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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
Why? It's perfectly clear what davidtaylforth said. 😉
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 🙂