Songwriter, a documentary by Ed’s cousin Murray Cummings that chronicles the Grammy-winning star’s creative process, premiered last night at New York’s Tribeca Film Festival. In the movie, Ed declares that Divide is his career-defining album, but speaking to Billboard, Cummings begs to differ.
“He’s always really into whatever he’s doing. So I kind of believe him whenever he says, ‘This is the best I can be,'” acknowledges Cummings. But, he adds, “I personally think that he can get better — I can’t wait to hear what he’s doing two or three albums from now.”
While he’s been creating video content for Ed for a long time, Cummings decided to make Songwriter less about Ed the superstar, and more about Ed the artist. To accomplish this, he filmed Ed as he wrote the songs that would appear on Divide, and turned it into the 84-minute documentary.
You might think that traveling around with Ed as he tours and writes his songs is the coolest thing ever, but as Cummings tells TIME magazine, “To be honest, me and Ed, when he finishes a gig, we get a bottle of wine and a box of cheese, and we just go to the back of the tour bus and watch The Simpsons. Not very rock ‘n roll at all.”
In an Instagram video, Ed says his favorite part of the film is “the parts that I don’t remember [Murray] filming, if that makes sense.” He explains, “Murray’s very good at blending in while I’m working. So [watching it is] kinda like a blast from the past.”
Dominique Charriau/WireImageDespite the chart-topping, multi-million-selling worldwide success of Ed Sheeran’s current album Divide, at least one person close to the star thinks that he “can get better.”
