Ed Sheeran confirmed the release date (May 5) for his upcoming album – (pronounced as Subtract) on Instagram. In his announcement post, he revealed that he dealt with a lot of struggles at the start of 2022, which is what inspired the music on this record. Ed explained that he went through three life-changing moments in 2022 when his wife, Cherry Seaborn, was diagnosed with a tumor, followed by the death of his best friend, Jamal, as well as the copyright lawsuit over his song “Shape Of You.”
“Within the space of a month, my pregnant wife got told she had a tumor with no route to treatment until after the birth,” Ed shared. “My best friend Jamal, a brother to me, died suddenly, and I found myself standing in court defending my integrity and career as a songwriter. I was spiraling through fear, depression and anxiety. I felt like I was drowning, head below the surface, looking up but not being able to break through for air.”
Ed and Cherry welcomed their second child, Jupiter, in May 2022. Ed did not expand on where Cherry’s health stands now and if she began receiving treatment after giving birth. Meanwhile, the singer won his copyright infringement lawsuit and was awarded $1.1 million in costs, according to Variety.
– (Subtract) will be Ed’s fifth studio album. In his post, he revealed that he had been working on the record for a decade, “writing and recording hundreds of songs with a clear vision.” However, the events of 2022 changed everything. “Writing songs is my therapy,” Ed shared. “It helps me make sense of my feelings. I wrote without thought of what the songs should be. I just wrote whatever tumbled out. And in just over a week I replaced a decade’s worth of work with my deepest, darkest thoughts.”
In conclusion, Ed said that the record is an accurate representation of where he was in his life when he wrote it. “It’s opening the trapdoor into my soul,” he admitted. “For the first time, I’m not trying to craft an album people will like, I’m merely putting something out that’s honest and true to where I am in my adult life. This is last February’s diary entry and my way of making sense of it.”
At the end of January, Ed hinted that he had been dealing with some personal issues in another Instagram post. “I realized I haven’t been that engaged in my social media and my fan base online for the past couple of years,” he wrote. “Just being totally honest, I’ve had some turbulent things been happening in my personal life, so I just didn’t really feel like being online and pretending to be something I’m not when I wasn’t feeling like that.”
