Seal wishes he’d written Ed Sheeran’s hit ‘Thinking Out Loud’.
The ‘Kiss from a Rose’ hitmaker has huge admiration for the pop megastar – who has 13 number one singles in the UK and has sold more than 150 million records worldwide, making him one of the world’s best-selling musicians – and says his says success simply comes down to being a brilliant singer and songwriter.
Speaking to Classic Pop magazine, Seal said: “The key to being a musician is not to lose sight of the fact that we’re just singers and songwriters.
“That’s it, that’s the job.
“Do that singular job and do it well.
“You can do other stuff like getting political in addition, but make sure you’ve got your songs together.
“That’s one reason I have the utmost respect for Ed Sheeran.
“I don’t own any of Ed’s records. I’ve not seen him in concert.
“But anyone who can stand up there at Wembley Stadium and play for three nights in a row, playing to 90,000 people a night with just an acoustic guitar: that’s someone who does one thing really great.
“He writes fantastic songs and he sings them really well.
“If Ed couldn’t do that, people wouldn’t show up.”
Seal loves Ed’s 2014 hit ‘Thinking Out Loud’, hailing it “one of the greatest songs ever written”.
He added: “Whenever I hear it, I think: ‘God, I wish I’d written that.'”
By comparison, Seal has sold more than 20 million records globally and has two number one albums.