Ed Sheeran announces surprise new album Autumn Variations coming next month

Ed Sheeran has announced the surprise release of a new album next month.

Once again produced by Aaron Dessner (the executive producer of Subtract, who also worked with Taylor Swift on Folklore and Evermore), Autumn Variations will be released on September 29. 

In a statement, Ed says: “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.

“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.

“My dad and brother told me about a composer called Elgar, who composed ‘Enigma Variations’, where each of the 14 compositions were about a different one of his friends. 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.”

Ed's last album Subtract became his sixth consecutive UK Number 1 album, and was for a time the fastest-selling album of 2023 in the UK, before being overtaken by Lewis Capaldi's Broken By Desire To Be Heavenly Sent.

See the cover for Ed Sheeran's Autumn Variations below

Tracklist for Ed Sheeran's Autumn Variations

1. Magical
2. England
3. Amazing
4. Plastic Bag
5. Blue
6. American Town
7. That’s On Me
8. Page
9. Midnight
10. Spring
11. Punchline
12. When Will I Be Alright
13. The Day I Was Born
14. Head > Heels