When Twenty One Pilots hit Australia in March 2017 will there be a bigger band in the world
THERE’S only two members but Twenty One Pilots have become the biggest rock band in the world right now. They end their world tour in Australia.
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BACK when Twenty One Pilots were playing tiny clubs in Columbus, Ohio, frontman Tyler Joseph’s roommate Josh Sinclair always had the same mantra.
Each time Sinclair watched the band pack their gear into a van to play to a handful of people he’d ask Joseph “You playing the Garden tonight?’’
Seven years after forming, Twenty One Pilots are playing the Garden — that’s Madison Square Garden in New York. And they’ve sold it out. Twice.
At their first ’Garden show Sinclair was in the house (“I told him tonight ‘Yes we are playing the ‘Garden,’” Joseph says), as well as their proud parents and grandparents.
On stage an emotional Joseph struggled to verbalise the achievement beyond three simple words — “we did it”.
The duo are one of the biggest bands in the world right now — dominating concert tickets, album sales and online viewing figures globally. And it’s all been done on their own terms.
Backstage, Joseph and bandmate Josh Dun were coming to terms with the milestone achievement for any band.
“It’s something we’ve been talking about for a while, we finally did it,” Joseph said.
“We’ve played some of the smallest venues in New York, so to play the Garden is a really good narrative for what we’ve been doing all over the country and all over the world.”
A quick history lesson. Twenty One Pilots formed in 2009 with Joseph and two college friends, Nick Thomas and Chris Salih. Joseph named the band after a plot line in Arthur Miller’s All My Sons. Their self-titled debut came out in 2009; two years later the line-up downsized with Thomas and Salih out, replaced by drummer Josh Dun and Twenty One Pilots were a duo.
They christened the new partnership with 2011’s Regional At Best, leading to a record deal with Fueled By Ramen, linked to Atlantic and home to Paramore, Fun, Panic at the Disco and Gym Class Heroes.
“We’ve been lucky,” Joseph says. “Even as a young, local-level band we were able to rise out of the local scene without having any debt, without having signed the wrong deal with the wrong manager or the wrong booker or a small label. A lot of bands have an unfortunate past, we’ve dodged a lot of bullets when it comes to that.”
After a 2012 EP Three Songs, Greg Wells (Adele, Katy Perry, One Republic) produced their major label debut Vessel, released in 2013. By that stage heavy touring and a string of songs online (including some covers) had built up a loyal fanbase that saw Vessel reach No. 21 in the US. They toured the album relentlessly — and globally — for 18 months, with six singles released during that time including Holding On To You, Guns For Hands, House Of Gold, Car Radio and Fake You Out.
Their live show created a good old fashioned buzz through word of mouth. With just two members on stage, they relied on playing live instruments over prerecorded backing tapes (they’re at pains to point out how much time is spent on them) and maximised crowd interaction.
The tools they implemented in their smallest club shows are still being used playing huge arenas and festivals around the world.
At Madison Square Garden Joseph repeated his mantra “We’re Twenty One Pilots ... and you are too.” They’re not hollow words.
Their live show sees Dun play drums literally on the mosh pit, crowd surfing on a piece of perspex plastic holding him and his drum kit. There’s the giant bubble that also goes over the crowd, plus a magic trick that sees Joseph ‘disappear’ from the stage and pop up in the audience. As well as a B-stage where they play a medley of their earliest stage, Joseph sings from a raised platform at the rear of the venue for a time.
“Because it’s interacting with the crowd and interacting with the venue, it’s not something you can just phone in,” Joseph says.
“There’s variables at every single gig. I look forward to those every night. We have a lot of things that happen in our show, a lot of people from the outside watching the show might think it’s one schtick after the next. We promised ourselves we have to be there mentally. We have to be aware. We are forced to be aware. Sometimes you got to a show and you see someone and think they’re not there right now. They’re performing, but it’s muscle memory. There is no memorising some of the ways we put on a show. It’s good but it can also take a lot out of you doing that every show for five years.”
That “schtick” also helps retain their connection as the venues get bigger.
“We’re very concerned about that person in the very back, in the very top,” Joseph says of upsizing their shows.
“Even for us as a two-piece band playing in small clubs we used to worry about the person in the back of that room. So as the rooms have gotten bigger we’ve just continued the tradition of being concerned about that person all the way in the back. Now it’s just a lot further away.”
Last year’s album Blurryface has become their commercial breakthrough, with the dark lyrical and visual themes of the album (involving a lot of ski masks) carried over to their live shows.
The constant touring of Vessel helped Blurryface enter the US chart at No.1. While the album’s first two singles (Fairly Local, Tear In My Heart) were alternative radio hits in the US, the third, coming-of-age anthem Stressed Out, became their crossover moment. It went on to reach No. 2 in the US (where it’s sold over four million copies) and also No. 2 in Australia (where it’s triple platinum) and their first major hit in the UK and Europe.
“It’s a combination of lyrical content which is very relatable, and a melody I didn’t think was very strong but then turned out to resonate with a lot of people,” Joseph says of the song’s unexpected success.
“I’m proud of the chord progression in the chorus, it’s very different how it changes up — it’s cool that it’s reached the level it has.”
Ride followed the song into the US Top 10 — they became the first act since The Beatles and Elvis Presley to have five songs simultaneously in the US Top 100 — and Top 20 in Australia.
They were the breakout hit of this year’s regional Groovin’ the Moo festival in Australia. Oddly, Triple J have never supported the band, meaning they were winning over regional audiences who often had no idea who they were.
They’re also fan of unexpected cover versions — everything from Justin Bieber to Celine Dion to House Of Pain in their new tour.
“I keep a list in my phone of songs I’d like to cover so I just pull out that list,” Joseph states.
Australian audiences are among the band’s most fervent; in New York there’s a few hundred fans who’d slept out (in a heatwave) to ensure they’d be down the front as soon as doors opened. As fans left the first show, they passed diehards sleeping out to be front row for the second show.
Drummer Dun said even growing up he’d never slept out for a band.
“There’s something some of these people possess, a mindset, that I don’t have but I wish I did sometimes,” he says. “When I walked into my favourite bands it would have been a completely different experience if I would have waited there a long time, interacted with people in line or had to set up a tent or figure out a way to hydrate or eat.
“Now after experiencing this I realise how clever some people are. People are making friendships out there in the lines that last longer than 24 hours or however long they’re standing in line for or how long the concert lasts. That’s really cool. It’s a culture I’ve never really been part of unfortunately but it’s a culture I’ve been learning from afar, and one that we’ve really been inspired by.”
Joseph says fans imitating his stage costumes and props (fans put on white glasses and hats when he does during the show) happened randomly.
“It’s kind of a crazy thing. You realise how powerful this thing has become. It also reminds us of the influence we have. The fact we have a chance to set an example. A lot of bands in our position would maybe say they didn’t ask for that, they didn’t sign up for that. We’ve promised ourselves not to shy away from that, and try to step up to the challenge.”
Twenty One Pilots fans generally are all or nothing — there’s very few passengers. They feel part of a club, connected to the band. There’s intense debate online about every aspect of the band, from what lyrics mean to potential hidden Christian messages in them. The frontman regularly meets fans who say his band, and his lyrics, literally saved their lives.
“That is intense,” Joseph says. “It’s hard to hear that all the time. It makes you question what it was in the past you made that was so important to people, and so then what are you going to do next? It could potentially make you doubt you’re capable of creating something as powerful again.
“Ultimately the thing I walk away with when I hear that phrase is that it’s all worth it, all the hard work has been worth it, even if I hear that from one person, it’s all worth it.”
During the New York show Joseph tells fans a story he’s never shared — as an eight year old he told his mother “I feel like when I get older I’m going to be famous” and that he was concerned and haunted by it rather than it being an ego trip.
“Fame will always be weird to me,” Joseph says. “I can’t walk outside right now. I’m not saying I can never walk outside, but obviously it’s most densely populated with our fans or people who know who we are when we’re in a city and playing a show. And we always tend to be in a city playing a show. It’s logistically tougher to just walk around and be anonymous at that time. That’s the only downside. Everything else is pretty positive.”
Their success, and their intense fanbase, means the duo have been targeted by corporate brands. However the Emotional Roadshow world tour (showcasing Blurryface) is running without a sponsor and despite the huge production in Australia tickets are around the $80-$90 mark.
“We’ve said no to a lot of things,” Joseph admits.
“It’s as simple as ‘Sign here’ and they slap some logos somewhere and there’s a bunch of money in our pocket. Not that that’s something we would never do, but we’d want it to feel natural, with a brand we actually like and support and I guess believe in. It needs to feel right. So far none of those deals have felt right.”
“We identify with brands that are consistent and make sense.” Dun adds. “If we were to see a brand that we liked a lot, or even a band, that was all over the place and played every performance that was offered, took every sponsorship, advertised everything that was offered it’d be a complete mess. We like things to be a little more clean and conducive to an environment we’ve envisaged since day one. We try to maintain that. There’s performances and sponsorships we’ve said no to. Not that we would never do those things, but it has to line up with what we’ve envisioned.”
The duo have seen the mainstream come to them. Their sound is hard to categorise — using everything from dance beats to ukulele to reggae beats — which makes them an anomaly in an industry that likes to put bands in boxes.
“Compromise,” Joseph notes abruptly. “The further we get along in our musical career it’s left, it’s right, it’s all around us. We’ve learned a lot. We understand now more than ever why a song gets on the radio. There’s an art to it, it’s almost science, which sucks the life out of it.
“Knowing the directions you take in your decision-making while writing a song, one direction is closer towards a radio song, one is further away. You almost have to remove yourself from the fact you know whether it’s going towards one of those ways or the other.
“The way I look at it is it’s not us making those decisions, the song is making those decisions. You have to obey the song. Let the song take it where it wants to go, follow that, the song is its own entity, it lives and breathes. If it wants to be that shinier radio song, then let it be that. But at the same time most of the songs, at least those we uncover, are trying to go the other way so you just have to let them go.”
Their most recent recording is Heathens, written for the Suicide Squad soundtrack.
It’s now Top 5 in the UK, US and Australia and has been added to their tour.
Joseph was shown scenes from the film while the band were on the road in Europe and asked if he wanted to write a song for the soundtrack.
“We were swamped, but I took a stab at it,” he says. “I came up with an idea that was different than everything they’d suggested, they weren’t looking for that type of sombre song at all. But I felt like it fit a lot of themes of the movie. At the same time I was prepared for them to say ‘Thanks but no thanks’ so I wanted to make sure we wrote a Twenty One Pilots song. So we did. It just happened that they loved it. Great. So we wrote and recorded it and the whole process was 30 hours. It happened so quickly.”
The Emotional Roadshow world tour ends in Perth next April, and the duo are eyeing off their first major break. “We couldn’t think of a cooler place to wrap it up,” Joseph notes.
He and wife Jenna married last year, but as the songwriter in Twenty One Pilots he’s already working on ideas for the next album.
“We’ll definitely have some new things brewing by the time we get to Australia. As far as a timeline we’re promising ourselves we won’t realise anything until it feels right. I’m not saying that will be 10 years from now, but if it doesn’t feel right in 10 years it’s not coming out. We’re working to make sure we get something as soon as we can.”
Blurryface (Warner) out now
Twenty One Pilots, Brisbane Entertainment Centre March 27, Adelaide Entertainment Centre March 29, Rod Laver Arena Melbourne March 31, Qudos Bank Arena Sydney April 1, Perth Arena April 8. $79.90-$89.90 +bf, livenation.com.au
Originally published as When Twenty One Pilots hit Australia in March 2017 will there be a bigger band in the world
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