Says Ed hizzelf, "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," says Ed Sheeran. "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."