Twenty One Pilots is cooking up a storm in central Ohio, and is now starting to spread that across the US with their first tour venturing out of the Midwest and the release of their second LP, Regional at Best. The genre of this duo is hard to define. Take some pop, hip hop, rock, and electronic and you get the frenzy that is this band (and frenetic they are, especially live). The album keeps things cheery most of the time (“Guns For Hands”) but occasionally gets dark and introspective (i.e., the spoken word meets techno “Car Radio”). Most of the songs on the record are over 4 minutes, sometimes over 5 – breaking the mold for most dance numbers on top 40 radio. The buzz about this band indicates their live show is a spectacle to behold, and this record serves as a good preview of that. Don’t let the “poppier” tracks on the album mislead you – Twenty One Pilots means business, and that business involves shaking things up in their trademark way.
4/5 stars
