In Defense of Scaled and Icy
twenty one pilots make their most divisive album to date, but there's more to the album's shimmery pop sound and detached paranoia than meets the eye.
Well, I was going to have to talk about this band eventually. Might as well start now.
So. twenty one pilots. The alternative rock band that built one of music’s biggest musical niches of the past few years. Enough so that the band scored major hits in 2016 and cemented Blurryface as a turning point in pop music of the 2010s. One of the ideas I’ve had for this newsletter was to look back at Blurryface and evaluate why I still hold it so near and dear to my heart. It’s pretty easy to call the album flawed, and cringy, and uneven, and pretentious… which it is. But I still have a lot of reasons why that album means so much to me, especially in the context of where I was when I first got into it. I’ll still get to it someday, maybe when I can find another appropriate time to do so. But for now, there’s a bigger fish to fry. Or in this case, a bigger dragon.
I’m going to assume if you’re reading this, spend time online, and have at least a passing knowledge of modern music, you know this guy. Anthony Fantano aka The Needle Drop. Biggest critic on Youtube and the internet sphere as a whole known for his dry wit, dorky personality, and insufferable fanbase. I bring him up because as the most prolific critic in online music discussion, his opinion does kind of mean something to a lot of people. So seeing the score he gave Scaled and Icy filled me with a lot of dread for what it means for the discourse. I’m not even all that shocked by it. Fantano has a history of not reacting well to certain style shifts, and considering how much he loved Trench from 2018, I’m not surprised something with fewer stakes and a more plastic sound would sour on him that much.
What DID shock me was how much The Clique seemed to agree with him.
This heel turn wasn’t out of nowhere. People were having doubts about the album as early as the second single, “Choker”. Which was a lot more lowkey and strange compared to the flashy energy of “Shy Away”. “Choker” is weird. Very weird. It has this bubbling electropop sound paired with a scuffling beat and drifting atmosphere. It’s not particularly catchy aside from the “Mmmm” sound that sprinkles the song, and the hook sounds like it’s falling down into an endless void. Not particularly anthemic or powerful. It sounds detached from itself, and I can understand why a lot of people felt iffy about it when it first came out. Things did not get better with “Saturday”, which was an utterly left-field move for twenty one pilots to make. A straight disco song with lyrics that seem to be about the shallow partying that the band had (supposedly) dismissed on previous albums. The band’s dessenters couldn’t stand the flashy chipper aesthetic and the fans felt like they were lost and missing something from this pop pivot.
I’ll admit, I wasn’t sure what to expect from Scaled and Icy when it released. I liked all the singles, even with their oddities. “Shy Away” is one of the best songs of the year and honestly one of the best songs of the band’s career. “Choker” is weird, but I kind of liked its weirdness and themes of dread over whether or not the people in Tyler Joseph’s life should even trust him.
But “Saturday” was the single that fascinated me. For years, I’ve heard twenty one pilots described as pretentious or resentful of modern pop music. Not that it came from nowhere. Songs like the rejection of conformity on “Lane Boy” and the tangents on “Heavydirtysoul” didn’t exactly help. You can tell the fanbase at least believes it. A lot of them view twenty one pilots outside of pop music, even with their radio hits. And their focus on lyrics and mental health kind of painted them as above the generic, plastic pop music that’s usually accepted by pop radio. Personally, I always thought that was an unfair view of them, as a lot of the lashing out at pop culture on Blurryface was more stemming from an identity crisis being plagued by insecurity and doubt. Even then, I think the success of Blurryface humbled them a little bit, as they not only started competing in the big leagues, but they ended up inspiring artists to follow in their style, making that form of pop music in itself part of the “lane” they wanted to reject.
That’s probably why “Saturday” ended up embracing its disco-heavy pop sound. It’s an embrace of pop that twenty one pilots have always had, just being more willing to take cues from modern pop music instead of the little bit of everything that Blurryface had. To be honest, I think they pulled it off incredibly well. Greg Kurstin’s contribution to the song’s flashy aesthetic helps build the song’s nostalgic sound, and with the whole album out, it now makes sense why the outro feels like it’s breaking apart. The whole song is a shield against the insecurities and fear within Tyler Joeseph and how lockdown will affect his relationship with his wife. Not in a “meant to be bad” way, but more in trying to lose yourself in a happy, comfortable aesthetic to keep yourself from spiraling.
In that sense, I’m actually surprised that last year’s single “Level of Concern” didn’t make Scaled and Icy. It embodies a lot of the same elements that embody the entire album, right down to its disco pop sound. More importantly, it has lyrics that explicitly refer to quarantine and how it feeds on Tyler’s insecurities. There’s not as much lore to this song as their is on Scaled and Icy, but it still hits all the same themes and sets up this album’s arc in one neat little package. You could almost call it Scaled and Icy’s thesis, with the only blockade being that it’s merely a standalone song meant to give people some comfort within the pandemic. And even then, I wouldn’t exactly describe this song as “comfortable”.
I guess this is the part where I actually start talking about the album. If the issue most people have with it is not being into the sound, I do kind of get it. There’s more going on with the production that I’ll touch on later, but going from Trench to this will absolutely feel weird on the first listen. Scaled and Icy is for sure a grower for me because I loved it more the second time around now that I know what to expect. I also wouldn’t get too attached to Trench when comparing this album, because both set very different goals. Trench is a lot more atmospheric and murky, traversing through its darker impulses and fears in trying to find light on the other side. Scaled and Icy is probably more comparable to Vessel, which was on-edge and sorting out its own scrambled emotions. Where Scaled and Icy differs is its themes and “narrative”, and why I feel so compelled to defend this album. Because in its strange style shift away from Trench, I worry a lot of people missed something when taking this album into consideration, especially Fantano.
The moment I “got” Scaled and Icy was this interview with The Hype where Tyler Joseph revealed the true meaning of the title; “scaled back and isolated”. Once I understood that, so many things about the album fell into place. A lot of it was recorded in quarantine, and they center around Tyler Joseph’s mental state as he found himself once again alone with his thoughts. But this time, he has a wife and kid. And one of the main things at the forefront is his family and his newfound role as a father. It’s not even just about his wife (“Saturday”) and his kid (“Formidable”). His brother is the subject of “Shy Away”, his dad is involved in the backing vocals of “Bounce Man”, and “Redecorate” is a contemplation of Tyler Joseph and what the impact on his family will be as touring starts up again and he will have to “part” from them once more.
Actually, another notable thing about this album is that the songs “Good Day” and “Redecorate” are meant to be the first and last songs on the album respectively. Most of the album could be listened to in any order, but the opener and closer are intentional. Both are songs where Tyler imagines a hypothetical in his life involving loss and learning how to move on as if everything was suddenly taken away from him. In the case of “Good Day”, that scenario is bleak. Imagining himself at rock bottom with no wife or kid, losing his job, and being at his worst point mental health wise. All behind a bright, piano-driven bounce as Tyler Joseph tries to convince himself he’s having a good day, even when everything around him falls apart. Meanwhile, as mentioned before, “Redecorate” was inspired by a friend whose son died and his decision to leave that son’s room the way it was to preserve his memory. But Tyler asks the question whether redecorating the room would allow him to move on or if keeping that memory is what keeps him together. It’s a hard question that he never really answers. Not that he needs to anyway. It’s a scenario that his anxiety made up in his head, especially after “No Chances” shows DEMA, the manifestation of his insecurities taking shape in the most impactful people in his life (whether it’d be personal or even parasocial with fans), overwhelming Tyler and even sucumbing to them if it meant saving someone else like his daughter.
I think that’s where a lot of people get confused with this album. As a song off a previous album once said, this one’s a contradiction because of how happy it sounds, but the lyrics are so down. Scaled and Icy is RIDDLED with uncertainty and insecurity. It just uses its colorful aesthetic and retro production to distract itself from it. At first, I thought “No Chances” was a jarring song in that aspect. After an album with shimmering sounds and flashy hooks, this one was imposing and claustrophobic. Really dark production and a massive, chanting chorus that felt almost like a villain song. It made a lot more sense the second time around though, because it was the moment I saw Tyler Joseph’s defenses lower itself. DEMA might have been lurking in the background this whole time, but this is the moment where they take control. I’ve heard a bit about this theory of “SAI is propaganda”, implying that something about Scaled and Icy isn’t “real”. Which I don’t really believe, as this album is very sincere and its only deviation is in its production, but it does make sense if you take it in context of how Tyler copes with his emotions this time around. Tyler has always wore his emotions on his sleeve, but now he seems to be hiding from them. Or at the very least, trying to live in optimism and deflecting DEMA from other people in his life, especially his family. I’ve heard this album described as cryptic a lot, and to be fair it’s not like this is an easy album to get. Someone like Fantano probably wouldn’t notice these themes if he’s not actively looking for them. Someone like Mark Grondin of Spectrum Pulse can because he’s always given the lyrical content of the music he reviews a proper analysis, but on the surface, this does feel like something is off.
And yet, it’s in that alienation where Scaled and Icy’s greatest strength lies. It’s not an easy album to get, but once you understand the circumstances, especially in quarantine where the focus on the individual and his family are heightened, a lot of things fall into place. Suddenly, you know why “Shy Away” is on this album despite not quite sharing the same sound as the rest of the album. It’s a connection to a sibling trying to save him from the insecurities that have already plagued Tyler Joseph. Now we know why “Saturday” feels like a sell out. It’s Tyler trying to spend time with his wife and prove to her she’s truly worth it by deflecting from fear and work and just partying the night away. Now you know why “Never Take It” feels really on edge about the divide that media enforces in every day conversation. When we’re locked in our houses, unable to escape from the heightened tension of the real world, these are the only conversations we can have, and that can fuck with your mental health. Fantano dismissed this song as diminishing the importance of today’s politics (probably not helped by the weird episode Tyler Joseph had on Twitter over Black Lives Matter), but I don’t think its dismissing that conversation, so much as feeling overwhelmed by the constant discourse and growing divide caused by higher powers who want to weaponize our desperation. Enough so that recentering by learning a new instrument can be healing in keeping your head on straight and not losing yourself to doomscrolling. In a similar vein, “Mullberry Street” is where Tyler explores an area that’s familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. In reality, he hasn’t gone anywhere, but things are still different enough that it puts him on edge a little bit, even if others tell him to relax. Which I find especially interesting in relation to quarantine and how different things feel as we slowly transition out of lockdown, readjusting to modern life and revisiting moments that now suddenly feel alien. It especially hits with mask mandates being lifted and vaccinations rolling out, at least in the United States. Everything is going back to normal… so why doesn’t it feel like it?
Again, that’s what makes this album so special to me, and why it gets better with every listen. It so perfectly captures that strange feeling of being on edge and waiting for the worst, even when everything is just fine. Who knows what could be provoking this? Maybe it’s your insecurities, maybe it’s your uncertain place in your family, maybe it’s how this ongoing pandemic has affected our mental health. Either way, what’s important is to keep on moving and be there for those who are worth it to you. Even if it may be too late for your mental health, or you know you’re headed down some sort of spiral, the least you can do is save the people closest to you. This makes Scaled and Icy kind of bleak for Tyler in that aspect. It’s as if he’s already gone, uncertain of his future and where it’s headed. But then again, the best parts of himself still live within his family. Maybe it’s that spirit within them that keeps DEMA from ever fully controlling him.
We might get another album from twenty one pilots this year. It’s not impossible. Maybe this one will be more reminiscent of Trench and Fantano will slap a 5 on it this time. Maybe this one will be called NATION., delivering on the promise that Kendrick Lamar never made. But if this is all we get from them this era, I’ll gladly stick up for it. Hopefully my scattered thoughts were able to justify this album’s existence for you, even if only a little bit.