Ryan Adams once suggested “records don’t really hurt anybody,” but there is a chance he never listened to Play. Ed Sheeran’s just-in-time-for-Christmas-advert-fodder album is more of the cringe-inducing simplicity which makes his music so popular to those who project themselves onto a piece of work, for it is the only way they can connect with the world around them. It’s shameful stuff, especially when we consider the vast riches of Sheeran as a musician. His skill, his knack for the genre, and his knowledge of music history does not show itself in his music. If he says he likes The Eagles, then the more dedicated fans will worry over a shift from chart-topping pop slop to soft-rock slop. Music that keeps you warm is fine in small doses. We must step into the cold, the unremitting and experimental, to appreciate the standards. But those who are wrapped up warm and refuse to exit their pop echo chamber are the audience Sheeran aims for here.
Play is different. Compared to the preceding pop misery Sheeran has offered, these are open moments of genuine grief. Sincerity is hard to find in pop music no matter the message. To hear any artist put their real lives on the line is not a given, and it should not be an expectation either. Musicians can create vivid stories through fiction alone, but if an artist is to lay their heart on the line, they had better write convincingly. Sheeran does that but then tires of it and decides to stop off to throw a few rap-like bars in. Pair that with the similar-sounding acoustic treatment of all his other songs and it sounds as though the stresses of the real world caused a complete loss of the senses. This is a genuine effort rather than a cry for help, ripping genres and world music for the rehabilitation of the pop star image. Opening and Sapphire have potential, but it’s lost in the repetitive and plain attempts Sheeran makes.
Those dabbles with genre structure are lost around Old Phone, a tiresome acoustic traditional with the pleasure or pain contrast of chart-topping tracks embedded. It’s a literal undertaking where the act of discovery is stronger than the reflection it should then necessitate. Sheeran has honest wordplay on his side but that’s a wooden raft to contend with the dull, instrumental tsunami. His experimentation is a welcome change but still falls well short of what contemporary artists can offer to cement their place in the history books. Relatively passive but honest works are a somewhat better draw than those musicians not even trying. Those who are conforming to an image or genre standard for the sake of embedding an already projected idea, rather than an honest counter.
Sheeran may be well off the mark with Play but at least he offers sincerity in his songwriting. It may be plain, cheesy materials which do little to highlight his vast knowledge of music, but it will work for those who need their hand holding to cross the roads of life. For Always, the album’s penultimate song, is as honest and open a track as you can find in Sheeran’s discography. He still has no flair beyond the plain acoustic touch, the warbling voice touched by emotional experiences of lived-in variety. There needs to be depths beyond this openness, though. An open book can still feature an empty page, after all. Play is far better than the work Sheeran has put out in recent years, though that isn’t saying much. He could’ve tucked the microphone, unplugged, into a cupboard, and it would’ve picked up better noise.
