Sheeran brings his A game to light up Croker
Nothing beats a Saturday night in Croker,’ Wexford fan and sometime musical megastar Ed Sheeran told the 82,500 who came to see him there last weekend. He brought his A game to GAA HQ. His shows at the Jones Road stadium and also the brace of shows at Páirc Uí Chaoimh in Cork on Thursday and Friday revealed the singer is at the peak of his powers in the live arena.
Having seen an Irish show on each of his stadium tours, I will attest to the fact that the gig I witnessed on his Mathematics Tour was the most enjoyable of the lot. The three stages on the centre of the hallowed turf, one of which revolved to allow all fans a view of this particular man in black, created a sense of engagement that his previous tours lacked. Digital cameras followed his every move and flashed his image on six large screens shaped like guitar plectrums. Giant pylon-shaped stage supports pulsed light into the night sky and fireworks shot from them on occasion. It was a truly spectacular show.
Sheeran now brings a drummer and keyboard player which he employed on surprisingly rock-orientated numbers such as Tides and BLOW, the two tracks with which he opened the shows. He pummelled a brown Gibson Les Paul or an Irish-made Lowden acoustic guitar as the songs demanded.
Becoming more confident with the revolving stage, he scampered and jogged around it, cajoling the audience to give their larynxes a good workout on the appropriately
‘Sheeran is the perfect panacea after the pandemic’
named Sing and bidding us to hold our mobiles aloft for The A Team, the single that started it all off for him back in 2011.
Okay, so everyone from Westlife to U2 has done similar in this stadium but hairs still stand on the back of the neck. You can’t prevent it, especially when most of the those present are also singing the chorus to what is still very much a fan favourite. They were no less enthusiastic when singing along to the first verse and chorus of Steve Earle’s The Galway Girl which segued into his own, similarly named Galway Girl.
He played medleys of songs such as Own It which he co-wrote with Stormzy and Burna Boy; Peru recorded with Nigerian singer Fireboy DML; Beautiful People a track from his No.6 Collaborations Project album, and I Don’t Care on which he teamed up with Justin Bieber in 2019. He told us that when he started out, he assumed that he would be a songwriter and got into the habit of collaborating with as many artists as possible to ensure he was constantly working.
That will to succeed driven perhaps by a fear that his dreams would be shattered is still part of his artistic makeup. Sheeran never was anyone’s idea of a rock god or pop idol but appeared almost fully formed when new solo artists seemed to need the boost of competing in a TV talent show and Simon Cowell or Louis Walsh’s imprimatur to prosper.
Though I would still contend that his latest album = is the weakest of his four albums (or five if you count No.6 Collaborations Project) it still sold in its millions and songs from it such as Bad Habits and Overpass Graffiti sounded much better with the backing vocals of the Croke Park multitudes.
The Parting Glass, the end of the set proper, was another poignant highlight but a celebratory Shape Of You, the subject of a recent court case – where he and its co-writers were accused of plagiarism – which they rightly won, and You Need Me I Don’t You were the tracks that sent the throngs away into the night. It was a joyous occasion after the pandemic with Sheeran the perfect panacea.
He will head next to the comparatively intimate Thomond Park in Limerick, the Treaty City. Ireland, however, surrendered to Sheeran many years ago.