Off Message

Ed Sheeran’s mind-boggling success is a sign that something, somewhere, has gone badly wrong in modern culture

Ed Sheeran: the compromise candidate Pic: Getty

We get the government we deserve, or so the saying goes. We also get the musicians we deserve. So, in 2017, we must have done something heinous indeed, considering the musical predicament in which we find ourselves. In 2017, we don’t have a young Michael Jackson, a young Bruce Springsteen or a young Kurt Cobain. No, what we have is a young Ed Sheeran, a man whose success has snuck up on us ...