Counting Stars

Background and composition

Ryan Tedder stated that "'Counting Stars' came about [in August 2012] as an idea. It was probably the most versions of any song[...]to get it right". He also called it "one of [his] two favourite songs on the [Native] album". Tedder started writing "Counting Stars" while waiting for Beyoncé to turn up to a studio session, about a month after starting to write "Love Runs Out". In an interview with the Official Charts Company, Tedder said, "I had the idea for Counting Stars originally in the summer of 2012 when I was in the Hamptons. I was working in the largest house I've ever stepped foot in, which was being rented by Jay Z and Beyoncé. I was in the middle of working on my most recent album with OneRepublic, Native, and during that time I was determined not to work with any other artists. I broke the promise because I also did sessions that year with Beyoncé. When Jay Z and Beyoncé invite you to stay with them in the Hamptons, you don't say no!" He continued: "I was out there for about five days and on the second day I woke up early and I started combing through the internet, searching for stuff that would inspire me for Beyoncé. 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. I debated playing it for Beyoncé and putting it forward for her album, but it didn't feel like a song Beyoncé would record. I immediately came up with the chorus idea, went home and for the next three months finished the Native album."

"Counting Stars" is a folk pop song with a disco beat. Ricardo Baca of The Denver Post said that the song is "an extremely effective (and infectious) song — with Tedder's polished pop hijacking a folk song, and a little R&B attitude in there as well." The band explained that the song is about "laying in bed awake at night when you're stressed out of your mind, thinking 'How are we gonna make ends meet? How are we gonna pay the bills?' You know, all those things you wanna do with your life - how are we gonna make them work? How's this actually gonna happen or come to pass? So, instead of counting sheep, we're counting stars." According to the sheet music published at Musicnotes.com, this song has a tempo of 104 beats per minute before increasing to 122 beats per minute. This song is actually written in the key of C-sharp minor, and follows a chord progression of C♯m-E-B-A.

Music video

The music video was filmed on May 10, 2013, in New Orleans, Louisiana, and premiered on May 31, 2013. The video features the band performing the song in a gloomy ground floor of a building surrounded by hanging light bulbs – which is interspersed with scenes of several people in a religious revival service on the upper floor. At the end of the video, one of the people in the service falls through the floor, coming through the ceiling of the room the band is performing in. The video also shows clips of an alligator crawling through the ground floor.

The video has received over 1.68 billion YouTube views and, as of March 2017, is the 16th most viewed video on the site.

Commercial performance

"Counting Stars" debuted at number 32 on the Billboard Hot 100 on July 6, 2013. The song peaked at number two on January 18, 2014, and stayed there for two weeks behind "Timber" by Pitbull, featuring Ke$ha. The song spent 25 consecutive weeks in the top ten, and finished fifth for the most total weeks on the Hot 100 after spending 68 weeks on the chart. It is tied with "Apologize" as OneRepublic's highest peaking single in the United States, and is their third US top-ten hit. The song has sold over 5.3 million copies in the US as of December 2014.

In Canada, the song set the record for the longest climb to number one on the Canadian Hot 100, reaching number one on its 34th week on the chart on February 8, 2014. The song has topped the charts in Canada, Finland, Israel, Poland, Slovakia and the United Kingdom, and charted within the top ten in 20 countries, including attaining top five placements in Australia, Germany, Ireland and New Zealand. In the United Kingdom, "Counting Stars" spent 34 consecutive weeks inside the top 40 before exiting. On October 11, 2014, the Official Charts Company confirmed that "Counting Stars" had sold 1 million copies in the UK.

1. "Counting Stars" – 4:17
2. "Counting Stars" (Lovelife remix) – 3:55

Credits and personnel

Covers and parodies

Uses in popular culture

Bellator MMA used the song to promote their eleventh season on Spike.

"Counting Stars" was used in the end credits and in some of the TV spots for the 2014 sci-fi film Earth to Echo.

The song was also featured in the international trailer for Xavier Dolan's 2014 film, Mommy.

The song was used in "74 Epiphanies", episode 11 of Rookie Blue's 6th season.

The song appeared in 2015 video game, Guitar Hero Live.

"Counting Stars" was used in the game MLB Perfect Inning 16 for mobile devices by Gamevil.