Ed Sheeran

Ed Sheeran0:00

Yeah.

Presenter0:00

This

Ed Sheeran0:00

Uh

Presenter0:00

Is the B B C.

Presenter0:03

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young. Thank you for downloading this podcast of Desert Island Discs from BBC Radio four. This is an extended edition of the original broadcast. For rights reasons the music choices are shorter than in the radio broadcast.

Presenter0:17

For more information about the programme, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.

Presenter0:44

My castaway this week is the singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran, a musical storyteller for the modern age. If you're not already humming his latest chart-topping hit, there's a teenager nearby that surely will be. His compositions bridge the gap between Dylan and Eminem, a troubadour with a soft spot for hip-hop and grime. He's garnered huge worldwide sales and multiple international awards. Tracks from his latest album filled nine of the top ten places in the UK singles charts recently. His career is, in part at least, an anomaly to modern music-making methodology, talented, undoubtedly, dedicated and driven too.

Presenter1:24

But the fact remains that in an industry obsessed with image

Presenter1:28

He's a pasty gingerbloke in a scruffy T-shirt. He says, I've been a singer-songwriter from the word go. I have worked hard to focus my sound and style to a point where it was just me being me and not me striving to be anyone else. I guess that's the same with my appearance. I've never tried to be something I'm not. So welcome, Ed Sheeran.

Ed Sheeran1:48

Hello.

Presenter1:49

You were pumping the air with your fists as the signature tune came on then. You're looking forward to this, are you?

Ed Sheeran1:55

Yeah, I feel like this is the peak of my career. It's all downhill from here.

Presenter1:58

You're not just saying

Ed Sheeran1:58

No, I'm really not. This is literally every single weekend as a kid I listen to this.

Presenter2:03

You once said you have a very cool job because it's about making people happy every day. That's what you do. And aside from selling the music, what is it about connecting with the people who listen to your music that you like the most?

Ed Sheeran2:14

My songs are not my songs as soon as they're out there. A song like Thinking Out Loud, for instance, when I wrote it, very personal, and then I released it, and suddenly it's no longer my song. It belongs to Stacey, who got married here, or Kevin, who proposed to it, or Dave, who had his first kiss on it. You know, it's because everyone remembers what their first dance was, and the fact that they've kind of bestowed that honour on a song of mine to make it immortal in their lives. The song might not be immortal in the public domain forever, but in that one person's mind, it lives on, which is, I think, pretty cool. Give me a

Presenter2:50

Window on your they call it the process, don't they? How do how do you write a song?

Ed Sheeran2:54

I try to write as much as possible. I'll try to write like four or five songs in a day and just write them as fast as possible. If I'm in like album making mode, it'll be four or five songs a day and there'll be no thought process. It'll just be get a guitar and just write a song. And that will be, you know, twelve out of a hundred might be good. And that's all you really need for an album. So yeah, I write a bunch and scrap a bunch.

Presenter3:18

And your writing, as all of your fans will know, it's highly personal. You write about the minutiae of your life, whether it's heartbreak or whether it's memories or whether it's feeling warm about a certain view from a hill. If if something has happened to you deeply, do you need to write about it?

Ed Sheeran3:35

Yeah, I think it's a form of therapy, to be honest. I think any time I've ever got down or ever felt low, the one thing that picks me up from that is writing a song about it, because at least you've got a positive experience out of a bad experience or something really happy. You know, you can write a really happy song and that's an even better thing. And can it actually help mend if you've got a deep sadness? Yeah, certainly. I've never dwelled on anything too much. As soon as it's out of me on a song, I kind of move on.

Presenter4:00

What what's your criteria for your uh choice of eight discs today?

Ed Sheeran4:04

I think the music that made me want to create music, because I know I'm coming on at twenty-six and I would like to do Desert Island Dists again when I'm sort of like 40, 50 and have a lot of fun.

Presenter4:09

And I would

Presenter4:14

I love that you have that much of a plan.

Ed Sheeran4:15

And have music of my lifetime. But I think for this, I want the music that made me want to create music.

Presenter4:21

Okay, so um now here's a strange thing. We give every castaway a list just to have by them as they're recording. I handed you your list as we were coming in. You're like, No, I don't want that. I don't want any bit of that. No, I'm I'm I'm

Ed Sheeran4:30

No, I'm I'm I'm easy. I wanna be in this interview. I don't wanna uh be fiddling with a bit of paper. I'm a very like I guess attention deficit. So if you give me an inch, I will take a while.

Presenter4:38

Okay.

Presenter4:43

Okay, so I have your full attention and for that I'm grateful. Tell me about the first track we're going to hear then. What are we going to hear?

Ed Sheeran4:47

We're going to hear Derek and the Domino's Layla.

Presenter4:50

And why have you

Ed Sheeran4:51

It was the Qu Queen's Golden Jubilee, I think. Yeah, Golden in two thousand and two. Yeah. And uh I remember watching it and this guy came on stage with this sort of graffiti splash guitar and played this riff. And I was like, Dad, who's that? And he was like, That's Eric Clapton

Presenter4:55

I think

Ed Sheeran5:10

And that riff just stuck in my mind. That day I was like, I want to be a musician. I want to play guitar. So I got a guitar for Christmas, and that was the first song that I learned, and the only song that I could play for a long time. And I just played that riff over and over and over again. And weirdly enough, I tracked down a kind of fake copy of the guitar that he was playing, bought it on eBay, played it on Jules Holland's Hoota Nanny, and woke up New Year's Day with an email in my inbox from Mr. Clapton just saying, nice guitar. And ever since then, we've formed this very fun friendship. He's such a fantastic man. And I'm just learning more and more from him every time I see him.

Speaker 45:58

No.

Speaker 46:08

One what's the

Speaker 46:11

It's just your foolish cry.

Speaker 46:25

Or Jimmy!

Presenter6:31

That was Derek and the Dominoes and that was Layla. Ed Sheeran, you said a strange thing once which was nothing I think it's strange nothing about fame has surprised me. What did you mean by that?

Ed Sheeran6:41

Um

Ed Sheeran6:43

Before you get into it, everyone warns you, you know, this'll happen, this will happen, this will happen and uh it's kind of like having a checklist in in front of you and you just tick off when things happen, you know.

Presenter6:55

What have you ticked off? What were the big big ones?

Ed Sheeran6:58

Do you know what the big the big one for me is everyone always said outside the industry, oh, when people get successful they change. And everyone inside the industry always said, it's not you that changes, it's everyone around you. But actually it's a bit of both. What happens is you strive for normality and you go, nope, I'm not going to change, I'm not going to change. And as soon as you find success, everyone around you starts treating you super normal because they're kind of like going a bit over the top to show you that everything's cool. And then people start changing towards you and then you start getting paranoid about it. And then you basically get to a point where you have changed and the rumors are true basically.

Presenter7:40

When I talk to, and I have the advantage of getting to talk to a lot of people who are very, very successful, when I talk to successful musicians.

Presenter7:48

What often comes up is that it is a great uh

Presenter7:53

Comfort and a great normality to be going through it with other people. So if people are in a group, they're part of a musical group, then they can you know, I remember George Michaels saying that to me. He could look across at Andrew Ridgely and think, All right, mate, this is all a bit strange, but we're in it together and they could go off stage afterwards and kind of talk about how ridiculous it was.

Speaker 18:11

Uh

Speaker 48:11

Mm.

Presenter8:13

You don't have that advantage. It is a solitary and you have chosen very much, obviously, to be aware of. There's no band on tour. There's no band on tour. You're out there on stage in the spotlight on your own. Given the intensity of what you're going through, how do you deal?

Speaker 48:17

Yeah.

Ed Sheeran8:19

Tori.

Presenter8:28

With that, because you must only really be able to ultimately talk to yourself about the experience.

Ed Sheeran8:33

Yeah, I don't think I did deal very well with it. I think I think it's a really weird thing, you know, playing playing a venue like Wembley Stadium or or similar venues like that world worldwide and

Ed Sheeran8:45

Playing in front of like 87,000 people and walking off and sitting in a dressing room afterwards with nothing but an air conditioning sound, and you're sitting there, but you don't really know how to come down from there. So, what did you do on those nights? Well, Wembley, I had my friends and family there, but on tour, I don't know. I will admit I did lose myself for a bit. Like, you can't really not go mental in that setting. But I've quickly realized that sort of my real schoolmates had always been the sort of constant threat of sanity.

Presenter9:18

Can I ask you? I mean, when you said you lost yourself, how did that manifest itself? What did you do?

Ed Sheeran9:23

Uh

Ed Sheeran9:25

All of the checkpoints that are on the list for you know, as I said earlier, the things that I said wouldn't surprise me about fame, all of those checkpoints. But I realized my like proper school, I have about 12 really, really close schoolmates that we've kind of been in the same group since we were about 11. And that's been the constant thread of Sanity. So I now employ four of them and they work on my tour. And is that fine? Yeah,'cause I come off and finish a gig and I've got my best mates there.

Presenter9:28

Oh, okay. You know. Yeah.

Presenter9:48

And is that fine?

Presenter9:52

I get that, but if ultimately you you are ping

Presenter9:55

The wage bill. Would they ever turn around to say, You know what, Ed, tonight you are being a right.

Ed Sheeran10:00

Of course, yeah, of course, because they're still my mate. Like, I don't stress how sound these people are. They will say that.

Presenter10:07

And when you were, you know, sitting listening to the air conditioning unit alone in your dressing room, people would get why that would drive you slightly off beam for a little while. Was it somebody saying to you, Ed, get a grip, mate, you want to stop it with the girls and the drugs and the boos, you want to actually get back on track here? Or was it yourself saying it to yourself?

Ed Sheeran10:15

For little.

Ed Sheeran10:24

Uh yeah, it was my cousin actually, my cousin who worked on the tour and he basically said he he was he was leaving if if it didn't calm down.

Presenter10:35

And that's what made it cunt.

Ed Sheeran10:36

Pretty much, yeah.'Cause he's another one who's a constant throughout all of that. I I I really want to stress the point, me employing people that are m my friends and my family is not me putting people on the payroll so they can be yes men. It's completely th the the opposite. They're r really not scared for their jobs basically. They will say how it is.

Presenter10:55

I get it. We could keep on talking, can we? But we need to fit in some of this fabulous music that you've chosen. Can you see it from here?

Ed Sheeran10:58

Yeah.

Ed Sheeran11:02

The next one is Van Morrison, Carrick Fergus, and he did this album, Irish Heartbeat with the Chieftains. I come from an Irish family and spent most of my childhood summers and birthdays and Christmases in Ireland listening to trad music, bands like Planksty. And this was a record that my dad played a lot. And this is probably one of my favourite songs in general in life. But hearing Van Morrison sing it is pretty wonderful.

Speaker 411:32

I wish I had you.

Speaker 411:35

In carry furgus.

Speaker 411:39

Only four nights.

Speaker 411:42

In Bally Grand

Speaker 411:45

I would swim over

Speaker 411:48

The deepest ocean

Speaker 411:52

The deepest ocean

Speaker 411:54

To be by your side.

Speaker 412:00

But the sea is white

Presenter12:05

That was Van Morrison and the Chieftains and Carrick Fergus. So let's talk then, Ed Sheeran, a bit about your boyhood friends and your own relations as Van Morrison was singing about there. You were born in 19.

Speaker 112:12

Yeah.

Presenter12:15

It seems ridiculous to say this. You were born in nineteen ninety one.

Presenter12:19

And you spent the first few years of your life in Hebden Bridge in West Yorkshire, but when you were four, you moved to Framlington in South.

Ed Sheeran12:25

Yeah.

Presenter12:25

Grammarly.

Ed Sheeran12:26

Again

Presenter12:26

Framlingham from Scotland, what do I know?

Ed Sheeran12:27

I'm guessing.

Presenter12:29

Tell me about you as a little boy, who you like.

Ed Sheeran12:32

What were you like? I was a bit of a weird kid. Bit of a weird kid. Um, I had huge blue NHS specs. Um, had a huge like Port Weinstein birthmark on my eye that's subsequently gone, and a stammer. Really, really bad stammer.

Presenter12:49

That's quite the combo, isn't it?

Ed Sheeran12:51

Yeah. Oh, and uh I lacked an eardrum so I couldn't go swimming, which helps. Nice. Helps get friends.

Presenter12:56

Close.

Presenter12:58

Tell me a bit about that then. Tell me because he you know, sitting opposite me today is this incredibly buoyant, optimistic, almost laughably successful young man. Tell me what it felt like to be the little boy in that life with those things.

Ed Sheeran13:12

Um

Ed Sheeran13:13

Do you know what, up until the age of eleven, I really didn't feel like I fit in anywhere.

Presenter13:18

Did you did you as a little boy, did you have friends?

Ed Sheeran13:22

Uh one or two. Not really. Not re I mean, yeah, kind of, but not not not really. I was always the tag along.

Presenter13:30

It was a very loving household. You had a big brother, and it was a very artsy household. Very art.

Ed Sheeran13:34

It's very artist. So, yeah, we were not really allowed to watch TV. We were encouraged to paint and play instruments and do artistic stuff. Like, we only had David Attenborough on VHS, and that was the only thing we were allowed to watch. And other than that, I didn't even know anything outside of that existed. It wasn't until getting to primary school, like, when everyone was watching The Simpsons, I was like, oh.

Presenter13:55

That you p I think lo loads of parents could listen to that and think, Oh, that's brilliant. You know, you wasn't allowed to watch T V, they didn't you know, it wasn't a com obviously it wasn't a computer upbringing, you weren't sitting there on an X box or whatever. But with the other things you've spoken about, you know, looking different, as you say, the port wine stain, the s the stammer, the big glasses, the red hair,

Presenter14:13

Not watching the tele, you know, television is a great sort of common currency among kids. You know, you come in and you say, Did you see that last night?

Speaker 114:17

Uh

Speaker 414:17

It's gonna use the

Presenter14:21

Did that almost encourage even a sense of separateness?

Ed Sheeran14:24

Uh

Ed Sheeran14:25

Yeah, I think do you know what? My mum my mum's always been a wacky dresser and she loves colours and me and my brother would have the most amazing knitted jumpers that she'd make that just be weird. And looking back at it, we definitely stood out for that. But like now, I I mean the reason I've got such colourful tattoos I think goes back to that. I love I love being different. I love doing stuff a little bit off kilter.

Presenter14:49

From the age of seven you sang in a a choir?

Ed Sheeran14:51

Church choir, uh yeah, I didn't last too long in the church choir.

Presenter14:53

What happened?

Ed Sheeran14:54

The Simpsons was on Channel 2. That's when I started watching T V. It was on at six o'clock every Friday and uh the church choir was from six till eight.

Presenter15:02

I wonder about those four-part harmonies that you must surely have learned and probably been very good at, because I imagine quite early on it was evident that you had a beautiful voice, was it?

Ed Sheeran15:10

Uh, no, actually, I couldn't I couldn't really hold a tune up until I was about sixteen. And that's that is one hundred percent true. I was on the Jon the Jonathan Ross show and told him about it and he said that's not true. And I pulled up a clip of me singing when I was fourteen, totally off key.

Presenter15:15

But

Ed Sheeran15:26

I can find it for you if you want.

Presenter15:27

Yeah, this I do want to see.

Ed Sheeran15:29

Yeah.

Presenter15:30

And the I love red hair, but people get a hard time for having red hair. Yeah. Did you get a hard time?

Ed Sheeran15:36

Yeah, but I just think kids will find anything to be mean about. It wouldn't matter if you're r redheaded or not, they'd find something, you know.

Presenter15:43

And what about the stutter? How did you'cause you clearly it's not in evidence any more.

Ed Sheeran15:47

Well, we'll get on to it with maybe the next song on the list. Tell me about that. Well, this song is MM Stan. I mean, I was going to choose another MM song, but it was probably not Radio 4 friendly.

Presenter15:47

Uh

Presenter15:48

Yeah.

Presenter15:56

We could have done about seven seconds of it could have been a little bit more.

Ed Sheeran15:57

Yeah, but I sort of did the whole speech therapy thing and going to try and get rid of the stammer. And then my uncle bought me the Marshall Mathers LP, M and M's second album, and said he thought that this guy was the next Bob Dylan, his storytelling was this, his storytelling was that. And my parents d didn't, you know, know what the content on the album was. And I must be nine when it came out. So when you're nine and someone's sort of saying rude stuff

Presenter16:23

Yeah.

Ed Sheeran16:23

You want to learn it. So I learned all the album back to back, and he raps at such a fast pace that my stammer would go when I rapped. And that, weirdly enough, was the speech therapy that cured me listening to rap music. And it wasn't just Eminem's album, it was, you know, through MM you discover like Dr. Dre and then Tupac and then Biggie Smalls, and you kind of go on from there. But just learning rap music in general stopped me from stuttering. And I got awarded an award at a stuttering gala. I don't really know what the award is for, but I went there and there were a bunch of kids and they said exactly the same thing that singing and music stopped them stammering.

Speaker 116:35

Anyway

Speaker 116:41

Yeah.

Speaker 117:00

Dear Slim, I wrote you but you still ain't calling. I left my cell, my pager, and my home phone at the bottom. I sent two letters back in autumn, you must not have got them. There probably was a problem at the post office or something. Sometimes I scribble addresses too sloppy when I jot them. But anyways, what's been up, man? How's your daughter? My girlfriend's pregnant too. I'm about to be a father. If I have a daughter, guess what? I'ma call her. I'ma name her Bonnie. I read about your uncle Ronnie too. I'm sorry. I had a friend kill himself over something, too. They want him. I know you probably hear this every day, but I'm your biggest fan. I even got the underground shit that you did with scam. I got

Presenter17:36

Stan, that was MM featuring Guido. Um Ed Sheeran, you said things sort of

Presenter17:41

began at least to fall into some sort of place when you were eleven. That presumably was meeting like-minded people, people you could get on with at school, was it?

Ed Sheeran17:50

I think so, but you know, as well, I think it was watching Eric Clapton on T V and learning how to play guitar. I think that gave me some sort of identity. Like, when I was younger, you basically played sport to be cool, or you didn't. And then going to the high school that I went to, Thomas Mills High School, it had a fantastic music department. And I remember on my first day meeting this guy, Dan, who also played piano and loved Eric Clapton. And I basically made really good mates with him and jammed all the time. And that had never really happened before, meeting someone that was sort of into the same sort of music as me.

Presenter18:23

You once said that as a kid you never won anything.

Presenter18:28

Now given that I see that.

Ed Sheeran18:28

Oh, actually, I won most likely to be famous at Year Eleven prom. Did you? That was the one thing I did win, yeah.

Presenter18:32

Time.

Presenter18:33

And that was for playing your music, right?

Ed Sheeran18:34

Yeah.

Presenter18:35

That must have been for the ginger kid who had the port wineskin and the big glasses when he was a wee, that must have been quite a big moment.

Ed Sheeran18:41

Uh

Presenter18:41

Yeah.

Ed Sheeran18:42

Well, it's not you haven't got famous yet, have you? People just think you might. But that was when I was like sixteen. That was when I was really taking it seriously. Because it by thirteen you had made your first album. I recorded it on a four track in my bedroom. Oh god, it was dreadful.

Presenter18:55

Give us a flavor.

Ed Sheeran18:57

No. No way. How many copies of it did you have burnt? Too many. And then when I was fourteen I did an E P and I printed up a thousand of them and I've still got about nine hundred and eighty of them.

Presenter18:59

How many copies of it did you

Presenter19:04

No, I didn't.

Presenter19:09

And you're keeping them under lock and key, are you?

Ed Sheeran19:11

Yeah.

Presenter19:11

You were sixteen, this is remarkable, you were sixteen when you left home to go to London to try to pursue a a music career.

Presenter19:18

What advice did your parents

Ed Sheeran19:20

Let's give it to you. Well, my mum was always very pro-education and university. And I am still pro-education and always say you have to go up to 16 and then you can make a choice, I guess. And if you need to go to university to do the job that you want to do, you should do it. But in my mind, I couldn't learn anything about doing a show in a classroom. You would learn it just from doing a gig. And I think my dad knew that. He said, like, if you want to be a musician, you just have to work hard at it.

Presenter19:47

It's one thing to say to your kid, If you want to do it, you've got to pursue it, but he must have believed that his son had some sort of emerging talent.

Ed Sheeran19:53

Some of the

Ed Sheeran19:55

I don't know. I mean, I guess so, but I think you can achieve anything if you put your mind to it. And I think that's what he knew. I was not the musician I am today then. Really wasn't. Not even a shadow of it. You couldn't have taken me into any label then and even musically got them to agree to anything. So it was. Well, you were 16. Well, yeah, but there's a 10,000 hours theory that if you put 10,000 hours into anything, you become an expert at it. And I think my dad was like, he's 16. Even if he worked for four years and gigged every day for four years and it doesn't work out at the age of 20, you can still that's most people's gap years and then they go to university. So it wasn't like I was dropping out of a Harvard law degree or something like that. I was basically going to learn my craft.

Presenter20:35

And going to London? Were they happy with for you to just head off to London, aged sixteen, all on your own?

Ed Sheeran20:40

Yeah, well I enrolled in a two-day a week college here in Bromley by Bow and the government grant that I got to go there paid for my first year of rent. I was living in Finsbury Park above a pub called the T-Birds and after that first year I basically was doing like two or three gigs a day and then I kind of formed over a year this group of friends that we all played gigs together but they also let me crash on their couches would sometimes get me dinner and stuff so after a year I was pretty self-sufficient.

Presenter20:45

But

Presenter21:13

This next artist was sort of very important in your young musical m mind. Your your father took you to to see a gig of his when you were very young. Just tell me a little bit about what we're gonna hear.

Ed Sheeran21:23

Damien Rice Volcano. So I said about Clapton making me want to play guitar. Damien Rice was what made me want to write songs. I remember getting home after seeing him and writing four or five songs just in a row like that. And it did ne never happened like that before. And they weren't great songs, but I was so inspired by him as an artist.

Presenter21:40

What was it that he was doing that so attracted you?

Ed Sheeran21:43

Do you know what? I'd grown up listening to bands and suddenly here's a guy who stands on stage for two hours and captivates an audience. He holds them in the palm of his hands with just songs that he's written on his own with a guitar. And there was something about that that really excited me. You know, that I could express myself on my own. I guess it's back to the lone thing about playing gigs. There was just something that excited me about that. Not sharing it with anyone and just having it for me.

Speaker 422:07

Don't hold yourself like that.

Speaker 422:14

You hurt your knee.

Speaker 422:20

Well I kissed your mouth and back

Speaker 422:26

That's all I need.

Speaker 422:32

Don't build your world around

Speaker 422:38

Volcanoes

Presenter22:40

Melt you down

Presenter22:43

That was Damien Rice and Volcano. It was uh twenty ten. You're around about nineteen, I think, Ed Sheer, and when you scraped together the cash, as you say, you'd spent this time sofa surfing in London, you got small gigs, you you you made money where you could being got guitar tech and stuff like that.

Speaker 122:53

Then you

Presenter22:58

You ended up in L

Presenter23:01

and in Ellie

Presenter23:03

You ended up on Jamie Foxx, the Academy Award winner musician, you ended up on his sofa sleeping there and I'm I want to know how come that happened'cause that's seems a bit unusual.

Ed Sheeran23:13

I had I had reached a point in London where

Ed Sheeran23:18

I was doing the same shows with the same faces. I'd already been round the record labels and they'd already said no, and I felt very.

Ed Sheeran23:26

Stuck. I didn't really know where I was going. And then Did you feel resilient when they said no?

Presenter23:30

Yeah.

Ed Sheeran23:32

N no, there was I mean, there was part of me that wanted to change the way I looked and the way I sung and what I sung about to try and fit in with what they wanted. And then, you know, I did a couple of gigs like that and just didn't enjoy it. What did you do?

Presenter23:43

What did you do? What did you change?

Ed Sheeran23:45

Uh I they said specifically, don't use a loot pedal and don't rap because no one wants to see a ginger white guy rapping was is the quote. I did try it out, but I just didn't enjoy myself playing live. I j I remember standing on stage and being like, Well, there's no point doing this now, like I'm I might as well just go and work in a supermarket because like mute mu music

Presenter24:05

Was there a point where you nearly totally chucked it in?

Ed Sheeran24:07

Yeah, so I'd got to this point in 2010 where I was going around in circles and I had a poet friend that lived in London that was American that ran nights in LA. And so I booked a ticket with all the CD sales that I'd had selling stuff out at my rock sack. And as soon as I arrived, there was this guy called John who ran a night called Fly Poet. And I said to him, Have you got any mates that run nights? And he says, Of course, yeah. So from there, it was like a hit and run thing. We just basically just did loads of shows. It was a really fun month. And one of the shows happened to be at Jamie Fox's club. His manager was there. His manager said, Jamie does a radio show. Went on the radio show, did my ginger white boy with a rap thing with a guitar. He was like, that's great. Come and work in my studio. And I spent the rest of the time at his house.

Speaker 124:11

So

Presenter24:52

And so that introduced you to a whole different level of exposure, presumably, did it? You met the right people.

Ed Sheeran24:56

Do you know what? It didn't necessarily lead to exposure. What it did lead to was in my mind knowing that what I was doing was right. If I can go over to LA and within three weeks have someone that influential and that powerful be like, you're doing something right. I came back to London with a sort of charged-up battery in my back, and I was like, no, I can do this. And what I realized I was doing wrong was I was playing singer-songwriter nights. And when I went to LA, I was just playing urban nights. I was playing rap nights, comedy nights, jazz night. And what I realized here is if you put five singer-songwriters on a bill, they're all going to sound the same. If you go and play a rap night and there's four rappers and there's one really scruffy white guy with a guitar singing love songs, who's going to stand out? So as soon as I got back to London, I've kind of scrapped singer-songwriter nights and then just booked. This is where I sort of got involved with the UK Grimes scene and UK rap scene. And that was me going and playing nights that was totally out of my comfort zone. You'd stand on stage and have this look where people just looked at you and they were like, what is he doing here? And that was more fun for me because you would have to win him over. You wouldn't go on stage and be like, yeah, here's a love song that I wrote. You'd be like, right, guys, you need to sing this bit and you need to sing this bit. And just, it was more exciting. And that's when the buzz started, when people actually started talking about me because I was not staying in my comfort zone.

Presenter26:23

And so then in twenty eleven, I mean, what an incredible year for you. Let's just go through it. You released your first single, Eighteen. That earns you an Ivanovello Award for Best Song Musically and Lyrically. You were signed by Asylum Records, and you released your debut album, Plus, and two more singles. How much of that year do you remember?

Presenter26:41

'Cause that's quite the whirlwind.

Ed Sheeran26:42

Uh that year quite a lot. The years after that not not that much. Um because because I don't know, I just got caught as I said, I got caught caught up in it. Sort of like twenty thirteen to twenty sixteen was a bit of a blur.

Presenter26:58

And so given, of course, famously, A Team is is about this gradual destruction of this once lovely young woman through a very serious drug habit, what what is your own relationship?

Presenter27:10

With drugs been given that in the music business, you know, it's as rife as it is in any other business these days.

Ed Sheeran27:15

Um, I think that all twenty somethings um go through a certain experimental period and uh I don't I don't really feel comfortable talking about it'cause I realize I have kid fans um and I don't really want to glamorise anything. I basically had a much like any twenty something you just have a period where you uh slip in and slip out and I'm out the other side.

Presenter27:39

It's really interesting. When I hear you talk about also about school as well, I I'm conscious now that you are very conscious that here you what have you got, you're at seventeen million followers on Twitter, I think it is.

Ed Sheeran27:50

Yeah.

Presenter27:52

You s you seem like a man who is actually conscious these days of the fact that that what you say and what you talk about and how you portray your own life is will be an influence. That that's a that's a responsibility for a for a young guy.

Ed Sheeran28:03

Yeah. All that I try and maintain is that always be yourself. And some sometimes I do slip up in interviews, but that I'm not there are no air airs or graces. I'm just trying to be myself. And what I will always say to kids is as long as you're yourself, like no one can pick any faults with you. You're allowed to make mistakes.

Presenter28:20

I'm asking too many questions. We've got to fit in the music edge here, and it's time for your fifth. Do you know what it is?

Ed Sheeran28:25

Nisloppy, yeah, this is a band that I was obsessed with. I was always front row at the gigs. And after a while, they just started noticing me because I'd always turn up at the venue at like 2 p.m. and wait in line so I could be front row. And they invited me to be their guitar tech on tour. And I basically, everything from my live set, you know, the way I control my voice, the way I control the audience, the way I play the guitar, even the way I use beatbox and stuff, this comes from this band. You're going to hear it. I'm really, really, really heavily influenced. And yeah, they kind of gave me the opportunity to go on tour for the first time and see what a tour was like. I opened up for them in Norwich, which was cool as well. But I basically learned every aspect of my life set from them. And this is Flooded Quarry by Nisloppy.

Presenter28:26

Yeah, this

Presenter28:29

Death

Speaker 429:12

Well I followed my word and I followed my heart to you

Speaker 429:18

And I woke these Welsh mountains going down and I'm feeling it through, yeah And you saw me coming with this moment strapped to me With these words and feelings that could even just blow you apart, yeah And six months later, we're just crying out With these deep walls in our hearts To build up without now And I'm coming down to that Italian restaurant

Presenter29:50

That was Nisloppi and Flooded Quarry. You were beautifully singing along to that edge hearing. In 2012, you played live at the Diamond Jubilee concert and

Speaker 129:53

Sure.

Presenter29:58

I saw a shot from behind you, sort of looking down the mall, and not just all the Union flags, but the. Tens of thousands of of people that went all the way down the Mile.

Presenter30:08

You're all on your own, of course, yeah. This big stage. Tell me tell me what that was like, to stand alone on that stage on that day.

Ed Sheeran30:10

Yeah, speaking.

Ed Sheeran30:15

The weirdest thing for me is it was exactly 10 years to the day that I'd picked up a guitar because I had watched Clapton play the Golden Jubilee. Of course, yes. And I came back to play the Diamond Jubilee 10 years later. That was the weirdest thing for me, kind of standing there being like, well, this is a bit bit of a turn of events, isn't it? But, you know, it was amazing. That day was definitely a blur. And, you know, bringing my parents there, meeting the Queen, having a drink in Buckingham Palace afterwards, it was all pretty surreal.

Presenter30:20

And what's

Presenter30:22

And I think that's a good thing.

Presenter30:40

And having a critical r reception to your first album Plus people have a view then. You know, you're signed, this guy wants us to buy his tickets. This is what we think of him. Was the critical response something that you were braced for and ready for? Do you did you care about

Ed Sheeran30:56

Did you not at all? I did, yeah,'cause all the reviews came in before the album was on sale, and all of them were like one or two stars saying this is absolute driss. Driss? Dross. Dross. Driss is good, though. Driss is good. Could we change it to driss? I was gonna say drippy, but dross and driss. But yeah, they kinda crushed me because I was like, I've wanted to be a successful musician for my whole career, and all of the papers that I read reviews on have slated it. So I got really down for the week, and then the album came out and did 102,000 week one.

Presenter31:01

Hmm.

Presenter31:11

Okay.

Presenter31:26

Yeah.

Ed Sheeran31:26

And a

Presenter31:26

And what would be a typical amount, just to give people context?

Ed Sheeran31:28

Well, w my point is my main goal for my career ever was to do a hundred thousand albums and play Shepherd's Bush. And the week the album came out, it sold one hundred thousand and I played Shepherd's Bush. So I was there looking at these bad reviews and then I just achieved my dream within a week and thinking that it's I I shouldn't actually focus on what other people think of me.

Presenter31:32

I don't know what

Presenter31:48

And also surely you were part of that new wave of artists who built a fan base in a very different way. You did not rely upon a good review. You were speaking directly to your fans and to your fan base.

Ed Sheeran31:59

Where the power comes from though, because like coming to radio with a song like the 18, Radio 1 and all the other radio stations, to be fair, but they were like, This is a bit too dodgy lyrics, you know, it's go mad for a couple grams and stuff like that. So they were kind of anti-it. So what I did was I booked out the Barfly little venue on a Saturday in a school holiday, and I said, I'm doing a free gig today.

Presenter32:00

Yeah.

Presenter32:21

So you tweeted that, did you?

Ed Sheeran32:22

Yeah, I'm doing a free gig today and I invited the playlister at Radio One and someone that worked for Zane Lowe and they saw a thousand.

Presenter32:30

And these are the people who decide whether or not you need to.

Ed Sheeran32:32

Yeah, music makes it all. And radio is still the most important platform to break a new artist. So I had a thousand kids turn up and did four gigs that day and they basically saw their whole demographic who listens to their radio station queuing up to get into one show. So that was how I got on radio to begin with.

Presenter32:48

You have uncommon in everything that you're you're talking about, you know, you have an uncommon maturity for somebody of your age. And interested in business. You seem you've got a business head.

Ed Sheeran32:57

Yeah, well, I think I love creating. I love creating. And there is no business mind in my mind when I'm making an album. And I make the album I want to make. But when it's finished and it's all handed in, it's all masters and it's in its packaging, why not want to make that the biggest album in the world? Why not put your business head on and be like, right, let's make sure everyone hears this, because I'm so proud of it.

Presenter33:17

Your compositions are, you know, they're emotive, they're often quite melancholic, certainly your love songs. When did you first when did you first have your heart broken?

Presenter33:27

Oh, I dunno. Yes, you do.

Ed Sheeran33:30

No, no, be no, because like there there's a difference between like heartbreak and like teenage heartbreak.

Presenter33:36

No, I'm talking about heartbreak. I'm talking about the real deal.

Ed Sheeran33:37

Yeah.

Ed Sheeran33:41

Twenty, yeah.

Presenter33:42

And how did you deal with that? You wrote your way house footprint.

Ed Sheeran33:44

Yeah, I wrote my way out of it and I had um half of the the first album and half the second album basically.

Ed Sheeran33:52

Yeah.

Presenter33:53

Tell me about your next piece of music, man. We're gonna hear

Ed Sheeran33:54

They won't go when I go, Stevie Wonder. I really wanted to play a Stevie Wonder song and I was considering what to play. And I was thinking people have probably done Master Blast, they've probably done Superstition, like they've probably done Mr. Know It All or even Happy Birthday. And I just thought this one is quite topical because George Michael covered it very beautifully. And it's just one of those songs where you just hear Stevie Wonder really, really let rip on the vocals. And he's... Same as Nisloppi, he's someone who I've learnt a lot from vocally. And this is one song that I can't sing like this yet, but this is what I would really like to be like.

Speaker 434:34

People sinning just for fun, they will never see the sun, for they can never show their faces.

Speaker 434:45

There's no room for

Speaker 434:52

Who'll say more than he'll give?

Speaker 434:57

Here you can

Speaker 435:00

You can

Speaker 435:04

I ain't gonna give

Speaker 435:07

Uh

Presenter35:12

They won't go when I go. Stevie Wonder. Yeah, I was gonna say, Ed Sheeran, you you met Stevie Wonder, but more than that more than that. He's is he a friend? Could you call Stevie Wonder a friend now?

Ed Sheeran35:20

Oh, I don't know if I'm that privileged yet. Um I went to go and play with him at his Songs in the Key of Life tour. We did Pastor Paradise and Superstition together. And then he presented me my Song of the Year Grammy as well. But when I was at the gig playing with him, he said, You're gonna win Song of the Year for thinking out loud next year and then he was the one that presented it to me. It was a really weird full circle thing.

Presenter35:39

Do you have to think of, given how many of these you know, the list of goals, the things I'd like to do, do you have to imagine new peaks? Because God knows you've you've knocked off a lot of them so far.

Ed Sheeran35:50

Yeah, yeah, no, certainly. Do you have to think? I've got to have new things to aim for. I definitely do think that, but then there's also a part of me that knows that I've achieved more than I ever thought I would. So if it does end tomorrow, it's a really good story to tell the grandkids. So, like, the last peak on the last album was to play Wembley once, and we ended up doing it three times. The peak on the album before was doing Madison Square Garden once, and we did it three times. So, it was and the peak before that was to do Shepherd's Bush and sell 100,000.

Presenter35:51

Do you have to think

Presenter36:16

And your dad had said to you that, you know, to play in Madison Square Garden was really the the pinnacle of a a musician's career.

Ed Sheeran36:22

Yeah.

Presenter36:23

I'm presuming your parents came along to see at least one of them.

Ed Sheeran36:25

Yeah, it came to all three, yeah.

Presenter36:26

What was the conversation with your dad after you'd played Madison Square Garden?

Ed Sheeran36:30

Do you know what?'Cause I I kind of feel like we both thought that that would be further on end of career sort of thing. So I think we were both there being like, well, this is a bit weird'cause it's the first album. There was certainly a well done, but also like, where's this gonna go from here? Can this go on further?

Presenter36:45

Um in december twenty fifteen, you posted a message on social media. You said you were taking a break to, in your words, not have to be anywhere or do anything to travel the world and see everything I've missed. So give us a flavor of how you spent your time.

Ed Sheeran36:58

I spent a month in Japan. Going to see Japan as a whole was pretty beautiful. I went to Ghana, which I cannot recommend more. The culture, the people, the music, the food. I made some music out there. And every time we'd finish a song, they'd throw a party for the song being finished, and then we'd just dance to the song till early in the morning and then go to sleep and then wake up and then make a new song. It was really, really fun. Iceland, which was incredible as well. And then I did sort of the Australia-New Zealand backpacker thing.

Presenter37:28

And your single Thinking Out Loud, you got was it two Grammys for that?

Ed Sheeran37:32

Yeah, two Grammys.

Presenter37:33

I was very interested to see the video for that. It's very, very beautiful video with you dancing, dancing.

Ed Sheeran37:37

Yeah.

Presenter37:39

Well, and dancing in a way that clearly had been practised and choreographed with a brilliant professional dancer.

Presenter37:45

It's very grown up. It's very sexy. You look like a heart throb in it. Thank you very much.

Presenter37:51

I think that's interesting for somebody who's kind of refused to to portray themselves and maybe didn't feel comfortable with doing that music industry heartthrop thing before. Do you think it denotes a new kind of confidence for you?

Ed Sheeran38:02

For me, I know a music video is one of the most powerful things to get a song out there. And a music video that can go viral is like gold dust. If you find something that people will look at and go, oh my god, and share it like a million times. And in my head, I was like, what can I do that will make people go, didn't expect him to do that? And anyone looking at me before in a sort of baggy hoodie would be like, that's the last thing I expect him to do. So I knew that by doing a video like that, which took like five weeks of intense training, they really put me through my paces there. But I knew that when it came out, it would make the song as big as it did get because it was a talking point. It made people share it.

Presenter38:22

I don't know.

Presenter38:41

Just to rewind a little bit, you were talking about taking the time out. A sort of late gap here, if you like. What did you did you learn stuff about yourself? Did you come through that period of being away from all the attention that changed?

Ed Sheeran38:52

I definitely found appreciation for

Ed Sheeran38:57

My job and my life. I'd got to a point where it was turning into a job. Like I said before, that music, music is a privilege. I'm very, very lucky to be in the situation that I'm in. And I was getting to a point where I was kind of going through the motions with it and taking time off and not really having the chance to be on stage and watching everyone else be on stage. It really makes you want to really get back at it. Have having a year off made me really hungry for it again and really want to do it.

Presenter39:25

Let's have some more music at Shirin. Uh we're going to listen to Indian Sunset. Yes, tell me about this.

Ed Sheeran39:28

Indian Sunset. Yes. Tell me about it. This is on Madman Across the Water and um I'm a big Elton John fan. I think he's phenomenal. And this was in a time where he was using an orchestra for for everything and it's like a three part rock opera and it's just phenomenal.

Speaker 439:47

Those who will each to follow me

Speaker 439:55

I welcome with my hands

Speaker 440:02

I heard from passing renegades

Speaker 440:09

Geronimo was dead.

Speaker 440:13

He's been laying down his weapon.

Speaker 440:20

When they filled him full of a lamp

Presenter40:26

That was Elton John and Indian Sunset. Sheeran, in the world right now there's only one artist ahead of you in terms of sales, that is Adele. How do you feel about that?

Ed Sheeran40:37

Feel pretty good about it, yeah.

Ed Sheeran40:39

I I don't think anyone's gonna beat her. But if you if you aim to get a Dele level and you get halfway there, it's still twenty million albums, which is pretty good.

Presenter40:51

Where do you think the drive comes from?

Ed Sheeran40:54

Uh I think it dates back to my dad calling me lazy for not doing my homework'cause I never did m my homework. And I think the drive is there's a little bit of just wanting to prove him wrong still and work harder than everyone else.

Presenter41:09

Do you think much about the Wee Boy without many friends and the Port Weinstein and the specs? No.

Ed Sheeran41:13

No, no,'cause I think anyone's life has different sections and um yeah, I just it that was a section that, you know, has made me who I am today, but I don't really dwell on anything with the past. I'd really like to look towards the future.

Presenter41:27

Tell me if I've got this right. Four Brits, two Grammys, two Ivanovello Awards, seventeen million followers on Twitter. That's a lot of power. What do you want to do? Because people are listening. Listening.

Ed Sheeran41:38

Do you know what makes me buzz the most when a 10 or 11-year-old boy or girl comes up to me and says, You made me pick up guitar, I want to write songs? There's a brilliant artist called Sean Mendez who's having a lot of success. And he came up to me and said, I picked up guitar because I listened to your music, and he's now internationally known. Stuff like that. Because I look back at the days where I was touring with Nisloppi as a guitar tech or met Damien Rice, and that's what made me want to play the guitar and gig. And knowing that now, even if there's one person like Sean, you know, any other kid that wants to pick up the guitar that has listened to my music and wanted to find the same sort of comfort and solace in writing songs and performing, and then found, you know, some sort of success from it, it's cool. What advice do you give them? Write as many songs as possible because your songs continue to get better the more you write. You gig as much as possible because you continue to get better. And if you don't enjoy it anymore, change what you're doing. You know, always be yourself. Don't ever pander to anyone else because you don't need to change your musical sound to fit in. The world can fit around you.

Presenter42:44

It's interesting to me. I this is what I've read. I'll I'll check with you if it's right, but but your girlfriend is somebody that you've known since school days.

Ed Sheeran42:49

Yeah.

Presenter42:51

That would seem important, but that it's somebody who who knew you before.

Ed Sheeran42:55

Yes. Yeah, well she's from the same group of friends that I was talking about before.

Presenter42:55

Yeah.

Ed Sheeran43:00

Yeah.

Presenter43:00

Yeah.

Presenter43:03

What do you I I presume you can't walk down the street any more, can you?

Ed Sheeran43:07

Pensworker.

Presenter43:08

Where can you?

Ed Sheeran43:09

Not many places. I can go to my hometown. Everyone knows me there. I can go to the pub there and be pretty anonymous. I can go to the supermark. Well, supermarket can be quite difficult sometimes, but yeah, go and have breakfast in the cafe. Like it's it's fine.

Presenter43:24

What do you miss about the old life, the non-fame life?

Ed Sheeran43:27

Um, I don't know if I do. I'm lit, you know, I we were talking earlier about pitfalls of fame and kind of like falling into things, but I'm honestly in like such a wonderful place right now, and there's nothing that I would take away from it at all. I'm loving it. I'm now at an age where I get taken seriously musically, which has always been sort of like a burden on my shoulder that no one's ever really taken it seriously. But now, like, even if you don't like it, you still have to kind of respect that other people do. You know, when I first said I wanted to play Wembley Stadium, everyone was like, You're never gonna do that. And now it's got to a point because I did that, no one ever laughs at my dreams anymore.

Presenter44:10

I'm guessing you've got loads of money. Um what do you

Presenter44:14

What do you spend it on?

Ed Sheeran44:16

Uh I don't know. I mean art. My dad's obviously like massively into art so we we have fun going to galleries and stuff and uh I don't know. I bought my parents a kitchen. Kitchens are so expensive mate. Why are kitchens that expensive? Uh but yeah, I try and like do good things with it. Like now and then do something silly but like I I everything everything has to have a purpose.

Presenter44:42

And does your dad advise you on what to collect in terms of arts? Does he say stay away from this? I'm taking a significant exhibition.

Ed Sheeran44:46

No, no,'cause he's always said like art is meant to be enjoyed. You don't buy art for investments. Like I bought I bought this uh guy called Harlan Miller who puts r really offensive slogans on penguin books, yeah. And I've got pretty much the most offensive word you c you you can have.

Presenter44:58

On penguin books.

Presenter45:04

I hear ya.

Ed Sheeran45:05

Hear you. Huge in my house. And it's, you know, something that I have to cover up with a bit of paperwork. I was going to say that's coming down when the kids come along, just so as you know. Yeah, no, I know. But that's something that I really buzz off. I really like.

Presenter45:09

I was gonna say

Ed Sheeran45:16

And that's not necessarily my dad's taste, but my dad said: as long as you enjoy art, you never lose.

Presenter45:21

As you know, Ed Sheeran, cruelly I cast you away to a desert island all on your own. What do you think you'll enjoy about that?

Ed Sheeran45:30

You know, getting back to survival, I guess. I I'm now in a very fortunate position where I am financially comfortable and in my career I'm comfortable. But it would take me back to a time where I was sort of like eighteen, nineteen, fending for myself and, you know, br bringing back that survival instinct, which is always fun.

Presenter45:48

Tell me about your final piece of music then. What are we going to hear? Oh, no, I should say this is somebody that's signed to your label. You've got a label now.

Ed Sheeran45:55

Yeah, this guy is a guy called Foy Vance, and I've been obsessed with him for over 10 years now. I remember going to all his gigs and thinking he's going to be massive soon. And then suddenly, my career started taking off. I remember playing Brixton Academy and in the dressing room listening to Foy, and I was like, why have I surpassed him? I think he's much more talented than me. So I took him on tour for four years. And this is a song about his father. It's called Two Shades of Hope. And it's the only song in the last 10 years to make me cry.

Speaker 446:26

Well some people think they're sin

Speaker 446:33

Cause the cancer that's eating it

Speaker 446:38

Do then

Speaker 446:39

And the only way.

Speaker 446:46

Is by the healing of somebody's hands on their skin

Speaker 446:59

But when the council does

Presenter47:03

That was Foy Vance and Two Shades of Hope. Um Ed, I'm going to give you I give all uh Castaways the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare, and they get to take one other book along with those two. What is your book gonna be?

Ed Sheeran47:13

His Dark Materials by Philip Paulman. I personally think that's the greatest love story ever told. I don't care what anyone says, I absolutely love it.

Presenter47:20

Absolutely love it.

Presenter47:21

A luxury item too. Now this is something that can't be too useful.

Ed Sheeran47:24

See, I I chose this because it legitimately when I say this to any any one of my friends about about coming on this and what my luxury item would be, they'd be like, Of course it's that. But this it it's very trivial, but it's a bottle of ketchup.

Ed Sheeran47:39

And that is 100%. That is 100% the only thing that I would need to survive.

Presenter47:39

I wasn't expecting that.

Ed Sheeran47:45

I'm going to be kind to you. I'm going to give you a lifetime supply. Ketchup. Yeah. A bottle's not going to go very far. I often get to like.

Presenter47:48

Yeah.

Presenter47:50

Yeah.

Ed Sheeran47:52

You know, you get like fish and chips somewhere and they don't have ketchup. I don't know what to do. What'd you do with that?

Presenter47:58

Yes. Finally, which one of these eight tracks, if you had to save just one from the waves, which one would it be?

Ed Sheeran48:05

Do you know what? I'd probably flooded quarry Nazloppy. That would always make me feel happy and make me feel warm. Yeah.

Presenter48:12

Okay, it's yours. Ed Sheeran, I will see you in 20 years and thank you very much for letting us hear your Desert Island disc.

Ed Sheeran48:17

Okay.

Presenter49:03

You've been listening to a download from the BBC. You'll find more information on the Radio 4 website: bbc.co.uk slash Radio 4.

Speaker 449:32

This is the BBC.