Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

[3 Colours Red]

You'd think so from this week's top 20.
This is a joke, right? Right?

[ad hoc]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

It's something to do with the charts being based on streaming these days or something like that isn't it? So essentially every track on his album is counted as a "single". Hopefully the utter ludicrousness of this particular chart though will convince them to alter how the chart is defined.

I read somewhere that "Galway Girl" at number 2 there was so awful and basically a combination of every Irish stereotype known that the record company tried to bury it, but they couldn't persuade him to bin it and, well, here we are

[Sits]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

This confirms my suspicions based on the snippets of "hit radio" I hear every morning at the coffee shop. Even that 3 or 4 minutes drives me to the edge of violence.

Oh, the suspicions being that the charts are shite. I'm just surprised there isn't loads of Adele in there too.

[Jah Womble]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Well, there probably will be once she releases 43 and a Half or whatever it's going to be called.

I showed this current Top 40 to a couple of unashamed pop-fan friends last night - and they were shocked. To echo ad hoc, if there were any justice, this would (go some way to) capsize the stupid, stagnant singles chart in its current state. But I ain't holding my breath.

But if things have gotten so bad that Ed f***ing Sheeran is seen as pop's saviour, then I'm happy to have no more to do with it all.

[Beatle Simon]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Its 16 of the top 19!

I don't know if the people who compile the charts will be having a re-think on how they collate their figures, but the most bizarre thing is that Ed Sheeran fans will be giving Chainsmokers & Coldplay (7), Rag 'N' Bone Man (16) and Katy Perry ft Skip Marley (17) grief on Twitter or whatever.

But, in the words of Ed himself, 'What Do I Know?'

[Anorak Smith]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Reginald Christ wrote: This is good from Laura Snapes and goes some way to explaining the question posed in the OP.

As for Sheeran himself, his entire shtick can be expressed as "Creepy PMs set to music." I can't fucking stand him.

I'm feeling old, I barely know anything by or about Ed Sheeran, other than he looks a lot like a long lost cousin I have, and so, on the odd occasion I see Ed, he reminds me of times gone by. However, Stormzy has totally passed me by. Am I missing anything?

[Sean of the Shed]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Did this ever get discussed on here?

[caja-dglh]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Laura Snapes also wrote this rather splendid review of the album

[Gerontophile]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

I think the answer to the original question posed by 3 Colours Red can be found in the very fine back catalogue of those mid-80's popstrels, China Crisis.

[Gangster Octopus]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

I can't believe that this thread wasn't called Ed Sheeran's Week. There's some serious slacking going on round here these days.

[Vulgarian Visigoth]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Ed Sheeran is our new evil overlord, slowly suffocating us into submission with his posh faux-blokish bonhommie, one bland song and charming interview at a time. Resistance is futile.

[Jah Womble]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

"...the news that Sheeran is auditioning talents for his very own boyband, who will sing his songs and support him on tour..."

Jesus f***ing wept.

[3 Colours Red]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Gerontophile wrote: I think the answer to the original question posed by 3 Colours Red can be found in the very fine back catalogue of those mid-80's popstrels, China Crisis.

I don't know whether he believes Black Man Ray or not.

[Beatle Simon]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Serge Gainsbourg wrote:

I don't know if the people who compile the charts will be having a re-think on how they collate their figures

At last, someones listened to me.

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/mar/13/ed-sheeran-singles-chart-takeover-spurs-calls-for-drastic-rethink?utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campai gn=GU+Today+main+NEW+H+categories&utm_term=217236& subid=17389289&CMP=EMCNEWEML6619I2

[3 Colours Red]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

That line about what is and isn't a single gets to the heart of the problem.

It shouldn't be that difficult - I reckon that you could put a bit of code in the metadata of the MP3 (or whatever other codec it might be in) file that informs the chart compilers whether or not to include it.

[Vulgarian Visigoth]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Why be slaves to obsolete parameters? The single is a moribund concept. The current applicable unit is the song. If that means some punchable ginger-nuts clogs the charts, be it.

[Jah Womble]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Dunno, just a hunch, but perhaps some folk like a little variety, a little less suffocation of the industry by the few, opportunity for more interesting artists to flourish...

Personally, I don't think that it 'is' about the song anyway. This phenomenon arrives as a result of a lack of any kind of discipline in the compilation of the singles chart (which is still how it's described, after all) and is entirely artist-driven: what we have this week is a bloated version of what we saw starting to happen with Bieber's album last summer (or whenever it was). There are only a handful of artists that can ever really benefit from this: Bieber's obviously one, Adele and Coldplay probably among the others.

If this is how it is to be, then why not create a separate chart entirely? Perhaps something akin to that of the old sheet-music-listings days - which genuinely was about 'the song'.

[Vulgarian Visigoth]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

I'm assuming the carpet matches the curtains.

[Vulgarian Visigoth]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Even if I could be bothered to muster a reason I can't see why I would share it with you.

[Various Artist]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

One wonders how much difference it would make if they ratcheted up the ratio hugely to make it something like 1000 streams = 1 sale, rather than the clearly ineffectual change from 100:1 to 150:1 they've recently made. I suspect, given the degree to which the chart seems to be 'broken', even that might not be enough.

The whole notion of a 'single' has gone so much by the wayside here though it makes a mockery of calling it a singles chart. The main problem appears to be that now the ubiquity of streaming among the younger generation (in particular) has grown to such an extent there's no longer any need to own the music in any tangible sense, not even as an mp3 file on a computer or phone, the question arises what exactly the chart is meant to be measuring.

You can't argue that someone like Ed Sheeran is wildly popular (without getting into the baffling why), but then he's probably not more so relatively than any other pop phenomenon has been in decades of yore. The difference is that even at the heights of Beatlemania, or Elvismania, or Boney M or Frankie Goes To Hollywood or Take That, the chart could only reflect how many new people went out and bought a release each week.
For starters, the necessity of making a physical journey to an actual shop to do so represented in itself a certain 'commitment' to the purchase that casual downloading or – much more so again – casual streaming fail to replicate. All the more so if streamings count non-registered listeners who can't skip songs in a playlist without listening to the same adverts umpteen times and hence are consuming a song purely passively, with no more intent than if it came out of the radio.
More relevantly, physical – and to a broad extent download – sales meant that the chart represented how many different people (aside from certain instances of mass purchase of a single by die-hard fans, and more latterly the likes of CD1 and CD2 gimmicks) wanted to own the music. If someone bought a 7", cassette or CD, or downloaded an mp3, and listened to it ten times a day all week, that's 100-150 listens – but they only counted once for the chart. OK, the streaming/sales ratio attempts to balance this by making that sort of figure equal one 'sale' – but that only works up to the end of that week. By definition, though, every week's sales of actual singles demonstrated how many new converts a song had acquired: but nowadays the same fans continuing to listen to a song hundreds of times are effectively continuing to 'buy' copies of the same thing week after week after week, so you get the terrible clogging effect that's made the charts so moribund the last year or two. Factor in how the industry seems to be disproportionately focused on a mere handful of artists, and it means Sheeran and a very few others have turned into a self-perpetuating clique.

[MiserableOldGit]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

I'm feeling rather unique in that I have never heard anything by him.

[Janik]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Various Artist wrote: The whole notion of a 'single' has gone so much by the wayside here though it makes a mockery of calling it a singles chart. The main problem appears to be that now the ubiquity of streaming among the younger generation (in particular) has grown to such an extent there's no longer any need to own the music in any tangible sense, not even as an mp3 file on a computer or phone, the question arises what exactly the chart is meant to be measuring.

The first bit, but maybe not the second. What this is really showing is the singles chart was always somewhat artificial, driven by manufacturing constraints rather than anything musical. The chart is now measuring what it was always trying to do but previously only really achieving somewhat obliquely, telling you what is currently popular (hence why ownership of the music is a complete irrelevance). Popular being a completely different thing from what is currently out that is 'good', of course.

Every song in the world is pretty much available, which makes things much more equitable. It's just a pity that what it tells us about what people chose to listen to is not what we want to know.

[Janik]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

MiserableOldGit wrote: I'm feeling rather unique in that I have never heard anything by him.

Can one be rather unique? It's an either/or. In this case I think or, as in 'or you are not', because I would make the same Sheeran-free claim. Possibly with the caveat that I've never heard anything that I was aware was by him, as supermarkets/lifts/etc exist...

[Gerontophile]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Two arguments in a two page thread.

Ed Sheeran is a curse, people.

[Jah Womble]

Has Ed Sheeran died or something?

Janik wrote: Every song in the world is pretty much available, which makes things much more equitable. It's just a pity that what it tells us about what people chose to listen to is not what we want to know.

Every song in the world being 'available' doesn't make matters any more 'equitable' for the musician - after all, consumers that aren't even aware of an artist's existence are hardly going to be seeking out his/her/their wares. The system as it now operates perpetuates the juggernaut of the already-established, which is why a handful of acts remain enormous, a cluster fairly big and nobody else anywhere approaching the radar. It's also why only a limited collection of acts purveying an even more limited collection of styles/genres are now represented in the singles (sic) chart - as opposed to the fairly eclectic mix we used to see back in th' day. (I'd wager that there was a greater argument for the market being more 'equitable' in the late seventies when, for example, a punk rock band that could barely play had as decent a chance of national exposure as your polished pop act.)

As I suggested in that earlier post rather lost in the crossfire of 'gingergate', if the singles chart is now regularly to be clogged up and suffocated by tracks from one major artist's album - whoever that might be - then perhaps a separate 'song' chart needs to come into play here?