Released July 12, 2019
4.5 / 10
Favorites
I Don't Want Your Money (feat. H.E.R.)
Least favorites
Way To Break My Heart (feat. Skrillex), Cross Me (feat. Chance The Rapper & PnB Rock)
On this fifteen-track long compilation album, Ed Sheeran channels his inner DJ Khaled, hates parties, loves hip-hop, and is just a regular guy clinging to cultural relevance. The piece is not shy about its aspiration of mass appeal, polishing its edges and serving bland, uninspired tracks mostly void of flavor. For some reason, Ed refuses to lean in to his strengths and makes every effort to keep his songs in a one-dimensional format - easier to carry and play around the world. "No. 6 Collaborations Project" is the scene of a tentative hip-hop crossover with repeated dabs in rapping without the knack for songwriting and spitting hard-hitting honest rap verses. Cross Me is a vastly uneventful track that tries its best to masquerade as part of the Black Panther soundtrack but is giving away its impostor status with its juvenile lyrical content. Even grime aristocrat Stormzy can't distract us away from the recycled beats and background instrumentals onTake Me Back To London that tragically throws away all credibility anytime the chorus comes back. Similarly Remember The Name reminds us that Ed is not the Renaissance man he might think he is. A weird succession of autobiographical origin verses from some of the biggest names in the industry, it struggles to take off and is bounded in that one-dimensional case Ed has built specially for this album. Ed sings "I was born a misfit", re-iterating his dislike of social gatherings and insisting that, despite his half a million grossing tour for the last album, he's just a regular guy. He's set on proving it and goes as far as joining forces with Khalid on Beautiful People, a song designed to scare off LA people (or is it to entice them, riding that sad-pop wave that resonates so much over there?). The song is very (very) radio-friendly, slowly eroding your senses until you're brought back to reality as a hand-clapping beat rises from the abyss. Not so inoffensive after all; borderline annoying in fact. Another single about resisting the glitz and glam of Hollywood is the lazy I Don't Care, which doesn't take us anywhere despite the dancehall inspiration. Maybe the target audience can relate, but again, the juvenility of the lyrics hits hard (if you "hate everyone here", how about not coming here in the first place?). Bieber and Ed have been stuck in 2016 for threes years, still milking that tropical pop cow 'til it's sour. His social anxiety thesis is reinforced by his inability to connect with many of the guest artists on "No. 6 Collaborations Project". Antisocial is lacking texture, despite Travis Scott's best efforts to feed off Ed's gusto-less sweet delivery. Ed's admiration and liking of hip-hop are not enough to make him a good potential collaborator in the capacity he aspires to. J Hus is the best thing about Feels, a strange combination of low and high energy contributions that don't align at all. It is only when Ed doesn't seem motivated by the ambition to update his sound to fit the vibe of the time that his talent shines through. Personally did not enjoy YEBBA's contribution to Best Part of Me as much as I thought I would but acoustic Ed serves the right amount of authentic feels and soap. I Don't Want Your Money is the one song that demonstrates a real songwriting effort beyond chasing the next catchy pop charter. From the welcome addition of horns to H.E.R's velvety vocals, this tracks stands out as one of the lesser stereotypical genre and theme borrowing tunes on the album. Ed seems to have anticipated what people would say about this album, in a couple of self-aware auto-prophetic singularities in his lyrics. But at the end of the day, does he really care if we think he should leave rapping to rappers? My hunch is that he probably doesn't, as he prepares for the zombie apocalypse bound to come, "stackin' up the paper for the bad times" - the only plausible explanation as to why one of the highest-grossing artist of our time sings about his 401-K.
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