twenty one pilots is an American musical duo from Columbus, Ohio. The band was formed in 2009 by lead vocalist Tyler Joseph (born: December 1, 1988) along with Nick Thomas and Chris Salih (born: September 18, 1985), both of whom left in 2011. Since their departure, the line-up has consisted of Joseph and drummer Josh Dun (born: June 18, 1988).
History[]
2009–2011: Formation and self-titled album[]
Tyler Joseph first met future bandmate Nick Thomas at a young age while playing youth basketball in Columbus, Ohio. Thomas later transferred to Joseph's middle school, and the two would remain friends throughout high school.
Joseph began playing music after finding an old keyboard inside his closet, a Christmas gift he received from his mother, and began mimicking radio melodies. In 2007, Joseph recorded a solo album, No Phun Intended, in his parent's basement. Thomas contributed guitar to several songs on the album, and collaborated with Joseph on the track "Trees", which would later become a signature Twenty One Pilots song.
While attending Ohio State University, Joseph met Texas-born future bandmate Chris Salih at a party. Noting the songwriter's talent and creative energy, Salih consulted Joseph about starting a band. Impressed by the recording studio Salih had built in his house, Joseph agreed to play music together and began sharing his ideas for new music. Just before their first performance, Joseph invited Thomas to join the unnamed band as a bassist. In 2009, the group moved into a house of their own, where their first album was conceptualized and recorded in the basement.
The band initially played for a wide variety of audiences at clubs and venues around the Columbus area. Playing at metal, hardcore, and electronic venues influenced Joseph to incorporate these disparate styles into his songwriting. To catch the attention of unfamiliar or disinterested attendees and promoters, the band began to experiment with costumes and on-stage acrobatics.
Now going by the name Twenty One Pilots, the group released their debut, self-titled album, Twenty One Pilots, on December 29, 2009, and began touring Ohio. Their initial marketing was grassroots; Joseph's mother would stand outside of Ohio State University, giving away tickets to their shows. During this time, the band participated in various "Battle of the Band" contests at The Alrosa Villa and The Basement, important Columbus music venues.
In 2010, the band posted two tracks to their SoundCloud account, a cover of "Jar of Hearts" by Christina Perri and a remixed interpretation of "Con te partirò (Time to Say Goodbye)" by Andrea Bocelli and Sarah Brightman. The latter track would become the first song that local drummer Josh Dun heard from the group.
Joseph, Dun, and Salih participated in musical efforts of a Columbus, Ohio, church Five14. They contributed to four of fourteen tracks for their album Clear, with Travis Whittaker and the gospel rock band "New Albany Music." In 2011, Joseph appeared in a three-part video called "The (moderately inspiring tale of the) Longboard Rodeo Tango", and sang "O come, O come, Emmanuel" in another video, Christmas With the Stars.
2011–2012: Lineup changes and Regional at Best[]
Salih left on May 8, 2011 to focus on work, and Thomas left the next month on June 3, 2011 to focus on schooling, both posting farewell notes on the band's official Facebook page. Before departing the project, Salih invited Guitar Center co-worker and friend of the group Josh Dun (former touring drummer for House of Heroes), to take his place in the band. Impressed by the band's potential and Joseph's creative vision, Dun abandoned plans to pursue drumming in Nashville and joined the project only a few weeks before Thomas left the group.
Both Salih and Thomas remained involved with the band's production for some time after their departure. Thomas briefly attended school in North Carolina, but moved back into Joseph and Dun's house in Columbus a year later and began to manage their merchandise. Thomas remained a part of the merchandise distribution crew throughout the production of Blurryface and continues to stay actively involved in the band's tour cycle. With a new lineup consisting of only Joseph and Dun, Twenty One Pilots self-released their second album, Regional at Best, on July 8, 2011. The album was accompanied by a free CD release show on the grounds of New Albany High School. While Salih and Thomas were involved with the conceptualization of the album, neither they nor Dun claim to have had much involvement with its production, which was handled nearly exclusively by Joseph. The album features Joseph's brother Zack on the track "Kitchen Sink" and Joseph's college acquaintance Jocef on the track "Be Concerned".
In November 2011, after months of cultivating a fan base in the Columbus area via social media interaction and constant touring, the band played a sold-out concert at Columbus' Newport Music Hall. This notable accomplishment for an unsigned local group caught the attention of several record labels interested in seeing if the band's appeal could stretch outside of Ohio. That same year, the duo put out two free songs via their email newsletter: the original version of "House of Gold" and "Two".
Joseph and Dun embarked on the Regional at Best Tour with rock band CHALLENGER!, documenting it in a series of videos uploaded to the Twenty One Pilots YouTube channel.
2012–2014: Major label signing and Vessel[]
In April 2012, the band announced their signing to Atlantic Records subsidiary Fueled by Ramen, the label responsible for the commercial success of popular alternative rock artists like Panic! at the Disco and Paramore, during a sold-out show at the Lifestyle Communities Pavilion. On July 17, 2012, they released their debut Fueled by Ramen recording, an EP entitled Three Songs. The next month, the band embarked on a short tour with Neon Trees and Walk the Moon.
Tyler Joseph successfully negotiated to maintain ownership of the preceding self-titled album, which remains available digitally. However, as part of a signing agreement in 2012 with record label Fueled by Ramen, rights to Regional at Best were transferred to the label, meaning that Regional at Best was discontinued and removed from digital markets. Regional at Best tracks "Slowtown", "Anathema", "Ruby", "Be Concerned", and "Clear" have since been made commercially unavailable, and physical copies of the album are now rare and highly sought after.
On November 12, 2012, the official music video for "Holding on to You", directed by Jordan Bahat, was released on YouTube. On January 7 and April 19, 2013, the band released music videos for "Guns for Hands" and "Car Radio", respectively, both directed by Mark Eshleman of Reel Bear Media.
In an interview with the Huffington Post, Joseph described Regional at Best as a "glorified mixtape" and confirmed that songs from that project would reappear on their major label debut studio album. Ultimately, five tracks from Regional at Best – "Guns for Hands", "Holding on to You", "Ode to Sleep", "Car Radio", and "Trees" – were re-recorded and released for their third album. "Lovely" was also re-recorded and released as a single in Japan on April 17, 2013. "Glowing Eyes", "Kitchen Sink", and "Forest" appeared unchanged as bonus tracks on the UK version of Vessel.
Twenty One Pilots' third album, Vessel, was released January 8, 2013; it would reach No. 21 on the Billboard 200, No. 9 on the Digital Albums chart, No. 17 on the Internet Albums chart, No. 15 on the Rock Albums Chart, and No. 10 on the Alternative Albums Chart. The band's first charting single, "Holding on to You", reached No. 11 on the Billboard Alternative Songs chart. Additionally, the singles "Guns for Hands" and "Lovely" reached No. 21 and No. 67, respectively, on the Japan Hot 100.
In May 2013, Twenty One Pilots were announced to join Fall Out Boy as opening acts on their Save Rock and Roll Arena Tour, along with Panic! at the Disco, also serving as opening acts. On August 8, 2013, Twenty One Pilots performed "House of Gold" on Conan in their late night debut. On October 2, the music video for the song was uploaded onto YouTube. On March 17, 2014, Twenty One Pilots performed a set at the MTVU Woodie Awards during SXSW. On April 13, Twenty One Pilots performed "Car Radio" at the 2014 MTV Movie Awards. On April 28, the band performed "Car Radio" on Late Night with Seth Meyers.
In 2014, Twenty One Pilots played a number of music festivals and other events around the United States, such as Lollapalooza, Bonnaroo, Boston Calling, and Firefly. Requests from many of these cities were incorporated into the band's first headlining tour, the Quiet Is Violent World Tour, which began in September 2014 and ended in November of the same year.
On December 31, 2014, the band released a music video for the song "Ode to Sleep". Composed of footage captured by band creative director Mark Eshleman from three concerts over the preceding three years, the video depicted the band's rapid growth from their origins as a small local band to a nationally popular alternative act, an upward trend that would continue into the next album cycle.
2015–2017: Blurryface[]
On March 16, 2015, the band announced that a new album, Blurryface, was to be released on May 19. They released the first single, "Fairly Local", on March 17. Their second single of the album, "Tear in My Heart", and its music video were released on April 5, 2015. On April 28, "Stressed Out", the third song released from the album, was released along with a music video. "Stressed Out" became the group's highest selling single, peaking at No. 2 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, and No. 1 on both Alternative Songs and Hot Rock Songs charts, while also surpassing one billion views on YouTube, on May 13, 2015 the music video for "Ride" was released.
Blurryface was released two days early on May 17, 2015 and sold 134,000 copies in the first week in the U.S. which made it the band's first No. 1 album on the Billboard 200. On May 22, 2016, Blurryface won in the category of "Top Rock Album" at the Billboard Music Awards, while the band won the category of "Top Rock Artist". The band began the Blurryface Tour on May 11, 2015, in Glasgow, Scotland. The tour spanned the United States, Australia, Asia, and Europe. The U.S. leg began September 8, 2015 and featured Echosmith and Finish Ticket as openers. Twenty One Pilots performed "Stressed Out" on Late Night with Seth Meyers on September 14, 2015. The band announced a London show in February 2016, and later announced a run of UK dates, with a second London date added. The band Transviolet served as openers. This run of UK dates ended the initial Blurryface Tour.
Soon after, the band announced a second tour for the Blurryface album, the Emotional Roadshow World Tour, which started in Cincinnati on May 31, 2016. The tour covered the United States, Canada, Mexico, Europe, and Australia. Chef'Special and Mutemath opened for the American leg. Irish singer Bry joined the tour for its European leg.
On June 16, 2016, the band released the song "Heathens" as the first single from the Suicide Squad soundtrack, earlier than the expected release date of June 24, after the song leaked onto the internet on June 15. A music video for the song was released on June 21, 2016. "Heathens" plays during the ending credits of the film.
Twenty One Pilots became the third rock act to have two singles simultaneously chart in the top five of the Billboard Hot 100, joining the Beatles and Elvis Presley, in addition to becoming the third duo to accomplish this feat, after Outkast in 2003 and Macklemore & Ryan Lewis ten years later.
Twenty One Pilots performing in London in 2016
In September 2016, the band contributed a cover of the piano ballad "Cancer" by My Chemical Romance to the tribute album Rock Sound Presents: The Black Parade. An animated lyric video followed the release of the song.
Twenty One Pilots featured as the musical guest on Saturday Night Live on October 8, 2016, performing orchestra-accompanied versions of "Heathens" and "Ride" in what Rolling Stone called their "most high profile performance yet". The band later performed a medley of "Heathens" and "Stressed Out" on the American Music Awards of 2016, where they also accepted their first awards on American television for Favorite Pop/Rock Duo and Favorite Alternative Rock Artist. On November 25, 2016, the band released a limited-edition live vinyl album documenting two performances at Fox Oakland Theatre, on the duo's 2015 Blurryface Tour under the name Blurryface Live. Joseph and Dun collaborated with alternative rock band Mutemath, for a five-song EP, TOPxMM, composed of remixes and re-imaginings of four tracks from Blurryface and the song "Heathens". The EP was uploaded onto the band's official website free of charge on December 19; a 25-minute long video of the bands recording the songs live in studio was also released on the band's YouTube channel.
On February 12, 2017, Twenty One Pilots won a Grammy Award for "Stressed Out" in the Best Pop Duo/Group Performance category. The band stripped to their underwear before taking the stage, with Joseph claiming in their acceptance speech that this was a fulfillment of a promise the duo had made each other in their early days as a local Columbus band.
On March 27, 2017, the band began selling tickets for Tour De Columbus, a five-date hometown tour taking place in June 2017. The duo performed at several small venues they first played as a local band including The Basement, Newport Music Hall, and Express Live!, before ending their tour cycle with arena shows at Nationwide Arena and Value City Arena.
In an interview with Alternative Press in November 2016, Twenty One Pilots stated that after their last show, they will be "going dark" to focus on new music. Joseph stated that he would like to focus on lyrical content of the music, and bring the music back to the "authenticity, lyrics, delivery, and fearlessness of songwriting" similar to that of the self-titled album. The band's last activity came in July 2017 in the form of posts on social media depicting an eye closing over lyrics from several of their songs.
In March 2018, their song "Hometown" received a gold certification from the RIAA, making Blurryface the first full-length album to have every track achieve at least gold certification.
2018–2020: Trench[]
In April 2018, a cryptic message was uncovered on the band's web store, which revealed a website. Fans began using clues and found other sections of this site, hinting at the possibility of the band's return. There were multiple images uploaded to the website, including letters from a character named "Clancy". In July 2018, Twenty One Pilots broke their year-long silence, first sending a cryptic email to fans and later posting a video to all social media platforms and updating their logo and branding. Tyler Joseph made his first media appearance in over a year for an interview with Zane Lowe of Beats 1 from his home studio in Columbus, Ohio, in which he spoke about the band's year long hiatus, creating the new album, and battling against personal demons and insecurities.
On July 11, 2018, the band released two new songs, "Jumpsuit" and "Nico and the Niners", as well as the music video for "Jumpsuit". They also made the announcement of their fifth studio album, Trench, scheduled to be released on October 5, 2018, and a new world tour, titled "The Bandito Tour", starting October 16. Later, on July 26, 2018, the music video for "Nico and the Niners" was released. The song "Levitate" was subsequently released as the album's third single via Zane Lowe's Beats 1 show as the day's "World Record". The music video was also released, concluding the trilogy series.
On August 20, 2018, at the MTV VMAs, a ten second long snippet of the song "My Blood" was played at the end of a commercial promoting the album. On August 27, 2018, the band made "My Blood" available on streaming services as the album's fourth official single. Twenty One Pilots released their fifth album, Trench, on October 5, 2018. On the same day, they released the music video for their single "My Blood" on their YouTube channel. Trench debuted at number one on the Billboard Top Rock Albums and Alternative Albums charts. All 14 tracks from the album charted in the top 25 of the Hot Rock Songs chart, where five tracks were in the top 10.
On September 12, 2018, Twenty One Pilots played their first live show in over a year, titled A Complete Diversion, at O2 Brixton Academy in London. They performed the four released songs from Trench, as well as some songs from their previous albums, to promote the album and the upcoming The Bandito Tour. Twenty One Pilots performed their single "Jumpsuit" at the 2018 American Music Awards on October 9, at the Microsoft Theatre in Los Angeles. On November 1, the band performed stripped-down versions of "My Blood" and "Ride", as well as covered Damien Rice's "9 Crimes", in BBC Radio 1's Live Lounge. BBC Radio 1 visited the band in their hometown and filmed the session at the Newport Music Hall in Columbus, Ohio, for the kickoff of the Live Lounge Month, a month-long series of performances from different artists.
On October 16, the band embarked on the worldwide The Bandito Tour, starting in the U.S. and continuing with legs in Oceania and Europe. They also announced additional 2019 tour dates for shows in Canada, Mexico and the U.S. Gab Ginsberg of Billboard described The Bandito Tour as a "must-see performance," noting the band's stunts during the set which included leaping, backflipping, vertical crowd-surfing, suspended bridge walking, and scaffolding scaling.
On January 22, 2019, the music video for "Chlorine" was uploaded to YouTube upon the song's release as a single and was directed by Mark C. Eshleman of Reel Bear Media, featuring an alien-like creature named "Ned". The band headlined a number of festivals in the summer of 2019, including Reading and Leeds and Lollapalooza.
On March 4, 2019, the band revealed to NME that they were already starting the writing process for their sixth studio album, mentioning a character that has not appeared in any Twenty One Pilots-related material yet.
On June 19, 2019, a re-imagined version of "Chlorine", titled "Chlorine (19.4326° N, 99.1332° W)", was released. It is the first song to be released from the Løcatiøn Sessiøns. Other songs in the series will include "Ride", "Smithereens", "My Blood" and "Cut My Lip". In 2019, Nationwide Boulevard in Columbus, Ohio was temporarily renamed to Twenty One Pilots Boulevard to celebrate two hometown shows at the Nationwide Arena in Columbus, where the band also opened up a pop-up shop named "Ned's Bayou".
On July 16, 2019, the song "The Hype" was sent to US alternative radio as the sixth single from the album Trench.
On April 9, 2020, the band released a new single, "Level of Concern". The song's lyrics reference the anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic, and its accompanying music video was filmed in Joseph and Dun's homes while they were under lockdown due to the pandemic. Joseph directed a portion of the song's proceeds to Crew Nation, a charity for live music crews who cannot be paid during the international quarantine.
On December 8, 2020, the band released a Christmas single, "Christmas Saves the Year", following a Twitch stream by Tyler Joseph.
2021: Scaled and Icy[]
The duo's sixth studio album, Scaled and Icy, was released on May 21, 2021. The album's name is an anagram, which spells out "Clancy is dead", and is a play on the phrase "scaled back and isolated", penned by Tyler Joseph.
On March 4, 2019, five months after the release of their fifth studio album Trench, the band confirmed that they were working on their next studio album. About the possible theme, Joseph said, "there's a character that hasn't been talked about on any record yet that plays a huge role in the narrative that obviously will need to be talked about and it's probably where we're going next". On April 9, 2020, the duo released the song "Level of Concern", which marked the first musical output by the duo since the release of Trench.
In November 2020, Josh Dun revealed that they were still working "remotely" on the album, with both members being in different locations. He describes the recording process: "we both have our own studios, which is really nice, so he comes up with a lot of stuff at his studio, sends it over to me, and then I come up with some stuff here at my studio and then send it back". They began teasing the band's new era in January 2021. The album was first teased on April 6, 2021 through dmaorg.info—a website the band uses to share lore—via a poster including the text "New Album and Livestream Experience". The album was officially announced by the band a day later. The lead single "Shy Away" was released the same day, along with a music video. The second single from the album, "Choker", was released on April 30, 2021, alongside a music video. The third single from the album, "Saturday", was released on May 18, 2021.
The band announced a concert livestream two days before the release of the lead single "Shy Away", which occurred on May 21, 2021, coinciding with the album's release. The livestream, described as being "career-spanning", included live performances of songs from Scaled and Icy, as well as previous records. Buying a ticket to the livestream provided fans a six-week pre-show experience with exclusive access to merchandise and album variants. In a promotional video, Josh Dun compared the pre-show access to the experience of queuing with other fans before a concert begins.
On June 16, 2021, Twenty One Pilots announced the Takeover Tour, during which they will spend one week in each city of the U.S. and one in Mexico, performing at small clubs as well as large venues. The tour began in Denver, Colorado in September 2021. On July 23, 2021, the artists Half Alive, Arrested Youth and Jay Joseph were announced as openers for the U.S. leg of the tour.
On July 8, 2021, a little over a month after the release of Scaled and Icy, the duo released an official music video for the song "Saturday", followed by a behind the scenes on the making of the video not long after. On September 8, 2021, it was announced by the duo that a virtual concert in the online video game Roblox would occur on September 17. They also collaborated with fellow Music YouTuber TeraBrite Games to giveaway some of their items on the event which is Virtual Roblox Items and a T-shirt.
2024: Clancy[]
On February 15, 2024, exactly 1000 days after Scaled and Icy was released, The band updated their album covers on Apple Music, YouTube Music, and Spotify with red tape over their covers of the previous four albums. On the same day, 1500 IRL letters were sent out to fans around the world. On the letters would be a letter from Clancy, A map of Trench, and "Evidence" Around this time staff from iHeartRadio and SiriusXM accidentally announced that the band had music coming out soon. On February 17, 2024, in Poland, the very 1st of many billboards showed the band's new logo over a video of the fire. They would leave the SAI logo and go back to the |-/. Later it would be revealed that the text around the billboard would be "Clancy", the album name. More would be found as the month progresses.
On February 22, 2024, Twenty One Pilots released a video titled "I Am Claney". A 4:04 video catching everyone up on the lore. The music used in the video was the Christmas version of "The Outside" and their new song. The video also showed that in the lore Tyler Joseph is Claney. The band announced that one week after that video, a new single from the album would drop. On the 28th, three new letters would drop on dmaorg. The letter would be written in text and not handwritten like in letters past. "Follow the torches"" and "Fly by" would be encrypted from these letters. The same day the album cover would be leaked. The cover showed a black and white Tyler and Josh
On February 29, 2024, the first song off of Clancy would be dropped titled "Overcompensate". It was also revealed that the album Clancy would be released on May 17th, 2024, 9 years after Blurryface. A world tour was also announced titled "The Clancy Would Tour". The release date would get moved to May 24th to avoid competition with Billie Eilish, who released her album on the 17th of May, and it was announced each song would get a music video. Other songs released as singles would be Next Semester, Backslide and The Craving. The band also selects cities to host either a small concert performed by the band or a listing party for the whole Clancy album.
RIAA Certification[]
There are two types of RIAA Certification an artist/duo/band can get. Gold, meaning the song has sold 500,000 units, and Platinum, meaning the song as sold 1 million units. The only TOP albums to not have any certification are Self-Titled and RAB. With both Vessel and Blurryface having every song earn at least a Gold certification at one point, they became the 1st band in history ever to achieve that feat. Trench as an album has a Platinum with 5/14 of the songs on the track list having a certification. Scaled and Icy, the latest album, has 2/11 songs on the track list to have certifications.
Gold (Earliest to latest)
- Not Today
- Screen
- The Run and Go
- Trees
- Cancer (My Chemical Romance Cover)
- Semi-Automatic
- Fake You Out
- Truce
- Nico And The Niners
- The Hype
- Shy Away
- Saturday
- Scaled and Icy (Album)
- Levitate
- Morph
Platinum (Earliest to latest)
- Fairly Local x1
- The Judge x1
- Vessel (Album) x1
- Migraine x1
- Trench (Album) x1
- My Blood x1
- Level Of Concern (Single) x1
- Chlorine x2
- Jumpsuit x1
- Stressed Out x13
- Car Radio x3
- Blurryface (Album) x6
- Doubt x1
- Guns For Hands x1
- Hometown x1
- Tear In My Heart x3
- House Of Gold x2
- Goner x1
- heavydirtysoul x2
- Heathens (Suicide Squad Soundtrack) x11
- Lane Boy x2
- We Don't Believe What's On TV x1
- Polarize x1
- Ode To Sleep x1
- Holding On To You x2
- Ride x9
- Message Man x1
Trivia[]
- Tyler used to have a channel named slushieguys, where he would upload a series of random videos, ranging from parodies, to sketches, and song covers. The channel however was shut down in 2013.
References[]
