News: OneRepublic’s ‘Counting Stars’ Passes One Million Sales
2 min read
(UK) OneRepublic have announced that their song ‘Counting Stars’ – written and produced by the band’s front man and Grammy Award winning singer-songwriter and producer Ryan Tedder, has become one of the UK’s biggest-selling singles of all time, as revealed by OfficialCharts.com.
Just in time for the start of their UK tour (which kicks off in Dublin on Oct 19 and includes dates at Liverpool’s Echo Arena and The O2, London), the US band’s chart-topping track has broken past the million copies sales barrier in the UK, according to Official Charts Company sales data, joining just over 150 other records to reach this milestone in British chart history.
Counting Stars first entered the UK Top 40 in August 2013, eventually hitting Number 1 on the Official Singles Chart seven weeks later, spending two non-consecutive weeks at the top. The track then went on to spend a full unbroken year inside the Top 75, only the seventh single in history to achieve this feat. Counting Stars still remains to this day inside the Official Singles Chart Top 100, having never dropped out since it entered the chart some 61 weeks ago.
Explaining the story behind Counting Stars, frontman Ryan Tedder, who has also penned a string of UK chart-toppers for the likes of Leona Lewis and Ellie Goulding, revealed to OfficialCharts.com that he started working on it whilst staying with Beyonce and Jay Z in the Hamptons. Ryan explains:
“On the second day I woke up early and I started combing through the internet, searching for stuff that would inspire me for Beyonce. I ended up coming across this weird song that had this indigenous folk sound to it that just struck me like lightning. I didn’t like the verses or lyrics, but I loved the feel and movement of it. That ended up inspiring Counting Stars.”
Ryan continued: “I debated playing it for Beyonce and putting it forward for her album, but it didn’t feel like a song Beyonce would record. I immediately came up with the chorus idea, went home and for the next three months finished [OneRepublic’s] Native album.”
With Counting Stars now officially recognised as one of the UK’s best sellers of all time, it might just have been a good decision. OneRepublic’s new single I Lived is due to be released 9 November.
