Some rabid fans camped out overnight in line for the sold-out Van Andel Arena show and Ohio’s Twenty One Pilots rewarded them Saturday with a show for the ages. (Review, photo gallery)
Ultra-Energetic Display: Twenty One Pilots played to a sold-out Van Andel Arena on Saturday. (Photo/Anthony Norkus)
The last time Twenty One Pilots was in Grand Rapids, they played The Orbit Room and packed it to the brim with a thousand loyal fans — an impressive feat at the time.
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On Saturday, for their second visit only two years later, the rock- and pop-fueled alt-hip hop duo sold out Van Andel Arena and fans were awed by the spectacle.
Masked Musical Mania: Twenty One Pilots on stage at Van Andel Arena. (Photo/Anthony Norkus)
“I’ve been waiting so long for this concert and it finally happened and I was like crying the whole time,” said fan Katie Bekkering, 16, of Grandville just after the show.
“This music saved my friend’s life … so in a way, it pretty much saved my life, too. I loved all of it. The old songs were so good; the last song tonight was breathtaking.”
The craziness started well before the the two-piece from Columbus, Ohio, took the stage – a moment that sent the crowd into a frenzy, a driving force towards the front, pitching and rolling like a tumultuous sea.
It was hectic even before frontman Tyler Joseph climbed into a giant blow-up hamster ball and “stage-rolled” across the overflowing crowd of longtime fans, newcomers and shrieking teenage girls.
And before the dazzling light show, before the striking musical diversity, or the incredible live energy — even prior to the arena filling up with, quite possibly, 12,000 of the most devoted and impassioned fans around, who sang, rapped and screamed every last note.
Before any of that, there was a buzz was in the air.
LINING UP EARLY, ROARING BEFORE THE FIRST NOTE
By 5 p.m., despite a persistent rain, a line had already started to wrap around the block, two hours before doors opened. Some fans arrived around noon, others as early as 6 a.m. A few die-hard fans even spent the night camping downtown alongside the mammoth arena to reserve a spot in line, their tents still wavering in the wind. The moment doors opened, the mass of eager concertgoers let out eruptive applause, reverberating off of nearby buildings.
Diehard Fan Base: Thousands of Twenty One Pilots fans jammed Van Andel Arena. (Photo/Anthony Norkus)
In a matter of minutes, thousands flooded in and filled the arena.
The audience as a whole become a living, breathing entity, it seemed, with a mind of its own. A crowd-initiated wave started in the furthest reaches of the balcony, before soon expanding to a dizzying panorama of raised hands and elongated “Ohhhhhs.” Random countdowns occurred, crowd-surfing, deafening applause for the unassuming sound techs as they walked back and forth on stage, all before any music began.
Opening bands were soon to follow, each displaying a unique but appropriate sound for the evening. Chef’Special, a reggae/rap/pop group from The Netherlands started things off, while New Orleans-based Mutemath unleashed a wild, rock ‘n’ roll performance before the main event.
As Twenty One Pilots takes the stage, chaos ensues — but a communal, intentional chaos. A rush of bodies pushes for the front, the audience moving as one towards the stage.
Through fog and blinding lights, a ski mask-covered Tyler Joseph (lead vocals/keyboard), and Josh Dunn (drums), can be seen back-lit, frozen in place on raised platforms.
HOUDINI-LIKE AND ENERGETIC
Opening with the very first track from their most recent album, “Blurryface,” the duo plows through the upbeat track, “Heavy Dirty Soul,” at peak intensity. Joseph stands at the back of center stage, singing into a microphone that dangles from a rope, stepping away every chorus to rattle a tambourine, that’s thrown to him from offstage.
The performers continue with a mixture of old and new songs, playing “Migraine,” “Hometown” and “Polarize.”
A Spectacle: Amid confetti and clouds of smoke, Twenty One Pilots had the crowd in a frenzy. (Photo/RIcky Olmos)
The lights go black for a transition. Joseph returns, ditching the ominous ski mask for a bright Hawaiian shirt and ukulele in hand. During the ever-popular, “House of Gold,” the crowd chants along at an ear-piercing volume. Ukulele-prominent tunes, “We Don’t Believe What’s On TV,” and “The Judge” follow.
In a Houdini-like move, lights fade and fog spills onstage. When the bright, white beams return, they illuminate a now empty stage, the band nowhere to be found. Soon, cheers ignite and rotating 180 degrees from main stage, Joseph and Dunn stand atop a 20-by-20-foot stage in the very center of the arena with instruments in place. They nostalgically float through a medley of seven old fan favorites in-the-round, a thank you to longtime followers.
The final stretch of the show includes a collaboration with Chef’Special and Mutemath joining Twenty One Pilots on stage to perform a batch of extraordinarily diverse covers: “Twist and Shout,” “Love Yourself,” and “Jump Around.”
Popular radio hits, “Holding on to you,” “Stressed Out” and “Tear in My Heart” see the crowd at its loudest. Joseph’s lead vocals are barely heard over the wall of voices. The same goes for “Car Radio,” a cult fan favorite, featuring mostly spoken-word/rapped lyrics and a breakdown that spurs all 1,000 audience members on the main floor to jump in unison.
Dynamic Duo: Twenty One Pilots at Van Andel Arena (Photo/Anthony Norkus)
One of the most impressive aspects of the show, however, comes in the form of the unfiltered energy and pure athleticism maintained by Joseph and Dunn for the duration of the show: Dunn makes his signature backflip onstage seem effortless; Joseph runs the length of the stage two to three times per song, ending with a full sprint that helps vault him up and over his upright piano.
The show ends with an encore and the song “Trees,” in true grand finale form. Starting as a melancholy piano ballad, the track morphs into a dance beat, the crowd now vertical once again. Stagehands launch two platforms with drums onto the the sea of fans, and they float like rafts out ten feet from stage.
Joseph and Dunn climb atop, red flecks of confetti falling around them, and pound on drums with everything they’ve got, all the while being held up by an audience of devote fans – both literally and metaphorically.
PHOTO GALLERY: Twenty One Pilots, Mutemath, Chef’Special
Photos by Anthony Norkus
