Twenty One Pilots

5.3

Foundation date: 2009

The country: USA

Town: Columbus

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Photo: Twenty One Pilots

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Twenty One Pilots biography

Twenty One Pilots is an American musical group that started as a trio and is now a duo. The guys perform in different styles from alternative hip-hop to rock and love to experiment.

Twenty One Pilots


History of creation

The band formed in Columbus, Ohio in 2009. It started with college friends Nick Thomas, Chris Salih and Tyler Joseph. The latter came up with the name “Twenty One Pilots”, inspired by the work of Arthur Miller “All My Sons”. The hero of this novel owns an aircraft factory and finds out that the next batch of spare parts is defective. He is tormented by a dilemma for a long time – to recall substandard or not, but in the end he decides to leave everything as it is. He later learns that 21 pilots were killed through his fault.

– Each of us often faces a choice: to choose an attractive solution that will bring immediate benefits, but negative consequences in the future, or unpleasant, but ultimately more useful … Our goal is to make people think.

Different stylistic spellings are possible, but the musicians are categorically against the use of numbers and, accordingly, the “21 Pilots” option.

First line-up of Twenty One Pilots


The trinity was not only friends from the student bench, but also shared tastes in music. They approached the matter thoroughly and seriously and presented to the public their debut album, the group of the same name, already in 2009. Critics praised the record as “thoughtful, free-spirited and open” and “the best representation of their views from a musical group”.

The main stages of creativity

After the release of the record “Twenty One Pilots”, the group began to actively perform within the state. The schedule became more and more dense, according to the official version, this was the reason for the departure of Nick and Chris. Tyler found a replacement in longtime pal Josh Dun, who used to play drums on House of Heroes.

Pictured: Josh Dun and Tyler Joseph


The album “Regional at Best” (2011) was already presented only by Joseph and Dan. They realized that working as a duet has its advantages: you do not need to adapt to the needs of a large team and pass your ideas through musicians with different ideas about sound. However, at the same time, Tyler began to say in an interview that he considers himself more vulnerable on stage: all the attention of the public is focused on only two artists.

The group’s debut video “Holding On To You” was released in November 2012. After performing at Columbus’ Newport Music Hall, “Twenty One Pilots” began to be looked at by record companies. Of several options, the guys chose Atlantic Records in 2012.

twenty one pilots

On their next album, Vessel (2013), the band worked with Greg Wells, who previously produced Katy Perry and Adele. By the way, the grandfathers of the band members are depicted on the cover.

The cover of “Vessel” depicts the grandfathers of the musicians


At this time, Joseph and Dan were invited to their tour by the guys from Fall Out Boy, a group with a worldwide reputation.

Twenty One Pilots is one of the few non-electric alternative bands. Joseph and Dan just don’t play it. Instead, their songs feature synths, drums, and the ukulele, a Hawaiian mini-guitar.

Twenty One Pilots spent almost the entire year of 2014 on the road and performed throughout the country. They have mini-studios on the bus, so they could write on the road. They have attended several big festivals like Lollapalooza, expanding their audience and fan base.

Blurryface is a character fictional by the band members


The album “Blurryface” (2015), according to the artists, is dedicated to a fictional character by them, personifying their own and other people’s complexes. Twenty One Pilots increasingly took to the stage in balaclavas, as music, in their opinion, should be separated from the individual and universal.

twenty one pilots often perform in balaclavas


In 2016, the band went on tour, which consisted of more than 100 concerts in different cities around the world. Russia also got into the team’s schedule: they appeared at two venues in Moscow and St. Petersburg.

Twenty One Pilots-Heathens

In the same year, the band wrote the song “Heathens” for the film “Suicide Squad”, which starred Jared Leto, Margot Robbie, Viola Davis and other famous actors. 2017 brought the duo their first Grammy, after which the artists went into the shadows for a while to work harder in the studio on new material.

Scandals

During a performance in one of the small clubs, Tyler Joseph noticed that the guy in the hall hit the girl. He interrupted the concert, went downstairs and, with the assistance of several others present, pushed the aggressor out of the institution.

At the Grammys-2017, the “pilots” came without pants


In 2017, the musicians took the stage to pick up the Grammy statuette after winning the Best Duo nomination. It was not their speech that attracted the attention of the public, but the fact that both performers were in formal suits above the waist, but without pants.

Discography

  • Twenty One Pilots (2009)
  • “Regional at Best” (2011)
  • Vessel (2013)
  • Blurryface (2015)
  • Trench (2018)

“Twenty One Pilots” now

In 2018, the group released the album “Trench”. Following this, a video for the song “Levitate” was posted on the official YouTube channel, which is considered the final part of the semi-mystical trilogy. The first parts are the picturesque music video for “Jumpsuit” and the enigmatic video for “Nico and The Niners”.

twenty one pilots

Active concert activity of musicians does not slow down. The start of the large-scale The Bandito Tour was scheduled for October autumn 2018. The musicians from Twenty One Pilots promised to visit Moscow and St. Petersburg in February 2019.

Twenty One Pilots – listen online