d Sheeran, middle England’s megastar bard, is a mass of contradictions, but one thing is crystal clear: he is unbelievably popular. We are spoiled for stats to prove it, but here are two: Sheeran has the most Spotify followers of any artist on the planet (10 million more than Taylor Swift, his good friend and closest competitor); he has been the most played artist in the UK for six out of the last eight years. His debut, + (Plus), was the UK’s third bestselling album of 2012 – but he was largely viewed as trite teen girl fodder. Then there was a serious step up in 2014, the year the Suffolk-bred singer-songwriter scored his first UK
