In case Ed Sheeran collaborating with Cradle Of Filth wasn’t strange enough, the British ginger is following his friend Taylor Swift’s footsteps and going the “indie” route with a record produced by Aaron Dessner. Now that’s a sentence we would’ve never expected to write before 2020.
But Sheeran was robbed of making the big announcement on social media and/or having to deal with polarizing comments from loyal The National fans because the project was spoiled in court.
Allow us to explain: Sheeran is currently in the midst of a copyright trial after Sami Chokri, a.k.a. Sami Switch and producer Ross O’Donoghue accused him of using “particular lines and phrases” from their song “Oh Why” in 2017's “Shape Of You.”
To prove that he actually writes his own songs and isn’t copying bits and pieces from others to create generic radio hits, Sheeran had to explain how his songwriting process works. It was then that, according to BBC reporter Mark Savage, the “Bad Habits” singer said he “recently wrote 25 songs in the space of a week with Aaron Dessner of The National.” Savage live-tweeted this from London’s High Court on Monday, March 7.
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If this had happened pre-Folklore, the quote tweets would have probably been all about The National selling out, or about the bizarre combination. But the quote-tweets are dominated by Taylor Swift fans who are overjoyed their idol turned Dessner into the “it” producer.
There aren’t any further details on what exactly Sheeran and Dessner are working on together or if it’s truly a Folklore-type record, but if there’s someone who can make Sheeran’s music sound tolerable, it’s definitely Dessner.
With his excellent work on Taylor Swift’s albums and his own Big Red Machine records, plus The National’s Boxer and High Violet (arguably the band’s best records to date), we can’t help but be proud of Dessner for getting the well-deserved recognition as a producer, regardless of who he’s working with.