Ed Sheeran Announces New Album 'Autumn Variations'

Three months after releasing his album, - (Subtract), British music superstar Ed Sheeran has unveiled plans for his upcoming record, Autumn Variations.

His 14-track new album will be released on Friday, 29 September, via Sheeran’s independent label, Gingerbread Man Records. You can pre-order your copy here and find the tracklist below.

Speculation around Autumn Variations arose ten days ago, with The Sun reporting that the Shape of You hitmaker had a new album completed and was readying it for a September release, according to sources.

A few days later, NME reported that after recently sharing the cheeky “Autumn is coming” post on Instagram, Sheeran provided a satirical infomercial phone number advertising “damper hampers”.

If you call +1 917 909 4498, you will hear a message taking you to Gingerbread Man Records, which teased that new stock would be coming on Thursday, 24 August—consequently, the album announcement date in the US.

Revealing a teaser behind his new album, Sheeran explained in a Sirius XM interview, “It’s an album about autumn. I kind of have no expectations for it”.

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He continued, “I made it whilst — there was the album I was trying to make, and then ‘–’ (‘Subtract’) happened. So I finished over the last year.”

In a press release shared today, Sheeran said about the album, “Last autumn, I found that my friends and I were going through so many life changes. After the heat of the summer, everything either calmed, settled, fell apart, came to a head or imploded.”

He continued to explain that “When I went through a difficult time at the start of last year, writing songs helped me understand my feelings and come to terms with what was going on, and when I learned about my friend’s different situations, I wrote songs, some from their perspectives, some from mine, to capture how they and I viewed the world at that time. There were highs of falling in love and new friendships among lows of heartbreak, depression, loneliness and confusion.”

Sheeran’s dad and brother then told him about a composer called Elgar, who composed Enigma Variations, “where each of the 14 compositions were about a different one of his friends,” Sheeran added.

“This is what inspired me to make this album. When I recorded Subtract with Aaron Dessner, we clicked immediately. We wrote and recorded non-stop, and this album was born out of that partnership. I feel he has captured the feeling of autumn so wonderfully in his sonics, and I hope everyone loves it as much as I do.”

A message from Ed…

Autumn Variations, the new album, out on 29th September. Pre-order & pre-save now!https://t.co/KTL8XSvxkR pic.twitter.com/derItS1VQQ
— Ed Sheeran HQ (@edsheeran) August 24, 2023