On December 13, 2016, Ed Sheeran returned to social media after a whole year. The only thing that kept us sane without hearing from Ed was the hope that he would come back with amazing music, and it’s finally here! After teasing us with singles, Ed dropped the rest of his album early this morning. Here’s a list of interesting facts that we know so far about some of the songs on his new album, Divide.
“Eraser”
A couple days ago, Ed Sheeran released a live video of “Eraser” and the song is about his life and how he deals with fame.
“Castle on the Hill”
Ed explained this song is a love song to Framlingham, Suffolk ,the town he grew up in. In the song, Ed sings, “Driving at 90 down those country lanes,” to which the police of Suffolk tweeted him saying, “Drive to Arrive.”
“Shape of You”
He originally wrote this song wanting to give it to Rihanna, and said she would sing it better than him. However, when he was writing the lyrics, he made the decision to keep it for himself.
“Perfect”
“Perfect” is about his girlfriend and high school classmate, Cherry Seaborn. Ed has said that this is his favorite song and wants this to be the biggest hit of his career. He sings, “We were just kids when we fell in love, not knowing what it was. I will not give you up.”
Did we mention they have 2 cats together?
“Galway Girl”
He had Irish band, Beoga play traditional Irish music in this song (and also in “Nancy Mulligan”), which he had to fight his record company to keep on the album.
“Happier”
This song is about a relationship with an ex-girlfriend, but he wanted to write it differently than other songs of the same nature and put a new spin on it.
“How Would You Feel (Paean)”
Ed wrote this song and produced it by himself in 15 minutes for his girlfriend when she was travelling so she could have something to listen to on the drive.
“Bibia Be Ye Ye”
He wrote this song during his year-long hiatus on a trip to Ghana, where he collaborated with other artists such as Fuse ODG.
Side note: he ended up drinking a drink called Shocker, which he didn’t know had an ounce of marijuana soaked in it, and ended up sitting in a corner by himself for 6 hours.