Ed Sheeran rocks AT&T Park all on his own
Unaccompanied star uses technology, killer songs to deliver winning show
One question came to mind as Ed Sheeran stood alone before a stadium filled with some 40,000 fans:
How did this happen? I mean, somehow this folksy pop artist — who performs unaccompanied, utilizing just his voice, guitar and looping technology — has managed to become a major stadium act. And he didn’t get to this point thanks to elaborate stage shows with fancy special effects and cool laser light displays.
Instead, he favors a relatively modest stage design (albeit one with some cool video screens) and keeps the focus squarely on the music.
He’s not trying to put on a big pop music spectacle such as his good pal Taylor Swift or a big-concept rock show like U2. He’s just rocking a stadium like he once rocked small clubs and theaters.
And it’s working for him. Sheeran delighted a capacity crowd as he sang and strummed through his burgeoning bag of pop hits during a highly anticipated concert Tuesday night at AT&T Park in San Francisco. The show was part of his first full-fledged stadium tour of North America.
With just guitar in hand, Sheeran opened the concert with one of his very best — the multi-platinum “Castle on the Hill” — and then immediately followed with “Eraser.” After those two numbers, both of which hail from the 2017 album ÷ (pronounced “divide”), the star continued to roll through such offerings as “Dive” and “Bloodstream.”
As he kept jumping from one fan favorite to another, the reasons why Sheeran has managed to successfully transition to a stadium act began to crystallize before our eyes. For one thing, he doesn’t need a backing band to bring his music to life onstage. All he needs is his loop station, which allows him to record multiple different parts live — from harmony vocals to percussive bits — and then play them back together to create a richly layered sound. The result is one of the most amazing one-man bands in the industry.
He’s also quite likable onstage, as he jokes around (often at his expense) and basically just lets his guard down. You walk away from an Ed Sheeran show thinking you’ve gotten to know him. And that kind of connection and sense of intimacy is truly rare in a stadium
gig.
But the main reason why Sheeran finds himself performing in front of tens of thousands of fans is his songwriting. He’s one of this generation’s best, having penned a staggeringly impressive amount of memorable pop tunes during the course of three albums. And, importantly, songs such as “Thinking Out Loud,” “Sing” and, especially, the gorgeous “Photograph”
don’t come across like disposable pop tunes. Instead, these are songs that will likely grow and mature with the listeners over time, like songs by Elton John or Smokey Robinson have done with earlier generations.
However, there was one major misstep, as Sheeran played his astoundingly soulless version of the classic “Feeling Good.” It was a moment that underscored,
once again, the greatness of Nina Simone, whose definitive version of the song is certainly a nominee for the title of Greatest Song of All Time.
He’d do much better when he stuck to his own material.
“If you don’t know this one then you are at the wrong show,” he said before embarking on the mega-hit “Thinking Out Loud.”
Sheeran was definitely
happy to be back in San Francisco, a city that carries with it good memories for the pop troubadour.
“The very first time I heard myself on the radio was in San Francisco,” he said.
Sheeran’s stadium tour was reportedly eyeing a date at Levi’s Stadium, home of the 49ers, yet talks reportedly broke down because of the venue’s weeknight 10 p.m. curfew.