Ed Sheeran
Could Ed be the biggest star in the U.S. by April? Could Goldenvoice be pissed they didn’t book him at Coachella?
It won’t happen quite that fast, but be prepared for an onslaught akin to James Taylor and Elton John in 1970, when suddenly they went from nobody to somebody seemingly overnight.
I’m stunned that there’s been no cross-pollination so far, no bleed from the U.K. to the U.S., where Sheeran has triumphed in the last twelve months. What if iTunes were international, what if you could have purchased Ed’s music simultaneous with his rise in the U.K., would he have been big here at the same time?
Not that no one knows. It’s just that without the label and the media to push the button, it’s been veritably underground, a hipster story, which would drive incredible business if he were just a headliner instead of opening for Snow Patrol in the U.S. this spring.
I guess you should start with "You Need Me, I Don’t Need You":
According to legend, this is Sheeran’s response to management’s request he conform.
I sing, I write my own tune and I write my own verse, hell
Don’t need another wordsmith to make my tune sell
Call yourself a singer-writer, you’re just bluffing
Name’s on the credits and you didn’t write nothing
I sing fast, I know that all my shit’s cool
I will blast and I didn’t go to BRIT School
Not that you’ll catch the lyrics the first time through, but the chorus hooks you and there’s an energy that draws you in, you just have to hear it again.
Then watch the live acoustic take at:
It’s old school and new school at the same time! Acoustic with electronic effects. And Ed’s geeky and possessed and isn’t this what hooked us back then and still now? He’s not dancing because he’s been choreographed, but because he’s got the music in him!
Not that Sheeran started yesterday. He’s been recording since 2005. Long after you gave up your high school career, went to college, got your MBA and started in finance.
And after reading that James Morrison, another bloke who’s big in the U.K. and is just waiting to break big over here, did two hundred gigs in a year, Sheeran decided to top him.
And then there’s a lot of effort and luck and after selling 7,000 copies of his EP in its first week, reaching number two on iTunes, Sheeran signed with the Warner Music empire.
Would he have done so if he was a U.S. act? Where they don’t play this kind of music on the radio?
Top Forty is just like AOR in the eighties. So narrow in its taste that it’s signing its own death warrant. Don’t say no, remember that KMET flipped to KTWV/The Wave, KROQ put a stake in its heart.
There’s something undeniable about Sheeran.
Watch his latest hit, "Lego House", here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4BLVznuWnU
The big honchos don’t get it but the little girls understand. The executives think we’re dancing fools, but in reality we’re alienated outsiders with mushy insides, just looking for a little honesty.
And I could e-mail my buddies in the U.K. and ask them what to believe, inquire about the backlash, but not worrying about what the masses believe, I must say I get this, and I believe Americans will too.
Not that there won’t be a push. Not that the media won’t jump on this. But the only radio format that counts, what will it say/what will it do?
Stick to its guns.
So, like a good Rebecca Black, Ed Sheeran is going to develop outside the system.
Sheeran is everything "Idol/X Factor" is not. He’s not a pretty face willing to do anything to make it, willing to compromise everything that makes him attractive. Britain’s got talent because the public’s been trained to search for quality, to pay attention. In the U.S. we’ve been trained to look at the penumbra, the endorsements, the money, anything but the underlying music.
And it’s the music that sells Ed Sheeran. Both the sound and the lyrics.
Someday those factors will be paramount in the U.S. once again. The golden age is right around the corner, once acts know it’s about hard work, being true to yourself and that if you play the game, you’re toast.
Because people can tell.
Just like they can tell Ed Sheeran is real.
