Top 7 Twenty One Pilots songs. 

After four albums the Ohio based pop duo has put out some great material, but which song is truly the greatest? The top 7 is hardly enough to truly make a best of TOP, but is it enough to make a convincing best list? Send me your thoughts at @younglifemusicreview on Instagram!

7. Semi-Automatic

Coming in at number 7 and playing with a weirdly beautiful synth groove is Semi-Automatic. This song has a great chorus playing happy chords to a darker vocal delivery paired with more dark lyrics. The bridge brings in a slightly detuned piano which brings the song to a slow down. This is beautifully contrasted with the comeback of the synth line which pulls the song back together into its original groove and punches it home. The bass on this track is another masterpiece of funkiness, perfectly playing off of the swing drums from Josh Dun.

6. Doubt

Doubt was easily my favorite song on Blurryface. The solid chords pushing up against the Hip-Hop beat brings up a Hip-Hop/Alt Pop crossover. The light dripping melodies in the background of the verses gives a nice atmosphere, while the main melody on the chorus oozes of Twenty One Pilots ingenuity. The pre-Trench references to Dema are impressive too. Finally, the reverb backed vocals of the outro bring the song home. 

5. Chlorine

At number five we have the psychedelic dreamscape of Chlorine. Oftentimes bands get lost in their own dreams, but Tyler Joseph must have lucid dreams to create this banger. The reverb and overdrive bonuses bring a hazey backdrop while the piano rolls sparkle brilliantly in the mix. The tight drumming anchors the song in reality until the end when the song unfolds its wings and goes fully into its own dreams. The claim that that inspiration kills you, like chlorine is a great connection for this song. 

4. Jumpsuit

At number four, Jumpsuit puts itself out as Twenty One Pilots’ most rocking song. No one ever thought that the first song on the album after Blurryface would have one of the most rocking bass solos of the 2010s. This songs introduction to Dema without putting on a crushing, plot-driven narrative is beyond impressive. It also finally brings us home to Tyler Joseph vocals that are not just inoffensive, but good. The bridge also brings up the synth and reverb induced dreamscapes that are scattered throughout Trench before the song brings back the bassline for an explosive finish. This song was unexpected, unneeded and not nearly popular enough, yet it provides the perfect Twenty One Pilots experience. 

3. Ode to Sleep

Ode to Sleep is Twenty One Pilots’ Bohemian Rhapsody. Its many pace changes, genre changes and time signature flips make this song so exciting. While this may not be there flashiest song instrumentally, many of the synths sound unusually cheap and cheesy, the usage of them is nigh on brilliance. The theme of demons attacking you at night, even though the protagonist promises never to do anything worth them hurting him for is interesting. People with no problems tend not to do the desperate, yet people who are frightened continually pull of stunts and crazy. Being scared is the best motivation. It shows off the start of Tyler Joseph’s singing ability developing from his near awful performance on TOP’s self-titled album.

2. The Hype

The Hype is Twenty One Pilots’ ode to the bass. This song, built around that instrument, sounds like the very reason that Tyler Joseph learned the instrument in the first place. The tightly knit grooves are something that would never have happened if he had tried to play it on a bass synth. The Ukulele playing here is just a clean, providing an anchor to keep this song, like so many on Trench, from dissolving into reverb after the bridge. The song lyrically is the story of TOP from beginning to end. Them coming up as a small group and never believing what other people said they would or should be. The siren in the background is a nice touch too. 

1. Pet Cheetah

Pet Cheetah. Twenty One Pilots best song. Some of you might say, “Wow, you have bad taste for not putting any of their top three hits on a top seven list,” and I would agree with you. However, I would argue that this song gave me hope. Hope for a Twenty One Pilots that would not be defined as emo forever. It gave me hope that critics would not just call Trench an Alt-Pop or a Dark Pop album, but a true, genre-bending movement of Pop, Hip-Hop and Rock. This song has the dreamscapes so prevalent on Trench, but the section of Rap proceeding it is easily Tyler Joseph’s best rapping combined with one of the best moving beats I have heard from Josh Dun or any other Pop artist in the last five years at least. Pet Cheetah is a movement in TOP’s music and hopefully in Pop music for “filler songs” on an album that are not garbage. Hopefully musicians will learn from the night and day pieces of this song that fit together so well to create more interesting pop music in the future.