“No, not Ed, I don’t know any of his songs, old ginger bollocks. Jesus,” he boldly stated before revealing the star he was actually referring to: George Ezra.
“I think he writes really tremendous songs,” he said of the Shotgun singer. “He’ll be around for quite a while.”
Sheeran’s representatives were contacted by the New York Post following the comments but have not responded.
It comes almost one year after the Grammy winner was found not guilty of claims he stole key components of Marvin Gaye’s classic 1973 tune Let’s Get It On when he created his hit song Thinking Out Loud.
Sheeran was accused by Structured Asset Sales of using direct elements of Let’s Get It On - which was co-written by Ed Townsend. The late star’s daughter, Kathryn Townsend Griffin, was one of the plaintiffs in the copyright lawsuit.
The nearly two-week trial featured a courtroom performance by Sheeran as the singer insisted, sometimes angrily, that the trial was a threat to all musicians who create their own music.
Finally, after three hours of deliberation, the unanimous verdict was reached by seven jurors in a New York City courtroom in May.
“I feel like the truth was heard and the truth was believed,” Sheeran exclusively told People magazine following the decision. “It’s nice that we can both move on with our lives now — it’s sad that it had to come to this.”
