Yunus Hoytema

Ed Sheeran confirmed last year that he would be releasing his sixth album in 2023, and now after much speculation he has announced the release date, and tracklist, having previously confirmed the new album's name as 'Subtract'.

Earlier this year, he sent notebooks to fans with a variety of dates highlighted, and now it's been confirmed the album will be released in a couple of months.

After a lot of speculation, Ed has now confirmed the album will be released on 5th May 2023, and it is available to preorder now. The singer took to Instagram to share the news with a video which shows Ed walking along a beach as the sea washes over the album's song names.

Ed's sixth album is called 'Subtract'! Ed shared a fan account's post in February, which showed the first page from a book they'd received from Ed. The book had a subtraction sign, and a caption reading: 'Subtract maybeee?! It look like Subtract is coming sooon!' (sic).

Other fans who received the notebook also took social media to share photos of the book which shows some highlighted dates, potentially referencing release dates of the album or singles.

Ed revealed in a caption that he has been working on 'Subtract' for more than 10 years. The singer explained how writing songs is his 'therapy'.

He wrote: 'I had been working on Subtract for a decade, trying to sculpt the perfect acoustic album, writing and recording hundreds of songs with a clear vision of what I thought it should be. Then at the start of 2022, a series of events changed my life, my mental health, and ultimately the way I viewed music and art.

'Writing songs is my therapy. It helps me make sense of my feelings. I wrote without thought of what the songs would 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.'

'Within the space of a month, my pregnant wife got told she had a tumour, with no route to treatment until after the birth. 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 spiralling 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.

'As an artist I didn’t feel like I could credibly put a body of work into the world that didn’t accurately represent where I am and how I need to express myself at this point in my life. This album is purely that. It’s opening the trapdoor into my soul. 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. This is Subtract.' (sic)

Ed Sheeran has opened up about how Taylor Swift put him in touch with Aaron Dessner. Aaron is an American musician and songwriter who worked with Taylor on her albums 'Folklore' and 'Evermore'.

As Ed explains in this post, he was hesitant to work with Aaron because it was so soon after the release of Taylor's albums and they were: 'Taylors thing and they had both been done so perfectly.' (sic)

However, the pair did work together and 'Subtract' is the finished piece. Ed said in his caption: 'So in 2021, I got a message from @taylorswift to link me up with @aarondessner. She thought he and I would make something great together. I have to be honest I was a bit reticent to work with him that soon after folklore and evermore because I felt that was Taylors thing and they had both been done so perfectly.'

He continued: 'But we met for dinner, chatted about life and music, and he promised to send me some instrumentals for me to write over whenever inspiration hit. As soon as I got them, I loved the whole overall vibe of it and knew that one day I would write to them, but at the time I was finishing up what I thought was Subtract, so would put them on the back burner for a bit.

'Then, as I said in my announcement post, a lot of things started happening in my personal life that I just felt the need to vent about on song and write diaristically about them. I had Aarons instrumentals, so just started writing, and writing, and writing. He flew over to the UK and we recorded it in a week by the seaside, and its just been the most incredible process, and an album I'm so bloody proud of.

'Thanks to Aaron and Jon for the insane amount of hard work and dedication you put into this project, and bringing out a side of me I had put on mute for so long. And of course, thanks to Swizzle, as always, you rock x'. (sic)

Taking to Instagram to share the very exciting news in November 2022, Ed Sheeran thanked his fans for helping him reach a major milestone for his 2021 hit 'Shivers'.

"So 'Shivers' has just hit a billion streams on Spotify, which makes it my 11th song as an artist and 15th song as a writer," he told his fans. "I'm over the moon about it, thank you everyone who's been streaming that song."

He went on to announce: "I'm going to celebrate by shooting a music video for my brand new album, which will be out next year!"

This announcement left fans super excited at the news. Commenting on Instagram one fan wrote: 'NEW VIDEO NEW ALBUM NEXT YEAR! WHAT ED TELL US', (sic) another said: 'Congrats Ed 😍😍😍 We all can't wait for next year for your new music 😍😍'.

Ed revealed the tracklist to his new album in the video where he announced the album's release date. The song names are written in the sand as the sea washes over them.

In February 2023, fans started sharing photos the notebook they received from Ed, and there has been speculation that there could be an announcement regarding his album on 17th February as that is one of the dates highlighted in the book, however the announcement came on the 1st March.

You can hear many of Ed Sheeran's songs on Hits Radio.

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