in Trench, I'm not alone.
Pressures of a new place roll my way
Jumpsuit, jumpsuit, cover me
Jumpsuit, jumpsuit, cover me
Trench is the fifth studio album by American musical duo Twenty One Pilots. It was released on October 5th, 2018 through Fueled by Ramen, and was the band's first album in three years following the breakthrough success of their fourth album, Blurryface (2015). It was also the first release of Elektra Music Group after its revival.
The album was made during a year-long break from public appearances that the band took starting on July 6th, 2017 in order to rest and focus on new music. Much of the album was co-written and co-produced by Paul Meany, frontman and keyboardist for the rock band Mutemath, with whom the band had previously worked in 2016 to recreate five of their songs live. The album was reportedly recorded in secret; Meany was the only person involved in the album's songwriting aside from band members Tyler Joseph and Josh Dun, and Tyler stated that he only showed the album to people around him when it was finished.
In a first for the band, the story for Trench was created before the songs, as the album is based on a large, elaborately plotted conceptual world. This world primarily revolves around a dystopian city named Dema ruled by a theocratic government of nine bishops,note with "Trench" being the wider continent in which Dema is located. The album additionally follows the efforts of a citizen of Dema named Clancy to escape the city, through which he enters affiliation with a rebel group called the Banditos who aim to liberate the people of Dema (notably with the use of the color yellow,note which the bishops cannot see). In continuing the band's thematic focus on subjects like mental health, faith, and self-image, Dema has been interpreted as symbolic of the oppressive feeling of insecurity or mental illness, with the journey out of Dema and through Trench representing the ongoing struggle to overcome such feelings. The album's storyline has also been interpreted as a Crisis of Faith due to comments made by Tyler about the album being influenced by a shift in his Christian beliefs.
The majority of information about the album's concept was first disseminated through an Alternate Reality Game centered around the website "dmaorg.info", which served as an introduction to the album cycle for the band's fans when it was discovered in April 2018. Trying to fully understand the album without this background knowledge is difficult if not impossible, as the songs and music videos make reference to and depict parts of the lore but rarely outright explain it, and other parts of the lore have been left up to fan interpretation. (A rough timeline of the ARG can be found here
.)
The band embarked on their sixth tour, the Bandito Tour, to support the album; it began on October 16, 2018 (under two weeks after the album's release) in Nashville, Tennessee and concluded on December 13, 2019 in Chicago, Illinois.
Trench was supported by six singles: "Jumpsuit", "Nico and the Niners", "Levitate", "My Blood", "Chlorine" and "The Hype".
The Dema storyline was continued in the band's sixth album, 2021's Scaled and Icy, and is slated to be concluded by their forthcoming seventh album, Clancy.
Tracklist
- "Jumpsuit" (3:58)
- "Levitate" (2:25)
- "Morph" (4:19)
- "My Blood" (3:49)
- "Chlorine " (5:24)
- "Smithereens" (2:57)
- "Neon Gravestones" (4:00)
- "The Hype" (4:25)
- "Nico And The Niners" (3:45)
- "Cut My Lip" (4:43)
- "Bandito" (5:31)
- "Pet Cheetah" (3:18)
- "Legend" (2:53)
- "Leave The City" (4:40)
Troping on straight chlorine:
- Animal Motifs: As of Trench, vultures have become increasingly prominent in the lyrics, marketing, and story. Tyler also notes he dabbled in several different animal-based metaphors on the album, referring to himself as a lion in "Cut My Lip" and writing a whole song about his "pet cheetah".
- Arc Number: Nine. There are nine bishops guarding Dema and the 9th song is called Nico and the "Niners".
- Concept Album: Trench is even more dedicated to a single high-concept idea, namely the efforts of a protagonist named Clancy to escape from the control of the dystopian city of Dema. Songs like "Nico and the Niners" that refer to details about Dema's theocratic government of nine bishops are all but impossible to understand without reading the supplementary materials. Unlike their previous works, Trench is their only album where the concept was created before the songs.
- Dead Artists Are Better: Discussed in "Neon Gravestones". While the whole song is about how the mindset of glamorizing suicide by deifying victims after they die should be opposed as much as possible, the second verse shows Tyler openly contemplating it for a moment, knowing how much people's outpouring of sympathy afterwards would be great for his image and sales.I could use the streams and extra conversations
I could give up and boost up my reputation
I could go out with a bang
They would know my name
They would host and post a celebration - Genre Roulette: Trench features a hard-edged rock anthem ("Jumpsuit"), an experimental reggae/rap song featuring the ukulele ("Nico and the Niners"), a pure hip-hop track ("Levitate"), and a groovy pop rock song with elements of disco and funk ("My Blood") — and those were just the promotional singles.
- Epic Rocking: The songs on Trench contain more extended instrumental components than most of the band's preceding discography, extending the runtime on songs like "Chlorine" and "Bandito".
- Self-Referential Track Placement: "Nico and the Niners", which serves as the 9th track.
- Can you build my house with pieces?
I'm just a chemical
Can you build my house with pieces?
I'm just a chemical
Can you build my house with pieces?
I'm just a chemical
Can you build my house with pieces?
I'm just a chemical
