[Closed] ed sheeran

Not to my taste tbh. Mass publicity and the sheep will follow.

You're not missing anything.
He is bland bland bland.... which is probably why he sells so much music?

My God!
He has 14 of the top 15 songs!
He must be making a mint.

Coldplay havent released anything this month, so their fans are buying something similarly dull.

Gawd bless 6 Music.

Amen to that.

(A) he may well be the 'best the music industry has to offer'...but there is a world of music out there that doesn't try and fit into this world

(B) it's nice and safe. A friend told me the other day that he saw a pension age woman and her husband pick up the cd in sainsburys, and pop it in their trolley...no ceremony, no excitement, like it was a can of beans.

This kind of sums it up.

My niece filmed a video with him a year or two ago, says he was great. TBH I'd rather it was him clogging up the charts (easy enough to avoid) than many others...

but mostly downloads and it's not like he's selling millions of each track. Not my thing but at least he's become a famous pop star the long way rather than the cowell way

Pretty impressive video of the Telly Tubbies dancing to one of his tracks doing the rounds on Facebook, just to help you get some perspective.

Was chatting to a fairly well informed mate (his father in law has a life time achievement Brit award) last night about ES and he'd seen him a couple of times with his daughter and thought he was quite an impressive live performer

Is this the best the music industry has to offer.

Probably not, but he's currently the most popular.

Much the same as the Latest Harry Potter book wasn't the best the literary world had to offer, but it outsold everything else last year.

(Edit: I've seen him live and it was brilliant, his recorded stuff doesn't really impress, but his live performance, And the use of repeat etc, is very impressive.IMO)

People love average, unchallenging stuff. Not sure how you've been unable to avoid him, he hasn't inflicted himself on my world at all.

I am glad to say I have never listened to one of his songs. Have managed to dodge everthing One Erection have done too.

I can't hate the guy. He's not to my taste, but call him bland, yeah fair enough but he's a pop start who can actually sing, can actually play music and he writes his own stuff.

He's the credible pop star us 'real music' fans have been bemoaning the absence of for years.

Music for people who don't like music.
It's the sort of thing people can put on in the car, not really listen to, not have to concentrate on and reassure themselves that, hey, they still know about music.

Abysmal dirge. that class A team song actually made me want to OD on class A's just to ensure I never heard it again.

Bland beyond all belief.

I'm forced to listen to Radio One while traveling in the team car, and they played the entire album track by track when it came out, and it was really tedious, there's no light and shade, every track sounds just like every other track, and his songwriting is really very simplistic, pretty much student-level writing.
Predictably, there were people tweeting in going on about how they were feeling his words down to their soul, but there were a few, thankfully saying how unbelievably dull and samey it was.
Thankfully there are people like Laura Marling, who I saw last night, who [i]really[/i] can write meaningful lyrics and music to match, and she's only just turned 27, with her sixth album just released today.

^ I like the songs, can't stand the affected accent...

I couldn't name one of his songs or even recognise it if I heard it.
Am I culturally worse off? I'm going to take a punt and guess not? It's probably a bit like Coldplay but slightly more earnest and bedwettery?
I have seen pics of him though, he has that look of not quite believing he's still getting away with it.

Is he that busy ? It looks like he's never missed a meal!

Music for people who don't like music.
It's the sort of thing people can put on in the car, not really listen to, not have to concentrate on and reassure themselves that, hey, they still know about music.

This is the sort of "I'm superior" claptrap that people always spout about any music that's popular.

Why do you consider it "better" if you have to really concentrate on music to enjoy it ?

And everyone "knows about music" they just prefer stuff that appeals to them, and not necessarily you.

As someone else above said, he writes his own stuff, he plays his own instruments, he plays live (very well) and he can sing.

people who reckon they are always "right" about music will always get their g strings wound too tight and slag off anything popular though, I don't know why I'm surprised.

choppersquad - Member
You're not missing anything.
He is bland bland bland.... which is probably why he sells so much music?

This + 100000000000000000

And he squeaks when he walks.

"As someone else above said, he writes his own stuff, he plays his own instruments, he plays live (very well) and he can sing."

In which case, superb. Should be more like him.

(I've never knowingly heard anything by him, mind ewe.)

I've got a complete blind spot about Ed Sheeran. I just don't get his popularity. But I think there are two factors at work - best-in-class social media management, and he's renowned for engaging with the fans.

my local village co-op even had an pop stand with his CD for sale, cannot say I've ever seen one for another artist

on the radio they were on about how aggressively its being marketed at a very quiet time of year music wise,

pat on the back all round for the marketing men, they've just played the streaming.sales game very well, and clearly its a broken system

I am glad to say I have never listened to one of his songs.

So how do you know if you like him or not then?

Can't say I'm a fan but a few of his songs are cheerful enough. Reports suggest he is a decent bloke so good luck to him.

I'm stuck in the 90's so will probably just keep listening to Ill Communication, 36 Chambers, Parklife and Going for Gold.

Saying all that, I've seen Coldplay live twice and thought they were great so what do I know?

This is the sort of "I'm superior" claptrap that people always spout about any music that's popular.

Why do you consider it "better" if you have to really concentrate on music to enjoy it ?

And everyone "knows about music" they just prefer stuff that appeals to them, and not necessarily you.

As someone else above said, he writes his own stuff, he plays his own instruments, he plays live (very well) and he can sing.

people who reckon they are always "right" about music will always get their g strings wound too tight and slag off anything popular though, I don't know why I'm surprised

Well that's an opinion worth having 😆

My kids love him and so I get to listen to his stuff quite a lot. I actually think he's pretty good!

My 11 year old showed me this from 5 years ago before he was really big - most impressive one man band I've seen in a while!

Middle aged men in 'ooh, what is that rubbish that kids listen to these days' shocker...

this thread is akin to people wandering round the tate saying 'huh what's so impressive, i could do that'

but the fact is most can't play guitar even half well or sing and certainly can't write songs let alone gig long enough or hard enough or put it all together to make a career out or it let alone get a record into the charts

I have a degree in Jazz arranging and composing and I'm the biggest picky tossbag when it comes to composing and performance but there is a difference between personal taste and appreciation of craft

and yes I suspect he has a bloody good manager - and yes Laura Marling is awesome

e said, he writes his own stuff, he plays his own instruments, he plays live (very well) and he can sing.

Tell you what, after multiple top selling albums, playing to a packed Wembley stadium and (allegedly) enjoying some horizontal jogging with Taylor Swift, I bet being criticised by a bunch of forty something fellas who have nothing better to do on a Friday night than post on an Internet forum must be a real kick on the teeth for the poor ginger singer.

Hexakerly, we don't care much about him .. he don't care much about us.

Win.

Win.

Same analytics as brexit and trump I guess. Get used to more of this weirdness.

edhornby

I have a degree in Jazz arranging and composing

NICE!

[img] [/img]

[quote=tpbiker ]Cant get away from this guy at the moment. Has 9 songs in the top 10, fastest selling album ever, been at number one for weeks...
Hes ok I guess, better than some of the other dross out there, but really???? Is this the best the music industry has to offer. Its just so bland..
What am I missing?

What you're missing is that streaming has broken the charts and it's no longer any sort of measure of the popularity of an act, let alone how good they are (if it ever was, but at least it used to be a measure of something relevant). Of course what hasn't changed is that the acts which do well in the charts are the ones which appeal to teenage girls, so unlikely to appeal to a load of middle aged blokes - the only difference being the power of said teenaged girls to drive songs up the charts by having them on repeat (when listeners with more varied and sophisticated tastes are unlikely to do that with the the songs they like).

Hmm, given I could only think of a couple of current Sheeran, out of curiosity I checked what the ones at the top of the chart are. I can now understand where the hate is coming from - the only one which stood out is Galway Girl, and that stood out for all the wrong reasons - how the **** is that #2?

The ones I could think of I actually quite like - but then I'm happy enough listening to a variety of mainstream pop. The problem is the lack of variety with ed on repeat.

......streaming has broken the charts and it's no longer any sort of measure of the popularity of an act....

You are going to have to explain that to me.

How is logging how many times the public choose to stream a song not a measure of how popular that the song is with the public?

I covered that in the post - because rather than being a measure of how popular it is amongst a wide variety of people, which is a good definition of popularity, it's measuring which songs are on repeat with the more limited set of listeners who play songs on repeat.

I think he's good, and any one who doesn't agree is wrong. Fact.

I still don't like coldplay though....

I really like the idea of Ed, he seems a solid bloke. But his music isn't for me. But there again there is no way I'm the target audience

Dunno about Ed all a bit MOR for me, but he has shown what a farce the charts have become and are a complete irrelevance. Thank god streaming didn't count when Westlife were around, as they'd have been number 1 all year!

How is logging how many times the public choose to stream a song not a measure of how popular that the song is with the public?

I covered that in the post - because rather than being a measure of how popular it is amongst a wide variety of people, which is a good definition of popularity, it's measuring which songs are on repeat with the more limited set of listeners who play songs on repeat.

Don't really agree with that, one user streaming a 4 minute single on repeat for 7 solid hours would count as 1 single sale.
Whereas your "more sophisticated" listeners, may possibly buy a single and listen to it a few times before realising it's not that good.

Which song would you say is "more popular"

The more sophisticated listeners don't buy singles!

Though the interesting thing with the streaming on repeat is that one obvious way to improve chart position is to have a shorter song.

He's not my cup of tea but I caught his set at Glastonbury a couple of years ago and he can certainly hold a crowd.

There seem to be a lot of contributors on this thread who think music is binary - either great because they like it or terrible and without any merit if they don't. There's a fair bit of music I don't like but I reckon I just don't like it, it's not because it's crap.

It's an interesting point, but doesn't differentiate between what was traditionally seen as being the single (an advert for the album), and the album in itself.

It does.
Every 100 streams of a single count as 1 single sale.
Every 1000 streams of an album track count as 1 album sale.

Not quite the same as before, but there is some logic in it.

Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!

The more sophisticated listeners don't buy singles!

So they never had any influence on the singles chart then.

What was your point again?

Maxtorque - got it in one 🙂

Well I'm a mamil , and I think he's great ! Writes all his own stuff you know ! Very talented.

I don't get it. His faux rapping makes my shit itch. His songs are bland. Seems like a nice bloke, but the music is vanilla.

Sheeran is a very talented young guy, that unlike 99% of all the other talented singer/songwriters, realised early on in his career the secret to success...

It's not quality, it's quantity!

Sadly, just like those of us who spent our entire teens too scared to ask the girl out we really wanted to, whilst our mate was playing the numbers game and asked every single girl in the club for a snog (and invariably many of them actually said yes!), there's soooo many talented singer/songwriters out there that don't really get noticed because they're perfectionists, making sure each and every new song is in its own right better than the last. This approach is the antithesis of success sadly!

Success in the music industry comes from consistency. And F*** me, Ed Sheeran is consistent! When you realise that he only releases the "best" of his hundreds of songs he writes every single week himself, and the rest then get offered out by his record company for the likes of Justin Bieber, Taylor Swift and many many others to record (and send him royalty cheques in the post off the back of too), you begin to understand the guys work rate!

Supposedly he made more than £25million in 2016 alone... In an age where there's no money in selling music, that's an incredible feat!

We may think his music is boring, formulaic, bland... It is, and to be honest, I'm sure Sheeran himself would agree for the most part. But it sells, and given that he's still only 26 and has made more money today than just about any of us on this forum will make all year, do you think he cares?

He could give up the boring stuff now, disappear up his own arse, spend the rest of his life writing ridiculous experimental music and never sell another record, and he'd still be raking in the royalty cheques the entire time!

You gotta respect his work rate if nothing else.

Fair points mboy. He can have as much money as he likes, as long as I don't have to listen to him!
Even the Roots' classroom instruments couldn't make it sound good!

Oi mboy! Don't diss Taylor Swift. She is everything ES is.

Good on him.

He's certainly one of the worst musicians. Thankfully I've never listened to any of his songs.

He's certainly one of the worst musicians. Thankfully I've never listened to any of his songs.

Is confused 😕

Not my cup of tea but he's not bad, and certainly less dreary than Pink Floyd.
😀

Fair play to him. A couple of the girls in the office haves had him on repeat all day. Not my cup of tea, but good at what he does. Seems like a 'not quite as good as' Ben Howard in my opinion.

In fairness to him, I read an interview the other day where even he said that his dominance proved the charts were broken.

Is confused

I have a degree in Jazz arranging and composing

Eh?? - Jazz is arranged and composed? I thought they made it up as they went along! 😀

I have a 14yr old daughter and there's no getting away from Ed Sheeran at the minute! And to be truthful his songs always get stuck in my head so I can see the appeal.

I wouldn't buy it, but I won't go out of my way to turn him off.

I'm not an ES fan, but don't get the hate.

Agree. Don't understand all the elitist comments around anyone who likes him doesn't like music. It is popular music, popular music has always been just that.

I never hear him as the only radio I listen to is Radio 4 and he is not on there much! but I do appreciate his effort in getting where he is and his lack of obsession with money and belongings (rare for a young pop star)

I'm not a fan of the singing ginger ninja. However, he knows his market, understands how to get his music out there and does it successfully. Also, from my limited knowledge he seems like a pretty skilled musician.

Don't understand all the elitist comments around anyone who likes him doesn't like music.

Me neither, but it's always been the way I suppose. It's just the usual middle aged music "expert" bellendery.

Can't just leave it at "it's not for me" but has to slag off anyone who does like it, in order to feel superior.

Popular music is popular shocker.

It's not for me but at least he's actually a musician and composer and not some karaoke singer. Like that Elvis.

maxtorque - class!
As for ES I'm just jealous he got jiggy with Taylor Swift.
My kids ask me to turn off Radio 6 to listen to him...grr

Not a bad little musician, but he's playing the Positive Discrimination Game, and winning!

He knows how badly gingers have been discriminated against in the past, so if the Beeb don't play his records, he just plays the ginger card... "Is it cos I is ginger bro?".

He's got them in the palm of his hand, they were playing his albums back to back on Radio 1 AND Radio 2 last week!

There will be a backlash soon, action groups like Brunettes First and the Mousey Defence League will start springing up all over Facebook with anti-ginger memes...

AS the OP I wasn't critising him, just a bit bewildered by his success.Sure hes very talented (i remember seeing him do a one man band type thing once at glastenbury) and i'd rather he had success then some of the talentless xfactor types.

that said, apparently hes starting a boy band and holding open auditions..given the one thing he has going is that hes a talented singer, song writer and musician who made it on his own, seem an odd choice to go down this route..

Seems like a nice guy in this vid:

Sheeranalbumparty was trending on twitter a couple of nights ago, some Sheeran fans thought it was a party for his album

I'm not a fan at all but I do respect the fact that he's gone from a slot on the croissant neuf stage at Glastonbury in 2011 to headlining the pyramid on Sunday this year and seems to have mostly taken over the charts in the process.

He's great, best thing since James Blount.

I think he's alright. Got all 3 albums and fairly easy to listen to. He does all his own stuff and still goes out lashing it up on the wine etc and has a good time.

I'm not a massive music buff though so maybe my opinion is invalid in music buff minds 🙂