And from one man band to another. Ahead of OneRepublic's concert this weekend singer Ryan Tedder tells Belinda McCammon how they made it big thanks to one song, a guy called Timbaland and the internet
KEY POINTS:
Ryan Tedder is determined his band OneRepublic will not be a one-hit wonder.
You'll know the song the 28-year-old songwriter, guitarist and singer is referring to - the one called Apologize, with its piano driven plod.
The story goes that hip-hop producer Timbaland picked up on the songwriting talents of Tedder, remixed Apologize for his Shock Value album from last year, and made it a world wide hit. Thanks, Timba.
For Tedder, who has spent the past 10 years dreaming of success at the level the Colorado band is now at, the past nine months have been especially mad.
"It's absolutely absurd in a good way."
But Tedder and the band - which he formed in 2003 with his high school classmate Zach Filkins - are wary of their overnight success: "We said, 'Okay, let's not be that band which is like 99 per cent of the bands that come out, that has one good song and then for the life of them they can't put anything else out'. The past months have been a whirlwind but it's also been about proving to people through live shows and interviews the band is more than one single."
They released their debut album Dreaming Out Loud late last year and current hit Stop and Stare has been flying high in the New Zealand charts for 10 weeks.
If anyone is in doubt about the depth of talent, they need not look any further than Tedder, who majored in public relations and advertising at university and is already a successful songwriter and producer.
He co-wrote and produced British singing sensation Leona Lewis' hit single Bleeding Love, as well as Take A Bow off her debut album, Spirit. And he has written hits for Natasha Bedingfield, Jennifer Lopez, Lupe Fiasco, and many others.
Tedder however is dead set on making it as an artist himself.
"The process of being in a studio and writing and producing is so different from sitting on a stage playing in front of a ton of people. Until I'm 60 I will write but as far as being an artist, it'll go until it's not fun."
And he tries to keep his writing and producing work as separate as possible from the band because, he insists, it doesn't matter if it is Justin Timberlake or Madonna requesting his services, OneRepublic is his priority.
"I have moments when if other songs are doing well, such as Bleeding Love, when it can be awkward if we're competing with Leona Lewis for the same spot on a chart. That can be awkward but the promise I made to the band is that OneRepublic comes first."
While the band's success has had a lot to do with the Timbaland connection they initially started making a name for themselves via the internet.
It was guitarist Drew Brown who casually mentioned as the band gathered in a recording studio sometime during 2004 that he had signed them up to "this new thing called MySpace". When OneRepublic first used the social networking website to promote their music there were about seven million users; now the figures hover over 100 million.
"I reached a point with this band where I said, 'If we make it, it will be due in large part to MySpace', and it was the only medium we could control. Everything else in our lives and our careers we had no control over."
The exposure over a year and a half equated to millions of dollars worth of promotion for the band, he says.
"It's priceless for us." Priceless maybe, but there are some very real numbers behind OneRepublic's success.
Since 2006 OneRepublic has consistently been ranked as one of the top musical acts on MySpace. In New Zealand Apologize holds the record for the most downloaded track to date with more than 22,000 downloads since November. In the US it is only the second track to sell over 3 million downloads.
Another part of the OneRepublic equation for success is Tedder's faith. "All things are controlled in one way or another by God anyway," he resolves.
Though God and his newfound high life in Hollywood can be an unusual combination he says he still holds on to it. "Hollywood has not sucked that from me. It was the way I was raised, so for me to turn my back on my faith would be to turn my back on myself."
Tedder says he sees a lot of people in Hollywood who are running from their upbringing or from wherever they're from, and the song Say (All I Need), from Dreaming Out Loud, is about just that.
"A lot of people seeking and looking for things and that's what a lot of the album is about - meeting and running into those people and finding them. All these people are trying to find something they think is better than what they had, when in reality it's just a cheap replacement."
Tedder says he has faith that OneRepublic will "have a good run".
"If you can evolve and maintain consistency in terms of the quality of the songs, it doesn't matter how cool you are or what your MySpace page is. If you're not writing great songs no-one cares. For us it's all about writing great songs people can connect with."
LOWDOWN
Who: OneRepublic
What: American rockers best known for the song Apologize
Line-up: Ryan Tedder (vocals, guitar, piano), Zach Filkins (guitar, vocals), Eddie Fisher (drums), Brent Kutzle (bass, cello, keyboards), Drew Brown (guitar)
Debut album: Dreaming Out Loud, out now
Where & when: Sunday, April 6, Powerstation
