The 'Shape of You' hitmaker talks about how he decides which songs to keep for himself and which ones to give away to other artists, saying his inner circle thinks he made a big mistake giving away 'Love Yourself'.
- Jul 10, 2021
AceShowbiz - Ed Sheeran owes his career to the posse of music brains he surrounds himself with, insisting they help him decide which songs to record and which ones to give away to others.
The "Perfect" singer admits he'd be lost without them because he's never sure about the songs that really work for him.
"I've been wrong in a lot of cases... and I think the key to it is having people that you listen to...," he tells web series "Hot Ones", explaining he initially didn't want to record mega-hit "Shape of You".
"I didn't want to put that on my album... and everyone said, 'If you put this on, it'll be the biggest hit of your career'... I kind of felt it was like cheating, because I'd basically done a paint-by-numbers pop tune... and it was the biggest hit of my career... so I was wrong there."
But even his inner circle messes up from time to time.
"I know the people involved will deny this to the hilt, but there is no way that I would have given this song away if people liked it, but when I wrote Justin Bieber's Love Yourself I remember playing that to people and them being like, 'Meh,' so I gave it away and now it's like, 'Why did you give it away? You never played this to us!' " he laughs.
Ed adds, "I had an email the other day... I'd gone round this bloke's house and I played him this song three times, and played it on acoustic guitar and then I came to America, I played it to a couple of people, they emailed him and then he emailed me, like, 'What the f**k, this is the best song...!' and I was like, 'Dude, I literally played you the song three times a week ago and you weren't feeling it then.' "
"They say how many music industry people does it take to change a lightbulb? One - and 99 to ask each other what they think of it. That's basically it."
