5. An American Influence
Since the end of his European tour for +, Sheeran has been on the road in the USA (mostly supporting Taylor Swift's Red Tour) breaking in an American audience. In the same Ryan Seacrest interview, he said that "America is one of those countries where you have a lot of experiences and meet a lot of new people ... there are songs inspired by Nashville and things like that, and I took more influence from music here". Not surprising since he lived in America for almost a year, settling in Nashville for six months, Los Angeles for three and New York for two more. As can already be seen from the song at MSG titled New York, it's clear that the new album will feature quite a lot of US influence, not least from working with American musicians such as Rick Rubin, Pharrell Williams, Lupe Fiasco and, of course, Taylor Swift. Whether this means that the album might have a bit of a country feel remains to be seen (or heard), but from what we've heard so far his style hasn't changed too much, other than incorporating a lot more rap in Take It Back Now.