Twenty One Pilots (stylized as twenty one pilots or twenty one pilots) is an American musical duo from Columbus, Ohio. The band was formed in 2009 by lead vocalist Tyler Joseph along with Nick Thomas and Chris Salih, both of whom left in 2011. Since their departure, the line-up has consisted of Joseph and drummer Josh Dun. The duo is best known for the singles "Stressed Out", "Ride", and "Heathens". The group received a Grammy Award for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance at the 59th Annual Grammy Awards. The band independently released two albums, Twenty One Pilots (2009) and Regional at Best (2011), before being signed by record label Fueled by Ramen in 2012. Their label debut, Vessel, was released in 2013. The duo achieved breakthrough success with their fourth album, Blurryface (2015), which produced the successful singles "Stressed Out" and "Ride" and became the first album in history on which every track received at least a gold certification from the Recording Industry Association of America.[2][3] The release of the single "Heathens", recorded for the soundtrack of the film Suicide Squad, made the group the first alternative artist to have two concurrent top ten singles in the United States. The duo's fifth studio album, Trench, was released on October 5, 2018.

Joseph was born in Columbus, Ohio and grew up with two brothers, Zachary Philip "Zack" Joseph (also a singer) and Jay Thomas Joseph (a Twitch streamer), along with one sister named Madison Grace Brett. His mother, Kelly Joseph (nee Stryker), was a math teacher in the Olentangy school district before being named Olentangy Orange High School's basketball coach in 2013.His father, Christopher Anthony "Chris" Joseph, was also a coach at Worthington Christian High School from 1996 to 2005, and is a former school principal. Joseph played basketball from a very young age and went on to play point guard for Worthington Christian. In 2008, the varsity basketball team placed second in the Division IV state tournament.Future Twenty One Pilots bassist Nick Thomas also played on the same team with Joseph, the pair having performed the National Anthem at one of their games. From 2007 to 2013, Joseph uploaded short comedic skits and videos to a YouTube channel named "slushieguys". The channel currently has over 113 thousand subscribers as of November 2018. After seeing a songwriter perform at a High Street club, he rejected an opportunity to play basketball at Otterbein University, along with a scholarship to the university. He began playing music after finding an old keyboard in his closet, a Christmas gift from his mother, and began mimicking radio melodies. From around 2007 to 2008, Joseph recorded a solo album titled No Phun Intended in his basement. It was soon later revealed that Thomas contributed guitar to several songs on the album. Among Joseph's first performances with Twenty One Pilots, he recounts that his mother would often stand outside of Ohio State University giving away tickets to his shows. "She'd be like, 'Come see my son play music'", Joseph says.

Dun was born in Columbus, Ohio, to Laura Lee Dun (nee McCollum), a hospice social worker, and William Earl "Bill" Dun, a physical therapy assistant. He grew up with two sisters, Ashley Bonnie Lee and Abigail Christine "Abbie" Dun, and a brother named Jordan Christopher Dun. Dun states that his adolescence was somewhat rebellious. "I just had this aggression," he says, noting that his parents nearly kicked him out when he was 14. "They almost sent me to military school. They didn't know what to do with me, and I was always in detention. I never got into drugs or alcohol, but I would yell at my parents and just treat them terribly. Everything was an argument." Dun would often skateboard down to the local music store and purchase records, most of which were of the punk rock genre. His parents used to set strict rules on what type of music Dun was allowed to listen to, so instead he asked people at the store to recommend albums to him. "I'd hide albums like Green Day's Dookie underneath my bed," Dun says. "Sometimes they'd find them and get real mad. They'd find a Christian alternative, like Relient K, and make me listen to that." Regardless, Dun says, "Looking back, they were trying their best." Dun initially took trumpet lessons at school, but was "never awesome at it". He said the lessons only taught him how to read music rather than create his own. Dun turned his attention to drums but decided to teach himself rather than take lessons, believing at the time that "somebody else teaching me how to play an instrument... was kind of prohibiting me from being creative". One method Dun references was imitating the beats of the records he'd buy on an electronic drum kit. Dun did not attend college, instead living with friends and focusing on musical hobbies. "I was going nowhere," he says. "One day I said to my dad, 'Are you disappointed that I'm working a minimum-wage job, and I didn't go to college?' I'll never forget his response. He replied, 'It's not about how much money you make or what your job is, but it's more about your character. For that, I'm proud of you.' It gave me motivation." Dun worked at Guitar Center for three years alongside his friends. It was here he met former Twenty One Pilots drummer Chris Salih, who introduced him to future bandmate Tyler Joseph.