Review Summary: Tell me when it kicks in.
The rise of Ed Sheeran in the pop music landscape makes for an interesting case study. It's not often that an artist manages to hit that sweet halfway point between unbridled charm and quaint innocence, and while it would be nice to believe that Sheeran hits that sweet spot naturally, truthfully it's more artificial than we might want to think. But for how contrived his image might be, his monstrous success has been undeniable: even his debut record
+ was one of the best-selling records of 2011, thanks to the tremendous success of singles such as "The A Team" and "Lego House". Indeed,
+ is seen by many as Ed's best album due to its more organic feel and its playing more to the singer-songwriter's strengths. And while it seems foolish to argue Sheeran's most recent effort,
÷, as superior to
+, it's interesting that
+ is commonly viewed as a step above
x. For all of its organic qualities,
+ has the least stylistic variety of any record in his discography, to say nothing of its originating as nothing but a collection of tracks released on prior Sheeran EP's (not that Ed's albums are really known for their cohesiveness, but this is still a bit of a hodgepodge regardless).
+ is generally a pleasant listen, but not a very interesting one.
To be fair,
x is hardly flawless itself. Part of this has to do with the ever image-conscious Ed "letting loose", so to speak, with more aggressive lyrics and an even more angsty style of singing. Ah, but this aggression is merely a facade: take the track "Don't", for instance, where Ed details the story of an unfaithful lover with such passion that he *almost* swears, the actual cuss-word being conveniently obscured by a well-placed inhale of breath. The act of simply omitting that cuss word shows how aware Sheeran is of his target audience, and that awareness zaps a lot of the album's sincerity from it. Not that the album doesn't deal with serious matters, like Sheeran's father's alcoholism on "Runaway" and the death of his grandfather on "Afire Love", but the emotion just doesn't resonate as much as it should; it feels processed, formulated specifically for commercial success and to please a mainstream audience. Another weakness that burdens the record is Sheeran's ill-advised attempts at rapping. It's remarkable how much Ed harkens back to Jason Mraz's mentality when it comes to spitting verses; that is, wordplay for the sake of wordplay. The rapping is always more gimmicky than artistically significant, and it's no coincidence that the album's weakest tracks ("The Man" on the regular LP, "Take It Back" on the deluxe edition) are the ones where his speed-babbling is the focal point.
And yet
x somehow still manages to render itself enjoyable in spite of these faults? Well, it's no secret that Sheeran has been mentored by Elton John for a number of years, and while the comparisons between the two are rather ridiculous for a number of reasons (almost no musical similarities, lyrical content, musicianship, etc.), one thing that Sheeran does seem to have picked up from the pop idol is his sense of melody, most notably the ability to write a strong hook. The combination of his evocative vocals (often layered in three octave harmonies to enhance this feel) and his extremely rhythmic style of guitar-playing and musicianship in general (derived from years of experimenting with loop pedals) gives almost every track an insatiable groove. Not every hook is a home run (see the god-be-damned exercise in ebullience that is "Sing"), but tracks like the aforementioned "Don't", "Nina", "Runaway" and "Thinking Out Loud" benefit from chorus melodies that possess true staying power, which are coupled with appropriately complementary production (for being the folk-hip-hop fusion that it's advertised as by some,
x's production never really stands out as anything more than pleasant). The album has substantial success when it steps back a bit as well: "Photograph" is probably the most sincere ballad in the Sheeran catalog, and "Tenerife Sea" is about the only track on here that could conceivably be seen on a contemporary folk record, containing the most polished production on the album. (Additionally, the deluxe edition contains "I See Fire" (originally from The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug) and "All of the Stars" (originally from The Fault in Our Stars), two of Sheeran's finest moments to date.) These comments and critiques really only translate to
x being a shallow surface pleasure and nothing else, but in truth, that's about all Ed Sheeran is good for in general. Ultimately it's an inordinately "safe" record, and while it's certainly not everybody's cup of tea, those of us who, like yours truly, possess a bizarre affinity for the ginger's hooks will find it to be easily a more rewarding listen than anything else he has to offer.
