British singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran opened up about his Irish roots in the latest episode of "The Louis Theroux Podcast," which dropped on Spotify yesterday, Monday, June 9.
In the podcast episode, Theroux asks Sheeran if his dad is Irish.
"My dad is," Sheeran said, before adding, "Well - his dad's from Northern Ireland, his mum's from Southern Ireland.
"I would say, yes, he's Irish, but either side."
Theroux then pointed out that Sheeran tends to refer to himself more as English as opposed to British.
"I don't know, really," Sheeran said.
"Maybe that's just a nuanced thing. I don't know. I wear an England football shirt when they play."
Theroux acknowledged: "What a tricky fence to straddle sometimes."
Sheeran replied: "But that's if you're gonna get into politics.
"I class my culture as Irish, I think that's what I grew up with.
"My mum's family is very, very small, it's her and her parents. My dad's family - he's got seven brothers and sisters, massive.
"So we'd spend all of our holidays in Ireland. My first musical experiences were in Ireland. I grew up with trad music in the house.
"So, I do, I identify culturally as Irish, but I was obviously born and raised in Britain."
Theroux advised: "Don't overthink it."
"I don't overthink it," Sheeran said, "but I do feel like my culture is something that I'm really proud of and grew up with and want to express.
"And I feel like just because I was born in Britain doesn't necessarily mean that I have to just be British.
"There's loads of people I know that are just sort of half or a quarter."
He added: "I don't think there's any rules to it. It should be how you feel and how you were raised and what you lean into."
When asked if he gets "a lot of love in Ireland," Sheeran said: "Yeah. I'd say it's basically my second home, musically.
"I'd say Ireland is the place that I am most successful musically, it's definitely the per capita - yeah."
You can listen to Ed Sheeran on "The Louis Theroux Podcast" here:
Ed Sheeran's Irish roots
As Sheeran told Theroux, his paternal granddad is from Northern Ireland, while his paternal grandmother was from Gorey in Co Wexford.
Sheeran frequently leans into his Irish roots - he's recorded his hit song "Thinking Out Loud" in Irish, while his 2017 album "Divide" famously featured his take on "Galway Girl," as well as his original song "Nancy Mulligan," an ode to his Irish grandparents.
"One was Protestant from Belfast and one was Catholic from southern Ireland," Sheeran said about his paternal grandparents to music journalist Zane Lowe in 2017.
"They got engaged, and no one turned up at their wedding.
"He stole all the gold teeth in his dental surgery and melted them down into a wedding ring, and they wore borrowed clothes to get married, and just basically have this kind of 'Romeo and Juliet' romance, which is like the most romantic thing.
"So I thought I'd write a song about it and make it a jig."
RTÉ was on hand in Co Wexford in 2017 when Sheeran's proud Irish granny got to listen to the song she inspired:
Separately, discussing his version of "Galway Girl" on BBC’s "Desert Island Discs" podcast, Sheeran said: "It was based on the fiddle player in [Irish trad band] Beoga, Niamh [Dunne].
"She's married to an Irishman, a friend of mine. I had the band in my house for an extra day so I was like, 'what can I write about? She plays the fiddle in an Irish band... right, cool, let's write a song about that.'
"She inspired the first line but the rest of the song isn't about anyone, I just made up a story."
Sheeran admitted he was concerned that Steve Earle has a song with the same title.
"I actually tried to find another lyric," he said on Desert Island Discs.
"I did Wexford Girl and Clonakilty Girl and Cork Girl ... none of them worked.
"But the whole point of folk songs is taking inspiration from the past and making something new - so people will just have to deal with it."
Deal with it, they did - "Galway Girl" is one of Sheeran's biggest hits, clocking a massive 1.45 billion streams on Spotify.
He even got famous Irish American actress Saoirse Ronan to star in the accompanying music video, which has a staggering 612 million views on YouTube:
Discussing the Irish influence on "Divide," Sheeran told The Irish Times in 2017: “I grew up on Planxty and The Chieftains, and I really like Irish music.
"I don’t think enough people use it in pop music.
"For some reason, it’s considered twee and old, but it’s such exciting, youthful music, it should be at the forefront of pop culture.
"Hopefully, if these songs are successful, more people will do a bit more like it.”
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