Dan MacMedan/WireImageOneRepublic has been virtually absent over the last few months, and now fans know why.
Ryan Tedder, the frontman of the band, penned an open letter to his fans on Facebook explaining OneRepublic's disappearance. It turns out Tedder was on the "verge of a nervous breakdown." In the extremely candid letter, Tedder addressed his exhaustion—mental and physical—and how it ultimately caused him to crack.
"We've been a band now for 10 years as of January, and in that time we have gone nonstop... album, tour, album, tour etc... on Native we toured 2 1/2 years... 50+ countries and 225 dates. We went straight from that into finishing 'Oh My My', our longest (and most difficult to finish), and straight from that into promo for 'Wherever I Go' in April 2016.
"About 3-4 weeks into the promo for the 2nd single 'Kids' I (Ryan) hit a physical, emotional, psychological wall," he wrote on the band's Facebook page.
"I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, not sleeping, on meds, not happy, anxiety on a crippling level and it was triggered from sheer exhaustion. I looked at a calendar, realized I had been gone 200 days of 2016 and still had 3 more weeks of being gone.. From my family, my wife, my kids, my friends, basically my life."
The startling epiphany made him want to quit music, quit touring, quit everything. The "thought" of touring sent Tedder into "a sweat and made me feel like I was going to have a heart attack." He also suffered "crippling anxiety." All of the ailments combined, he explained, made him lose "the motivation" and "joy" necessary to write songs. Fortunately, he wrote, "That's over now."
OneRepublic's record label allowed them to press pause on everything so Tedder and the band could reevaluate their game plan. And now they have one.
"Fortunately we still love what we do and love you guys immensely, and love performing live. LOOOOVE. So we are going to. But we are changing the entire scope of how we release music and approach touring," Tedder continued. "I had the idea even before our last album of releasing 'songs'... when we want, as often as we want, however we want. Not albums, songs. It's always frustrated me that by the time u get to a 3rd, 4th or 5th single off an album that song may have been produced 2-3 years ago....and sounds dated."
They're aware fans might not like some of what they release, but they don't care.
"All I'm ever chasing is goosebumps or emotion or fun. Love, God, Hope. What else is there? In whatever shade or color that is-- Currently I'm chasing it. I'm a songs guy, the sound is always evolving," Tedder explained. "So.... some of these songs you're absolutely gonna love... some you might totally hate, some will be a breath of fresh air and some you'll skip. And guess what? It doesn't matter. that's the point. All the songs will be me singing and us playing. So it's Us. We won't be chasing trends but we will react to what's around us, we won't be trying to re-write songs from our past but some will unavoidably sound nostalgic. SONGS."
OneRepublic has its first release scheduled for two weeks from this Friday.