Ed Sheeran plays free pop-up gigs on streets of New York and Los Angeles

8 May, 2023

Ed Sheeran

Ed Sheeran debuted songs from new album ‘–’ this weekend at surprise pop-up gigs on the streets of New York and Los Angeles.

On Saturday (May 6), the singer appeared in Soho, New York atop a Volvo car to play a number of songs.

The next day, he performed from the open top upper deck of a StarLine City Sightseeing bus in Los Angeles. “I have a different vehicle for more fun,” he said of the LA gig. “RIP the Volvo.”

At both gigs Sheeran played a number of tracks from the new album, which was released on Friday (May 5) amid the singer’s high-profile plagiarism trial, in which he was accused of copying Marvin Gaye‘s ‘Let’s Get It On’ on his 2014 track ‘Thinking Out Loud’.

See what went down at the pop-up gigs below.

On Thursday (May 4), the pop star was found to have not copied ‘Let’s Get It On’ on ‘Thinking Out Loud’, a US court ruled.

The case was brought against the pop star in 2016 by Ed Townsend – one of the co-writers on Gaye’s classic 1973 track – who accused Sheeran of copying the song on his 2014 hit.

Of the controversy around the case, and why he felt it necessary to pursue victory on behalf of all songwriters, and to set a future precedent, Sheeran said: “There’s like four chords that get used in pop songs. And if you just think mathematically the likelihood of this song having the same chords as this song—there’s multiple, multiple songs—it’s all the same four chords … you are going to get this with every single pop song from now on.

“Unless it just stops, which I don’t think it does because it’s a big money business to take things to court. But you can only get caught out if you’ve done something wrong, and I have not done something wrong. I used four chords that are very common chords to use.”

Earlier this week, which also saw the release of new documentary Ed Sheeran: The Sum Of It All, Sheeran reportedly took to the stand in Manhattan to insist he would be “done” with music if found guilty.

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