'Counting Stars' hitmakers OneRepublic recently spoke to Billboard about their growing career and admitted that it has been a long, slow road to success, but now seems to be the real peak. 

They will kick off their full headlining tour of North America on May 28 with a concert in Colorado at the Red Rocks Amphitheatre, and frontman Ryan Tedder explained that the popularity of the tickets for this tour overwhelmed them all:

"We always knew we were going to go out again in the summer, we just didn't know in what capacity or how big or whatever. To test the waters, we picked mostly the major markets for the June tour, and it blew out so quickly in so many of the cities that... we were just kind of stupefied."

"It's always been a slow-growth process with this band; everything about this band is the tortoise. We're not the hare. We've always been the tortoise. That's what this tour is."

Referring to their hit single 'Counting Stars', Tedder added that it's great to see it doing so well because it has finally allowed them to match the success they had with 'Apologize': "It's always been a building experience for us -- like I said, we are the tortoise, we're the kid in the back of the classroom that doesn't really talk a lot and by the end of the school year might just end up being the valedictorian."

"It's incredibly gratifying because... it's our song. It's not remixed by some other person. There's nothing sonically about the song that isn't true to the band. That's the most critical thing about that song. It is where we are right now, without any filters or additives. That's what makes it so cool for us."