Due to The Clancy Tour rolling through town, Newark’s esteemed Prudential Center became an immersive alternative rock experience on September 17. Twenty One Pilots did more than grace the stage that night – they did what they do best, and that is turn the entire arena into their stage. It’s not news that The Aquarian has been supporting Twenty One Pilots since the beginning of the Blurryface era, and since then there have been four albums over nine years. Tours have been held, pits have been moshed in, hits have taken over (radio and streaming services), and both weddings and babies have been had. The band outdoes themselves in everything they do. They found their sound? Oh, they did it again, but better. They’re playing arenas? Well, now they’re playing bigger ones.
Twenty One Pilots, as a Grammy-winning duo, understands that their only competition is themselves, and it shows by the constant raise in quality of the material that fans new and old gravitate to. With that in mind, this specific show we attended here in New Jersey was one of the best performances we’ve seen in years (from them or anyone else).
When most bands reach superstardom, their live show will begin to consist of them putting a massive LED screen behind them, shooting off some occasional pyro, and calling it a tour for the adoring fans who bought the tickets and had their expectations in the first place. However, Twenty One Pilots has yet to do that, and we don’t think they ever will. Tyler Joseph and Josh Dun continue to push the boundaries of what constitutes a ‘concert.’ With The Clancy Tour, there were multiple stages for the band to perform on, so the pair were alternating between in the middle of the pit, the sides of the pit, the main stage, and even just performing while walking through the crowd. (These two aren’t new to walking, surfing, and performing on top of and over the crowd, as well.) The electric music filled the room as expected, and the band themselves utilized every square inch of Prudential Center to further bring it to life. They were intent on giving every fan they could a front row seat, which is not something seen very often in the industry, hence why it made such a positive impact on us.
Photos by Valentino Petrarca
While you can read a more in depth review of the band’s new album, Clancy, we are going to blatantly say right here, right now, that it is a phenomenal album. It continues what are easily some of the band’s most intricate and emotional songs to date. These new tracks more than landed live. The band played 11 songs off of this new album and all of them fit into the setlist with absolute ease. (Honestly, the two songs performed off of their last record, Scaled and Icy, felt more out of place than the entirety of Clancy, or anything else.)
Joseph and Dun would also go on to play medleys throughout the show, which saw them quickly switching up between “Tear In My Heart” and “Backslide.” They also played a mix of their older hits, featuring “Addict With A Pen,” “Migraine,” and even “Forest” off their removed and hidden album Regional At Best. This further showcases how prolific the band had become in the 2010s, and now into the 2020s. Their catalog is so vast and powerful that they physically could not fit any more songs onto a setlist. In order to give the proper fan experience they were aiming for, they had to put together medleys in order to fit it all in. Some bands can’t even fill an hour-and-a-half with straight hits, yet Twenty One Pilots did it with 28 songs. They played for two-and-a-half hours and the fans could have easily seen them on that stage for another hour for deep cuts and favorites.
There’s not much else to say that hasn’t been said a million times. It doesn’t matter if you hear it from us, Rolling Stone, Kerrang!, or any of the other rock outlets in the industry right now; there’s a reason Twenty One Pilots continue to dominate the alternative rock industry. For a band that doesn’t really have an exact genre to classify them in either (and hasn’t for the last decade), they put on one of the most concise, and overall greatest shows you’ll ever see. The Clancy Tour is a must-see. Their new album Clancy is a must-hear. Twenty One Pilots are a must on all your lists in 2024.
Photo by Valentino Petrarca
