Iconic Global Magazine Iconic Global Magazine is a global media company, focusing on business, investing, technology, entrepreneurship, leadership, and lifestyle.
Related Articles
HE’S been releasing music and touring the world since he was 19 – but only now does Ed Sheeran say he finally feels truly happy.
Speaking as his eighth studio album, Play, is set to go to No1 tomorrow, the superstar singer, 34, explains: “I am living in the good old days.
9
9
“These are the days that, when I’m 60, I will look back on and wish I could go back to.
“I have to savour them and really feel in the moment as they can fly past quite quickly.”
A lot has changed since Ed burst on to the scene in 2011 with his runaway debut single The A Team.
Since then he has sold 200million records worldwide and married his childhood sweetheart Cherry Seaborn, with whom he has daughters Lyra, five, and three-year-old Jupiter.
And Ed reveals his family are now at the centre of his world, rather than taking a more back seat role to him being a global pop star.
He says: “The stage I am at in my career is that I am really happy and settled. I am really happy with who I am as an artist, the music I am creating and the shows I am doing.
“Honestly, the biggest thing for me is being able to balance being a dad and being a husband, and to feel like I am achieving both things to a good level.”
‘Foot off the gas’
Admitting his global success came at a price, Ed adds: “I think in the first decade of my career I was intensely unhappy as I had no balance, I was just work, work, work.
“And yes, everything was hyper- successful, but it was hyper-successful because I had no personal life at all.
“Work was everything. I think finding that balance with getting married, having a family, living around my friends . . .
“Being able to spend time with my friends and family — that has now become 70 per cent of my life and work is like 30 per cent.
“Before, it was 100 per cent and zero anything else.
To be that successful in my 20s you have to give everything of yourself all day, every day, and there’s a time limit to that, sanity-wise
Ed Sheeran
“The balance of getting to exist as a human being rather than just a pop star machine — that would be my measure of success.”
Since releasing debut album + Ed has landed 14 No1 singles in the UK and eight No1 albums.
He continues: “To be that successful in my 20s you have to give everything of yourself all day, every day, and there’s a time limit to that, sanity-wise.
“I see it now, and when I hang out with new artists who are in the zone it just compounds the feeling for me of being, ‘That ain’t me any more’. You know, work 16 hours a day and just be in it. You have to do that at some point in life but at some point you have to just take your foot off the gas a little bit, especially when you have children.
9
9
9
“I don’t want my kids to turn 18 and realise I missed their entire childhood. I am living in the good old days at the moment so I need to stop and smell the flowers.”
If you had asked Ed a few years ago what it was like in his studio, he would have said it was packed out with beers and takeaways.
I have to savour these days and really feel in the moment as they can fly past quite quickly
Ed
But during some of the recording sessions for his new album, Lyra cheered her daddy on from the recording deck.
Ed says: “The studio sessions meant more. I was recording all these songs in India with me next to my four-year-old daughter with headphones watching it happen for the first time.
“When I was making my first records I was going on tour, I was doing them on buses and it was all so fast-paced.
“Now it is living in the moment. My parents would say, ‘Oh those are the good old days’, and I am currently in them right now.
“I am doing that with my kids, my family and my friends.
“I have to savour these days and really feel in the moment as they can fly past quite quickly.”
It is not just the studio where Ed brings his kids to see his work either.
Lyra recently joined him on the set of his new music video for A Little More, where she bonded with the five-year-old daughter of Harry Potter actor Rupert Grint, who appears in it.
Ed explains: “His daughter is the same age as my daughter.
‘Heightened emotions’
“Weirdly, the week was kind of more about them than it was about me and Rupert, so they are now very good friends, which is cool.”
When it comes to his relationship with his wife, Ed says having children has changed it — in the best way.
Cherry has inspired some of Ed’s biggest hits, including Thinking Out Loud and Perfect.
However, he is keen to stress that, just like for any couple, life is not always rosy.
He says: “Anyone with two young kids knows that it completely changes your relationship. You go from being a couple to a unit. It can be quite stressful and you can have some big arguments.
“I think Cherry knows that she had songs like Heaven [on the new album] and Perfect, but that isn’t reality 100 per cent of the time. It is good to be honest.
9
9
“She knows that I write songs like Don’t Look Down or Wargame [both on the new album] and it’s a moment in time and that’s how I felt but that’s not reality.
“I think some people listen to records today and assume that a song is about their world 100 per cent of the time. But it is very much heightened emotions. You never write a song on a ‘meh’ day.”
Looking to the future, Ed has turned to Coldplay frontman Chris Martin for advice.
The rule is I have to love it
Ed
Speaking at Spotify’s immersive fan event in King’s Cross, central London, Ed says: “I have based my career now a lot on Coldplay and where they are in different stages of their career and I think around their eighth album it was like this as well.
“I speak to Chris all the time about this sort of stuff as I love how they have weathered 25 years.”
In July, I covered Ed’s homecoming gigs in Ipswich which saw him play to 90,000 fans over three nights at his beloved Portman Road stadium.
And after the event at King’s Cross, this week, he thanked The Sun for attending the shows.
Admitting he kept an eye on what we thought of his performance, he told me: “Thank you for the lovely write-up of Ipswich — yes, I did read it!”
In December, Ed will play two shows in Coventry and Manchester as part of a run of European arena shows in support of Play.
‘More intimate’
Announcing the concerts, which are on sale now, Ed write: “Coming to play some shows in Europe, these shows will be more intimate than a stadium show obvz, but still will be incredible. I love playing these venues so much.”
Speaking of how his gigs have changed over the years, Ed says: “I think it’s become much more of a communal event. When I first started out it was mostly teenage girls, and bear in mind I was a teenage boy when I first started releasing music.
“We were all kind of the same age. If I was 19 then they were 16, and now I am 34 so my fans will be 31 and everyone is settling down and having kids. I think Wembley 2015 was frantic. It was off the back of two quite big albums. But now people come to the shows to enjoy 15 years of music they love with people they love and the feeling has changed.
“But I think the feeling where we are now kind of lasts a lifetime.”
Of his planned post-Play album, Rewind, Ed adds: “The rule is I have to love it. The only way to ensure happiness is do what you like. I like my music, I listen to my music.
“And if it does well I get to play it for the rest of my life and if it doesn’t, then I move on.”
9
