Ed Sheeran Almost Quit Music After His Daughter Was Born
Can we get a show of hands — who else cannot stop listening to Ed Sheeran‘s new song “Bad Habits?”
Lillie Gissen
Can we get a show of hands — who else cannot stop listening to Ed Sheeran‘s new song “Bad Habits?” It’s been on repeat ever since it came out on June 25, 2021, but it turns out, we almost didn’t get that song at all. In fact, the singer just announced that he almost quit making music altogether after his daughter, Lyra Antarctica, was born last year, which means we wouldn’t have heard new songs from him ever again!
While chatting with Sirius XM during a recent interview, Sheeran explained that after he and his wife, Cherry Seaborn, welcomed their first child together in September 2020, he was “searching for who he was” and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to be a singer anymore.
“I was like, ‘That’s it, this is me, I’m just going to be a dad, I’m not going to play music anymore,’” he explained.
Luckily for all of us, he later realized how important it was that his daughter see him work hard and pursue the thing he loves most — music.
“I found myself getting really sad and having zero purpose, even though I was putting time and effort into being a dad. Then I was suddenly like, it is more important for my daughter to grow up knowing that her parents have work ethic and her parents love working hard and and love creating and enjoy their jobs,” he continued. “And seeing that rather than like looking at your dad as technically unemployed.”
He also revealed that when he did start working on his next album, it wasn’t an easy process. After taking some time off due to the coronavirus pandemic, jumping back in was difficult for the “Thinking Out Loud” crooner. He said, “I slowly got back into music that way, and then the creative process sort of started flowing again. But there was a long period of time where I just didn’t really know. Everything was directionless.”
When Can We Expect More New Music From Ed Sheeran?
For those who missed it, Sheeran has actually been pretty vocal about the fact that his next album will be called Subtract for years now. He named his first album Plus, his second was called Multiply and his third was Divide, so that’s how we know the next one will be called Subtract! But when will Subtract come out? Well, back in February, he told fans that his next batch of songs were going to be released “later this year.”
“30 today. Thank you for all your wonderful messages, I feel very loved,” he wrote on his birthday. “I’ll be back online with the fourth installment in the series later this year, until then.”
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And according to the 30-year-old, he’s actually been working on this album for years now.
“I’ve been working on this one since the same time as Plus. Every year I write a song that will go on it,” he explained in a previous interview. “So I have about six, seven at the moment. It will potentially come later, because it’s been about six years in the making and it might be another three or four. So I might put other stuff out before then, just to have something out.”
And fans can expect the songs to sound very different from his previous hits.
“It’s not necessarily experimental but I don’t think there’ll be any hot radio songs on it this time. It’s a very acoustic record, very acoustic,” he added.
Sheeran’s managing director, Damian Christian, also revealed in another interview that the album won’t sound like “Bad Habits.”
“The album will come later in the year,” he said. “[‘Bad Habits’] doesn’t define the whole Ed record, they don’t all go down this route. We have got some absolute monsters to come, we can’t wait to get cracking on those as well.”
Have Any Other Stars Almost Quit Music Before?
Can you try to imagine a world without Shawn Mendes‘ beautiful voice in it?! Well, that was almost the case, you guys, because he revealed that his crippling anxiety made him lose the ability to sing earlier last year, and that he too almost quit making music forever.
“I had a moment at the end of January when my body would not allow me to sing,” the “In My Blood” crooner explained in a new interview with The Guardian. “I physically couldn’t sing because of my anxiety to have a successful album. The fear strangled me and literally stopped me being able to sing. It was a month before I felt like I was taking the first step. I really fell down. I came extremely close [to quitting the industry]. Extremely, extremely close. [But] I realized it’s not the industry, it’s the way I do the industry. I let the industry control what I do, rather than me controlling my life.”
Back in March 2021, Selena Gomez announced that she was considering leaving the music industry since people didn’t take her seriously.
“It’s hard to keep doing music when people don’t necessarily take you seriously,” she admitted to Vogue. “I’ve had moments where I’ve been like, ‘What’s the point? Why do I keep doing this?’ ‘Lose You to Love Me,’ I felt was the best song I’ve ever released, and for some people it still wasn’t enough. I think there are a lot of people who enjoy my music, and for that I’m so thankful, for that I keep going, but I think the next time I do an album it’ll be different. I want to give it one last try before I maybe retire music.”
She also told the outlet that she wants to spend more time producing and to “give herself a real shot at acting.”
“I haven’t even touched the surface of what I want to do,” the former Disney star continued. “The parts that I want are the ones I need help with. I can’t wait for the moment when a director can see that I’m capable of doing something that no one’s ever seen.”