Ed Sheeran

÷ [Divide]

Ich bin eigentlich kein Fan von Ed Sheeran, außer "The A-Team" und "Photograph (Felix Jaehn Remix)" hatte ich vor diesem Album kaum Lieder von ihm, die mir wirklich gefallen haben. Aber es hat sich für mich definitiv gelohnt, mal das gesamte Album durchzuhören.

Eraser: 5,5*
Castle on the Hill: 4,5*
Dive: 3*
Shape of You: 5,5*
Perfect: 4*
Galway Girl: 6*
Happier: 3*
Hearts Don't Break Around Here: 3,5*
New Man: 4*
What Do I Know?: 5*
How Would You Feel (Paean): 3,5*
Supermarket Flowers: 4*
Barcelona: 4,5*
Bibia Be Ye Ye: 4*
Nancy Mulligan: 5*
Save Myself: 4*

4,31 = 4*

Vor allem die für Sheeran eher ungewöhnlichen Songs haben mir sehr gefallen. Zweimal Folk, einmal Rap und einmal Dance. Das Standardmaterial ist eher nicht mein Geschmack.

Zooooo slecht gewoon.

Super

Absolutely love some of the tracks on this album. The singles 'Shape of you' and 'Castle on the hill' are already massive hits and clearly a few of the highlights on this album. Other highlights for me included the opening song 'Eraser' and the highly emotional 'Supermarket Flowers' which had me crying almost from the instant it started. Overall a great album from Ed.

It's also amazing that all 16 songs from the deluxe edition all landed in the Top 40 here in Australia. Who else has had that many songs debut in the chart at one time?

▒ Prima CD en vinylalbum uit eind februari / begin maart 2017 van de 26 jarige Britse zanger en songschrijver: "Edward Christopher Sheeran" !!! Gemiddeld ruim 4 sterren ☺!!!

Tracklijst en waardering:

LP 1:

01: Eraser - 4
02: Castle On The Hill - 6
03: Dive - 4
04: Shape Of You - 5
05: Perfect - 5
06: Galway Girl - 5
07: Happier - 4
08: Hearts Don't Break Around Here - 4

LP 2:

01: New Man - 4
02: What Do I Know? - 4
03: How Would You Feel (Paean) - 5
04: Supermarket Flowers - 5
05: Barcelona - 4
06: Bibia Be Ye Ye - 4
07: Nancy Mulligan - 4
08: Save Myself - 3

Kom gemiddeld ook iets boven de 4 uit. Goed album

There's no doubting that Ed sure knows how to win people over with simple pop compositions. I have no issue with some of these traits because many of these songs have nice transitions and structures to them which can make listening to the whole album from start to finish not such a challenge. I would at least say this for the first half of the record, after which it goes south in quality relatively quickly. The first three tracks are rather nice but I don't care much for the rest, of course in varying degrees. The poor little me image becomes increasingly difficult to digest with this record, which not only makes most of the songs sound less genuine but also gives rise to some super cringeworthy moments. 2.5

super

Grundsätzlich nicht schlecht, natürlich mit Höhen und Tiefen. Versteh den Hype um Ed nicht so recht - er liefert gut und das was man von ihm erwarten kann - nicht mehr und nicht weniger. PS: unbeding Deluxe-CD kaufen - ist bei Media Markt sogar günstiger als die normale CD, weiss der Kuckuck wieso.

ALLE 16 Tracks als Singles in den Charts (AT)? Wer kauft denn die einzelnen Songs, wenn es zeitgleich das gesamte Album gibt (welches natürlich auf #1 einsteigt)??

Genial!

Ein maßlos überschätztes Album eines ebensolchen Künstlers. Er ist der erste überhaupt, der ALLE Titel, also das gesamte Album, gleichzeitig in der Hitparade hält. Nur einer von vielen Rekorden, während seines momentanen Hypes um ihn. Für mich stechen 2 Songs raus: Einerseits "Dive", weil es wirklich der gelungenste ist und zweitens "Galway Girl" weil er eindeutig der schlechteste ist.
3,15*

Solide vier Punkte für ein solides Werk.

Solides Album, bestimmt besser, wenn ich ein Balladenfan wäre.

Mir gefällt das neue Album.

Insgesamt ein gutes Album, ich habe es mir auch gekauft. Generell ist Sheeran aber ein überschätzter Künstler, auch wenn er dank Spotify-Streaming im Moment die britischen Charts beherrscht. Gute Hintergrundmusik, finde ich!

If you had asked me during 2015-2016 what my thoughts were on Ed Sheeran, you would have gotten a negative response from me, and that probably would have been unfair. After all, I would say that before that point, I enjoyed much more of his music than I hadn’t, but one song sent his likability stocks plummeting down for me – “Thinking Out Loud”. It was one of my most hated songs of 2014, not only because of his terminally dull it is, but also because of how people seemed to be buying into it.

With the hit it became, it is always the song that I think of first whenever Sheeran’s name is brought up, and that’s why I had a sort-of allergic reaction to him.

And while that was clearly his worst song before the release of this album, the following singles weren’t particularly inspiring. “Bloodstream”, “Photograph” and “Lay It All On Me” were also incredibly uninteresting too.

So when a Facebook video of Ed Sheeran popped up in my feed of him holding up a sign saying “New Music Coming Friday!!”, I can’t say I was all that enthused.

This made it all the more surprising when the first two singles filled me with a fair bit of promise.

“Shape Of You” tackles a lyrical theme that I thought I would never hear from Sheeran – going to the bar, picking up a chick and having sex with her. Yes, this is the Ed Sheeran that exists now. What made this a surprise though is that it was a completely different sound to what I was expecting as well, so I thought maybe Ed was moving in a new direction, even if it totally sounded like a Sia song.

And as a side note, with the international juggernaut that “Shape Of You” has become, even with all its omnipresence, it still hasn’t tired on me, which it really should have by now ;)

“Castle On The Hill”, while a bit more like his typical style, kind-of worked for me as well. The lyrics have a vividly nostalgic element to it, and the constant strumming going on in the background was different to the simple acoustic guitar chords that I had come to expect from Sheeran, giving me hope that I wouldn’t be subjected to another tedious ballad that commercial radio would be sure to spam.

Unfortunately though, any promise I thought was there just never existed. Put simply, I did not like this album.

We get a different variety of sounds. We get an earful of Ed Sheeran’s rap side straight up with “Eraser”. It’s not a side I’m particularly fond of, but at the very least it’s a change-up for a musician that can get very boring very quickly.

Of course there is still a fair share of boring ballads here – “Perfect”, “Hearts Don’t Break Around Here”, “How Would You Feel (Paean)” (the worst of the bunch) and “Save Myself”. There isn’t a memorable second between these four songs.

“Galway Girl” expresses his Celtic roots, which I’m perfectly fine with, and it shows his attempts at variation, but it isn’t my thing at all, and the singing/mumbling in the background towards the close of the song just sounds crap. We also get another taste of this sound later in the album through “Nancy Mulligan”, and this track is probably even worse, and I have no desire to listen to it again.

And it is still so telling that even when he tries with these different sounds, they still sounds so predictable, as he finds a way to fit them in to this simple pop formula somehow. As a result, there are no surprises whatsoever.

And I still haven’t even mentioned the worst track on the album yet. “New Man” is still unfathomably awful, and pretty much undoes years of having built up this “nice guy” persona in three minutes. It’s hard not to see him as full of shit now after having heard this song.

If I had to mention a positive, which are still here despite the overwhelming negatives, “Supermarket Flowers” is a really nice moment actually, and is quite sincere and tender.

Also, “Barcelona” was a fairly enjoyable moment too, and surprisingly only made it in as an extra cut in the Deluxe Edition of the album. It doesn’t hurt that Barcelona is one of my favourite European cities as well ;) “Bibia Be Ye Ye” is slightly catchy as well, but any joy I might get from it is snuffed out just because of how tacky it sounds.

I like to follow music criticism, and Pitchfork’s review of the album was particularly of interest to me. I didn’t agree with the review in its entirety, but I agreed with the general sentiment – He’s the kind of guy that appears humble and down-to-earth, which means that any criticism, as fair as it may be, that is levelled at him can simply be rebuffed just because of how nice he is, and how he can use this position to create a bunch of humble-brags so that he can appear morally right in every situation, when that really isn’t the case.

I mean, he’s the sort-of guy that tries to appear so nice, but then in an interview makes a humble-brag about having slept with multiple members of Taylor Swift’s posse (look it up). Good on him I suppose, but this just doesn’t mesh well with the vibe he generally tries to give off, and makes his personality incredibly grating.

Fortunately enough for him, Ed has stated that he doesn’t care about critical opinions on his music, and I believe him – after all, this album has been unavoidable and will undoubtedly be the biggest album of 2017 worldwide. The amount of streams and sales this is racking up is staggering, and just looking at the charts, especially the UK Charts, I’m almost certain how well every single track on this album is doing is unprecedented (ahem, http://www.officialcharts.com/charts/singles-chart/20170310/7501/).

But then again, this kind of indifference towards critical opinion and ways to improve his music will just mean that he will continue churning out the same crap.

At the very least, I liked the artwork a little.

All in all, I’m happy to have that album in my rear-vision mirror now, and maybe I’ll be able to enjoy Ed’s next album more. I won’t be holding my breath though.

FAV TRACKS: CASTLE ON THE HILL, SHAPE OF YOU, SUPERMARKET FLOWERS, BARCELONA

LEAST FAV TRACK: NEW MAN

4/10

Eraser *** **
Castle On The Hill *** **
Dive *** **
Shape Of You *** ***
Perfect *** **
Galway Girl *** ***
Happier *** **
New Man *** **
Hearts Don't Break Around Here *** *
What Do I Know? *** *
How Would You Feel (Paean) *** *
Supermarket Flowers *** **
Barcelona *** **
Bibia Be Ye Ye *** **
Nancy Mulligan *** ***
Save Myself *** **

5.0 - 5*

Zeit, mich auch endlich über das neue und dritte Album von Ed Sheeran zu äussern, welches immerhin eines der Alben war, die ich dieses Jahr am meisten erwartet habe. Während ich bei den ersten paar Durchgängen noch recht enttäuscht war, entpuppten sich viele Songs als Grower, und nach ca. 30 Durchgängen muss ich nun festhalten, dass "÷" mein bisher liebstes Album des Rotschopfs ist.

Besonders ins Auge stechen die beiden irisch-folkig angehauchten Songs "Galway Girl" und "Nancy Mulligan". Vor allem "Nancy", welches leider nur auf der Deluxe-Edition landete, mag ich sehr und ist mein absolutes Highlight von "÷". Auch stark sind die Balladen wie "Happier", "Dive" und "Perfect". Das auch der Chartssmash "Shape Of You" eines der Highlights werden würde war zu erwarten, zudem beinhaltet das Album noch weitere typische Ed-Tracks wie der Opener "Eraser", auf welchem Ed mal wieder rappt, oder die akustischeren "Supermarket Flowers" und "Save Myself". Einzig drei Songs im Mittelteil - "Hearts Don't Break...", "What Do I Know?" und "How Would You Feel" - könnte man als solide Füller bezeichnen. Der Rest ist sehr gut gemachter Mainstream-Sound. Man möge ihm nun den Vorwurf bringen, dass alles aber wohl etwas zu kalkuliert für den Erfolg sein könnte, aber darüber schaue ich nun mal hinweg und geniesse die gute Musik...

Klare Highlights: "Nancy Mulligan", "Galway Girl", "Shape Of You"
...sein bisher bester Track ist und bleibt jedoch das unangefochtene "I See Fire".

Das erste Ed Sheeran-Album, das ich richtig gut finde.
Er wechselt sehr gut zwischen Ballade, folkigen Gute Laune Songs und Songs mit sprechenden Strophen.

Anspieltipps:
Shape Of You
Galway Girl
Barcelona
Bibia Be Ye Ye
Nancy Mulligan

Zwaar overgewaardeerd album. Het is dan wel zo dat niet alle nummers zo standaard en commercieel zijn als "Shape Of You", maar saai zijn ze zeker. Een zeer magere drie sterren.

very bad

Nun ist die Katze aus dem Sack: Ed Sheeran kommt 2018 wieder in die Schweiz! Am 3.8.18 im Letzigrund Stadion Zürich.

Ergänzung: Das Konzert vom 3.8.18 ist bereits ausverkauft! Ein Zusatzkonzert ist angesagt am 4.8.18 - ebenfalls im Letzigrund Zürich.

Super mooi Album. X blijft favoriet, maar deze is wederom mooi. Op een nummer na. dat voor mij niet had gehoeven. 6 sterren absoluut.

Tolles Album super Künstler

Ist eine recht gute Abwechslungsreiche CD.

.

Zeggen dat dit album een beetje populair is zou een understatement zijn. En het succes is eigenlijk niet zo heel moeilijk te geloven want Sheeran pakt toch uit met grotendeels fijne popmuziek.

Ganz ok aber nichts was ich mir oft anhören würde.

This is a massively disappointing album. x and + were some of the best pop albums of the decade for me and this is just love songs with no energy for the radio. This was just a massive let down especially since I waited 3 years for it.

Best tracks
1 Galway Girl
2 Shape of You
3 Supermarket Flowers

Worst tracks
1 How Would You Feel (Paean)
2 Save Myself
3 Hearts Don't Break Around Here

ein bisserl sehr enttäuschend, das Ganze......

Ich bin mal streng und vergebe für den Durchschnitt von 3,375 bei 16 Songs eine drei.

Verstehe eh nicht das Ed Sheeran so Mega Erfolgreich ist.

Durchschnitt, leider kein einziger Highlight

Oh doch, die drei besten Songs, darunter der instant classic wedding song "Perfect", bringen das Album auf einen knappen 5. Stern.

Einfach nur Hammer🤪😘👍

This would have to be my favourite Ed Sheeran album out of the other two. Yes there is a few ballads but also hip hop too asides pop music. I enjoy the singles mostly "Shape Of You" and others including "Castle On The Hill", "Galway Girl" even "Perfect" is an outstanding track. I'm getting into his stuff rn. Didnt like his old stuff from + and I didnt think much of the album and same with ×, but ÷ had done something good.

BEST SONGS ON THE ALBUM: (Apart from Shape Of You, Castle On The Hill, Galway Girl and Perfect)
Eraser, Dive, New Man and How Do You Feel (Paean)
LEAST SONGS ON THE ALBUM: None... so far

laaaaangweilig !

Finde ich gut!

Ich bewerte nicht die Deluxe-Version, da ich von den darauf enthaltenden Bonus-Tracks bis dato nur einen kenne.
Die besten Songs hat er relativ hinten versteckt. 'What Do I Know?' und 'How Would You Feel', die sind wirklich in Ordnung. Auch 'Hearts Don't Break Around Here', 'Perfect' und 'Happier' sind ok, mehr aber auch nicht. Und der Rest? ... einfach nur langweilig oder schrottig. Er ist vielleicht ein netter Kerl, aber musikalisch total überbewertet. Songs wie 'Shape Of You' oder 'New Man' sind einfach nur Mist. Man merkt dass sie geschrieben wurden, um in den Charts zu funktionieren und um damit Knete zu machen. Komme in meiner Bewertung auf ganz, ganz knappe 3*.

Bester Sänger, bestes Album

I think it's a solid effort but probably my least favourite of his three big albums. He shines most on ballads like Perfect or Supermarket Flowers, and I really like Castle On The Hill, despite it's constant overplay. I suppose saturation has brought this down as a whole for me. Both Shape of You and Galway Girl are songs I'd be happy to never hear again. Amazing how massive this has become, although I suppose he has picked up on what works commercially for him and has run with it here. 4.3/6.