the band's been up to more recently, let us know.
Follow Dividing The Element: Facebook: facebook.com/DividingTheElement Bandcamp: dividingtheelement263.bandcamp.com
