Ed Sheeran’s Disappointing Musical Evolution
photo from nytimes.com
Ed Sheeran’s music career has been a topic I have wanted to write about for quite a while now, and with the release of his recent single “Bad Habits,” I figured it was finally time. While most people already know Ed Sheeran and his music, the conversation I want to have centers around the decline in the quality of his music.
Ed Sheeran started his music career in 2004 by posting his music on YouTube but didn’t really step into the spotlight until 2011 with the success of his debut single “The A Team,” despite already releasing two EPs in 2010. Ed’s song “The A Team” became a massive hit worldwide, as well as his follow-up singles “Lego House,” “You Need Me, I Don’t Need You,” and “Drunk.” After the success of those singles, he later released the album + (pronounced plus) where it was well received by listeners and music critics. After the release of +, Ed Sheeran became such a big hit that he ended up performing at the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II concert and at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. He even went on to co-write songs with One Direction and Taylor Swift.
photo from welchemusic.com
After the release and success of + and gaining worldwide recognition, he then released his second full-length album titled X (pronounced multiply) in 2014. X turned out to be another success with hit songs such as “Photograph,” “Don’t”, and “Thinking Out Loud.” “Thinking Out Loud” became the biggest hit from that album and is probably the first dance song for half of the couples that were married during 2014-2015. With the success of X, Ed continued to gain recognition and collaborated with other well-known artists such as John Mayer and even wrote “Love Yourself” for Justin Bieber. Following the success of X, Ed took a yearlong hiatus from social media and held out on releasing any new music.
At the end of 2016, he ended his hiatus and started posting teasers for his upcoming album on social media. At this point in his career, I considered myself to be a pretty big Ed Sheeran fan and had been following his music from his release of “The A Team” so I was really looking forward to what was to come from him. He released two singles in January of 2017 titled “Shape of You” and “Castle on the Hill” with both of them being well received. He then released his album titled ÷ (pronounced divide) in March of 2017 after the success of the two singles. This third album was another success for Sheeran to the point that he was named Spotify’s top streamed artist of 2017. “Shape of You” ended up being the best performing song on the album and was the best selling single for both the UK and the Billboard Top 100 for the year 2017.
So at this point in Ed Sheeran’s career with all the success he had experienced is actually where my opinion on his music started to change. Now I am not one of those people who wants all the artists they like to always stay underground and never get too popular because I personally find that to be a bit shady. I always root for artists I enjoy to really make it big; my problem is when the quality of music declines as that happens. I am not hating on his album ÷ because it was obviously a success, but it was my least favorite of the three full-length albums. I also think “Shape of You” was extremely over played to the point where I would just immediately change the station and it gave me the vibe of the type of music they play in a Kohl’s dressing room. Although I had my criticisms of the ÷ album, I still considered Ed Sheeran to be a great artist and was looking forward to what he would be doing next.
After another hiatus and the birth of his child, Ed Sheeran released an album in 2019 titled No.6 Collaborations Project featuring collaborations with Cardi B, Travis Scott, Bruno Mars, Chris Stapleton, Meek Mill, 50 Cent, and many others. Now this album is where he completely lost me. I honestly could not find one song from it that I actually enjoyed. I was truly disappointed and had really hoped that the time off from music would help him get back to his roots, but I was poorly mistaken. I had already had my suspicions that he was falling into the mainstream pop machine that many artists fall into, and the release of No.6 Collaborations Project solidified that for me. The album was overall so chaotic and focused too much on who was on the album instead of the songs themselves. Since then, I had basically removed Ed Sheeran from my radar, not in a hateful way, but more in an uninterested type of way.
So that now brings us to the present day with the release of his newest single on June 25th titled “Bad Habits.” Once I heard that he put out a new single, I did not get my hopes up and still had my same uninterested opinion about the direction of his music, but still held out a bit of hope that this single would redeem him in my book. Well, it did not. I listened to “Bad Habits” this week and was yet again disappointed but it just further confirmed my idea of him becoming a mainstream, pop-hit, sellout. Not to be too brutal, but “Bad Habits” is not good at all and just highlights how inauthentic his music has become. Now please understand that I am not trying to bash Ed Sheeran, I am just honestly disappointed because I KNOW he is better than this and I KNOW he has immense talent that is simply not being utilized.
I just don’t understand how he can go from writing a deep song such as “The A Team” where he sings of a woman battling addiction to these basic pop hits that sound like bad retail music. He lured us in with so many beautiful songs featuring wonderful lyrics and just hasn’t been giving what I know he can. It is also disappointing because the younger generation who is now hearing his most recent stuff probably has no idea what type of music he is capable of such as “Give Me Love,” “Tenerife Sea,” and “Wake Me Up.” I do understand the appeal of wanting to put out these pop hits and I understand that it is probably an easy cash grab for an artist like him, but at some point he has to realize that he is so far off from the work that built him such a huge fan base. I really do root for Ed Sheeran and I recognize that he has a wonderful voice, excellent song writing skills, and overall seems like a great guy, but he just isn’t at all close to what made me a fan of his in the beginning. I know I cannot be alone in this thought and I hope there are others like me that just want to scream “What the hell Ed?!”
I will always hold a special respect for Ed Sheeran and I continue to give his older stuff the love it deserves, but I am done getting my hopes up that he will give us the same energy that + and X gave. Let me know in the comments your thoughts on the direction Ed Sheeran has taken with his music or if there are other artists that make you feel the same way I feel about him.
Thanks for reading!
