Crying on stage to fearing for safety: Ed Sheeran’s ‘pity party’ weekend in its woeful entirety

The fallout from Macklemore being removed from Ed Sheeran’s tour is still raging on, and the latter made it significantly worse when he addressed the scandal at a concert over the weekend. 

In a move that saw all of the opening acts drop out of Ed Sheeran’s tour, the singer’s promoter booted Macklemore over his “Free Palestine” speech. At the time, Ed issued a lengthy statement that only served to make the situation worse. 

“My audience includes young people, often children, of all backgrounds. Those who come to my shows do not expect a political forum. I respect Macklemore’s strength of purpose to stand up and shout for what he believes. However, there is room for multiple approaches to the same end: peace,” a portion of that statement reads. 

Nontheless, the tour continued in the United States, and it sparked a few moments that have since been used as gasoline on an already burning fire. 

Ed Sheeran cried on stage as he issued a second statement

In his first show since the scandal, which took place in Philadelphia, Ed Sheeran started his concert by addressing the elephant in the room. 

In full, his teary-eyed statement read: “This is not usually how I open a show, but before I play some songs tonight I hope it’s OK if I say a few words about this last week. I’m used to my music being criticised, and I’m always happy to take that because I’m lucky a lot of you like my stuff, and to be honest I’m surprised, I’m not surprised. 

“But this week the criticism was about something much more important. And I’ve had to take and make difficult decisions, and I am making mistakes, and I’m so sorry. I don’t want to disappoint fans, and I’ve never wanted to be an activist musician, but this put me in the middle of an important and passionate argument about freedom of speech and the most complex political issue on the planet.

“My concerts have always been a safe space for everyone and that matters hugely to me. Honoring my commitment to my fans is also completely central to who I am, and that is why I’m here tonight on my own and continuing my current tour.

“But I am deeply worried about the idea of venues pre-approving content of performers. This happens in so many places I perform around the world, but it should never happen in the free world.

@independent

Ed Sheeran issued a tearful apology to fans at his Philadelphia concert Saturday night, following a week of chaos surrounding his tour.

♬ original sound – Independent – Independent

“Now, I want to address the question of where I stand in the situation in Israel and Palestine and whether my doing this concert here tonight implies where I stand. I’ve tried in my career not be a political commentator of any kind because I want my music and shows to be about unity not division, about humanity not politics.

“But this is a humanitarian issue and I cannot hide how I feel about it anymore. What happened in Israel at a… music festival on Oct. 7 was horrific and compounded centuries of Jewish pain. What is happening in Gaza is catastrophic and unjustifiable and disproportionate.

“My heart has been broken by the scale of devastation and loss of civilians’ lives, of children’s lives and the systemic justice we’re seeing unfold in the West Bank cannot be overlooked.

“I am already speaking to people across the spectrum to work out how to make a contribution that helps victims of these terrible times, and listening and learning because I do not know enough.

“I honestly am so grateful that you’re here tonight with me. This concert is still a place where everyone is welcome, and everyone here can stand beside people who have opposing views, and everyone here can stand by people that they don’t agree with on everything, but they can all agree I’m singing these songs. And these songs are about love, hope and unity.”

Much like his first statement, it was a lot of words that formed sentences. He read most of it off a teleprompter. 

He feared for his safety 

@billboard

Ed Sheeran removed the B stage from tonight’s Philadelphia show because he was “afraid of what might happen if I stood in the middle.” #edsheeran #looptour #macklemore #concert

♬ original sound – billboard

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At the same concert, Ed Sheeran decided to remove the second concert stage where he would have usually stood to be closer to fans. He removed it over fears for his safety. 

“I didn’t know what this audience would be like tonight,” he admitted.

“I didn’t know if I would have things thrown at me. I didn’t know if people would be angry at me. So I apologise that today is not the usual Loop show. I took the B stage out because I was afraid of what might happen if I stood in the middle. And I’ll admit that.”

His friends have ditched him 

It seems Ed Sheeran did more “pity party” speeches at this concert than actual songs, because in another clip, he admitted to losing friends. 

“In these situations you really find out who your friends are. It’s been a weird week,” he told the crowd. “It happened very quickly. At the same time, I had so many people telling me to cancel this tour and so many people I’ve known for years and years and years they’re kind of backing away.”

Though he did consider cancelling the tour, he added: “I see 50,000 people who haven’t abandoned me. People will say what they want, but I am doing this for you. I love you. I love this.”

As  you can proboably guess, a lot of people are angry because Ed Sheeran “centred his own feelings” in a scandal about literal war crimes. 

His remaining friends say he’s ‘broken’ 

@mikeyv499

Ed Sheeran Philadelphia #edsheeran #edsheeranphiladelphia

♬ original sound – Mike

At the same time, friends of Ed Sheeran’s spoke to The Mirror about how “broken” the singer is after the controversy. 

“As Macklemore and then all the support acts left him, and with no public displays of support from any of his musical peers, it’s been a really, really lonely place at times,” they said. 

“He has been so broken, and everyone has been trying to rally around, but it’s been hard. There have been genuine concerns that he could walk away from it all.”

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