Skip to main content

Ed Sheeran: Equals review – no more Mr Wild Guy

Despite keeping one foot in the club-pop groove, commitment and maturity set the tone for settled-down Sheeran’s latest outing

Within his relentless upward trajectory, there has always been tension between Ed Sheeran, the relatable and heartfelt balladeer, and a friskier musician partial to late nights out. The more playful Sheeran is represented by just two songs on the fourth album in the mathematical series (+, x, ÷). Maintaining his toehold in club pop are singles Bad Habits and Shivers: two effective, flirty bops. Other busy tracks such as Collide and 2Step, meanwhile, foreground the garage rattle of Sheeran’s early “grindie” (grime+indie) inspirations.

But a happy marriage, fatherhood and the loss of an industry mentor (on Visiting Hours) mean that Equals tilts heavily into contentment and maturity, including an obligatory lullaby – Sandman – for his little one.

Continue reading...

from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3BqSjIN

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Knives Out review – Daniel Craig goes Columbo in Cluedo whodunnit

Craig grills an all-star lineup of suspects when a wealthy novelist is found dead in Rian Johnson’s sharp, country-house murder mystery R ian Johnson unsheathes an entertainingly nasty, if insubstantial detective mystery with his new film, Knives Out. Back in 2005, his debut movie Brick (a high-school thriller) paid tribute to the hardboiled noir genre. Now he does the same thing for cosy crime, although there is nothing that cosy about it. Knives Out has a country house full of frowning suspects, deadpan servants and smirking ne’er-do-wells and an amusing performance from Daniel Craig as Benoît Blanc, the brilliant amateur sleuth from Louisiana who annoys the hell out of one and all by smiling enigmatically, occasionally plinking a jarring high note on the piano during the drawing-room interrogation and pronouncing in his southern burr: “Ah suh-spect far-wuhl play!” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2L0NKO4

Tracey Emin decorates Regent's Park and a celebration of Islamic creativity – the week in art

Emin and others survey the state of sculpture, Glenn Brown takes his decadent imagination to Newcastle and artists offer northern exposure – all in your weekly dispatch Frieze Sculpture Park Tracey Emin, Barry Flanagan and John Baldessari are among the artists decorating Regent’s Park with a free survey of the state of sculpture. • Regent’s Park, London , 4 July until 7 October. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2IDCpPV

When Brooklyn was queer: telling the story of the borough's LGBTQ past

In a new book, Hugh Ryan explores the untold history of queer life in Brooklyn from the 1850s forward, revealing some unlikely truths For five years Hugh Ryan has been hunting queer ghosts through the streets of Brooklyn, amid the racks of New York’s public libraries, among its court records and yellow newspaper clippings to build a picture of their lost world. The result is When Brooklyn Was Queer, a funny, tender and disturbing history of LGBTQ life that starts in an era, the 1850s, when those letters meant nothing and ends before the Stonewall riots started the modern era of gay politics. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2H9Zexs