STEAM

3rd of May, 2017’s headlines:

The Queen calls an emergency meeting at Buckingham Palace.

Prince Philips decides to step down from King duties; some joke he does so to not have to meet United States president Donald Trump.

Theresa May accuses EU of trying to affect UK election and

a study by Whitehall thinktank says EU immigration is likely to continue for years after Brexit, despite Theresa May’s denials.

 

While the UK struggles as a divided country, a ginger man is bringing the nation together with his own album Divide.

On the 3rd night of a sold out run at the O2 Arena, Ed Sheeran is barely audible when 20,000 people join him in singing the words to his song What do I know?

 

‘My daddy told me, son don't you get involved

In politics, religions, other peoples' quarrels,

We could change this whole world with a piano

Add a bass, some guitar, grab a beat and away we go

I'm just a boy with a one man show

No university no degree but lord knows

Saying love could change the world in a moment

But what do I know?’

 

Those 20,000 people at Sheeran’s show have no race, no gender, no nationality. For one night, they’re together and bound by music, merely tinny beams of light engulfed in a sky of happiness.

 

Watching Sheeran live playing an arena is something hard to ever top. Never has another singer-songwriter played arena shows by himself. Sheeran makes it look like the easiest of feats.

 

Sabrina Shaw, 21, flew for ten hours to make the gig. She says: ‘I came with my best friend from Boise, Idaho to see him play. We got tickets six months ago, arrived yesterday and leaving in two days. It was crazy but totally worth it. It was a dream come true!’, with a large grin on her face she continues ‘he’s like no one else out there. He makes fans feel like they have a place in the world and a purpose, that you can achieve anything’.

 

When he plays Galway Girl the whole crowd seems to know how to Ceili dance. When it’s Barcelona’s turn there’s definitely a Latino vibe going on, and with Bibia Be Ye Ye (which means ‘All will be well’ in Twi) it’s easy for the crowd to imagine that they’re down by a beach in Ghana.

 

 

Another ecstatic fan Tim Lewis, 19 from Manchester, has travelled to London only to see him play. ‘He’s unique. One of a kind really. It’s difficult to put into words. I’ve never seen anything like it. As a Brit, I’m sad to see how some Brexit stuff is being portrayed in the media and how it seems some of us are racists. I feel like that only adds up to a small portion of us. Tonight, with so many different people singing the same songs… we’re no different from each other. It was really grand. He’s a great lad’.

 

However naïve it sounds, Ed Sheeran may well be on his way to changing the world for the better one album/gig at the time.

 

As his last song, Sheeran plays You Need Me, I Don’t Need You.

As he leaves the stage the crowd is still echoing the chorus ‘You need me man, I don’t need you’. And he’s right, in an era of so much uncertainty and fear the world needs more love, more music, more Ed Sheeran.

Sheeran is the boy next door who’s still a mystery: He keeps making a political stand without saying who he’s voting for, he says love could change the world in a moment, but what does he know?