Music Review/Reseña de Musica: Trenches by Twenty One Pilots

  

Music Review/Reseña de Musica: Trenches by Twenty One Pilots

Hi

Frankie here and today I will be reviewing the new album Trenches by 21 Pilots.

The album was released on 5th of October of 2018 and contains 14 songs of which 11 new songs with 3 already were released before ( Jumpsuit, Nico And The Niners and Bandito)

It was recorded between 2017 and 2018.

The CD in general uses the band's trademark mix of indie pop, reggae and hip hop while having a generally  sad overtone in the rhythms and lyrics.  This CD in addition uses the screaming resource of  heavy metal to an accentuation effect This CD also has a interesting uses of silence with fade to make the music in between the silence stand out.

We start with the heavy over saturated guitars of "Jumpsuit" in which we find the first example of the Screaming technique usually seen in heavy metal.  Then we pick up where the prior song left off and introduce us to the journey of "Levitate" that uses the heavy drums of hip hop and the hip hop vocals that distinguishes this band.

Then we jump into the hip hop beat and upbeat singing in falsetto in "Morph" which is an interesting fusion between indie pop and hip hop. The aforementioned hip hop beat is also used in the next song: "My Blood" about the love for a son. though in this sound it has a reverb that gives it a haunting quality, This song is a bit repetitive but it also shows the Falsetto that is seen throughout this CD.

The song that comes on next is "Chlorine" about the uses of drugs to "get away from life". It starts with a distorted conversation and is reminiscent of Coldplay.  After that comes  the love song "Smithereens" that uses a break in the tempo of the chorus to cause an interesting effect.  It has the trademark style of this band in it's sad cracking voice at the beginning.

After that comes "Neon Gravestones". This song uses the same technique used by the vocals of artist Imogen Heap.  It begins with a dark ominous piano then breaks into a hip hop beat and is a message about death. The Oasis classic (Wonderwall) reminiscent "The Hype" is similar in the lyrics to the issues addressed by the song My Generation by The Who. Again this uses the screaming technique found in Heavy Metal.

"Nico And The Niners" is the ninth track and is connection to the first track (Jumpsuit) which, in turn, also mentioned the titular characters of this song. This song uses hip hop beats with heavy distortion and reverse track in some parts for a dark effect. The reggae backed "Cut My Lip" is the 10th song and the reggae backing turns a bit more poly sound and psychedelic towards the end.

"Bandito" starts with a falsetto singing and later introduces a hip hop beat though the part that is formally delivered thru the rap styling is vocalized without beat  It reminiscence of Clocks by Coldplay.

Another heavy hip hop sounder is "Pet Cheetah" titled which is referenced in the Hip Hop solo.  This song also uses the heavy metal induced screaming technique and I found the ending a bit repetitive. "Legend" talks about his ego and reminds of the work of Pharell.  It begins with a upbeat piano that is joined by a urban beat all that sang in falsetto and has a lesser dark imprint than the rest of the songs of hte album.

finally "Leave the City" is a metaphor for death nad it begins with a marching band drums. The vocals are styled similar to David Lynch's Good Day Today. Uses the wording cleverly to declare "they know it's almost over!" to reference death but also the end of the CD. The clever usage of metaphors is a very well used resource in this song.

In general I love this band despite the clear vocals and the generally dark and sad themes it's mix of mainly three genres (Hip hop, indie pop and reggae) mixed with screaming, when not overused, is a deeply reflexive band, though I do not like many of the songs per album because of the dark themes and general depressing style.

TL;DR: The band mixes genres well but the dark themes and style tends to drive me away.

Thank you for reading

Frankie