FROM HERE
Written by: Eric Hultgren
A moonlit Saturday evening as cool fall air chills 102,000 fans waiting for Twenty One Pilots to begin their largest and longest show to date.
Suddenly, the stadium explodes in a wash of red as every screen and every bracelet adorning those fans ignites. Tyler Joseph, lead singer of the band, ascends the second stage as nearly every eye in Ohio Stadium is locked on the main stage. As the drone of the explosion fades, the chords of “Goner” start, faint and unmistakable.
We are starting here?
There are few bands on Earth with a fandom where they might start like this. Typically, the band starts with “Overcompensate,” which sets the tone for the rest of the set. Starting with “Goner” lets you know, as a fan, this is going to be a show to remember.
I first saw this band in October of 2013 when they were touring with Vessel. It was so early in their career that I was able to let one of my Aquinas College students, who was from Columbus, interview them for a school project. (There is a video of that somewhere on YouTube.)
To go back and watch the video evidence of that show, you can easily see how we got here. In fact, I remember saying to my friend Julian that they would never play a place that small here again.
They didn’t.
So Saturday night was a culmination of 17 years of hard work, tours, and a vision. The story Tyler and Josh have been creating over those years is captured in the lore about a character named Clancy. This storyline, which puts us as fans in the Avengers: Endgame part of the story, makes a typical Twenty One Pilots show different from other rock shows.
The words rock opera really don’t capture it. Imagine if George Orwell, Philip K. Dick, and Lin-Manuel Miranda created a musical, and you might be closer.
That would make Saturday night the culmination of that story. The ending of an era.
This means my 10-year-old, who is aware of Clancy and Josh as the Torchbearer, had the time of his life. It also means the five women behind me, who grew up here, saw the band play in smaller venues than I did, and have joined what might be described as the religion of Twenty One Pilots, had their faces melted on Saturday night.
All while Tyler, against the backdrop of a car in flames, dipped his hands in the black paint symbolizing the corruption of his character. A callback to earlier tours and theatrics.
For me?
I will remember this show for the rest of my life, putting it alongside a gift of other incredible shows like Pearl Jam’s first time at Wrigley Field, Rage Against the Machine at the Roseland Ballroom, or Alice in Chains opening for Van Halen (what a time).
This show stands on its own because of the backdrop of the city. Twenty One Pilots loves Columbus, and to be able to come back home and put on a performance like that, with a 38-song set, a drone show, a fake sports broadcast (Google it), the pyrotechnics, a song with the Ohio State Drum Line, and every other Easter egg that the three-hour set held, is both hard to quantify and explain to others.
In fact, I am still sitting here on Monday morning trying to turn this into a cohesive story that conveys the dizzying heights I felt on Saturday, seeing two of my absolute favorite bands (Death Cab for Cutie opened) with one of my absolute favorite humans.
What is next for Twenty One Pilots?
I assume rest. They are playing a festival in Mexico City in November, but then the schedule goes dark, and I imagine we might have to wait some time for them to go back out on the road.
But even when they do, this is something you will never see again, even if they play Ohio Stadium again.
Because the first time you see a magic trick like that, and trust me, Saturday night was magical, it changes you and those around you.
Does it change me enough to become an Ohio State fan? There are limits to my fandom, my friends.
But it certainly changes my understanding of the last thing Tyler says at every show.
“We are Twenty One Pilots, and so are you.”
That finally makes sense to me.
