Ed Sheeran uses songwriting as a “form of therapy”.
The 26-year-old singer is no stranger to penning hit tracks, with his recent smashes including Shape of You, Castle on the Hill and Galway Girl.
And in a new interview on U.K. radio programme Desert Island Discs, Ed reveals that composing tunes means much more to him than just creating a chart-topping song.
“I think it (songwriting) is a form of therapy to be honest,” he tells the programme’s presenter Kirsty Young in a preview listen of Sunday’s (07May17) episode.
“I think any time I’ve ever got down or ever felt low the one thing that picks me up from that is writing a song about it because at least you’ve got a positive experience out of a bad experience.”
Ed’s most recent album Divide features the best songs he penned for the record. But when it came to choosing, the flame-haired star admits he had a fair few to pick from.
“I try to write as much as possible,” he explains. “If I’m in album-making mode it will be four or five songs a day and there will be no thought process. It will be just get a guitar and just write a song.
“And you know 12 out of 100 might be good. So I write a bunch and scrap a bunch.”
While Divide has only recently been released, Ed’s fans are already clamouring for more new material. And they may be in luck, as the singer took to Instagram to tease his followers about an apparent upcoming collaboration with Rita Ora.
Rita shared a video of herself and Ed which appeared to have been taken in a recording studio, with several notes of a tune playing in the background as she and her co-collaborator looked slyly at each other.
According to Ed’s fan account on Instagram, the track is likely to appear on Rita’s long-awaited second album.