“Bandito” by twenty one pilots, and how it challenges my approach to creativity
By: Vani S.
Tags: Music Industry, Twenty One Pilots, Rap, Creativity, Music Review

Sahlo-Folina.

If you type this word into the Reddit search bar, chances are you might be bombarded with hundreds of threads displaying a slew of abnormally invested teenagers dishing clever, thoughtful, odd, and imaginative interpretations. Many have said that this word has linguistic roots in Somali with the first half, Sahlo, sounding remarkably close to the word for “enable.” Others claim the simple “feel” and “sound” of the word may trace it back to Latin. I disagree. I believe Sahlo-Folina is the first and only word to emerge from the language of music.

On October 5th, 2018, the band twenty one pilots released Trench, a concept album taking place in a fictional dystopian society called Dema. In this isolated and oppressive society, a compact group of disguised rebels, or Banditos, seek to escape conformity to Dema’s social hierarchy led by a clergy of Bishops in the fabricated religion of Vialism. In the song titled “Bandito,” perhaps the most unorthodox (and my personal favorite) song on the record, lead singer Tyler Joseph slows down the bridge into a beautiful, ambient-like diminuendo alongside a harmonic choir echoing the word Sahlo-Folina countless times, to which Joseph follows with a melancholy yet empowered verse: “This is the sound we make / When in between two places / Where we used to bleed / And where our blood needs to be.” In an obscure interview found in the depths of YouTube, the only explanation he offers to this curated word is this: it is spoken by the Banditos.

Inspired by Joseph’s work from a young age, I have always endeavored to use my intellect as a vehicle to discover truth through independent inventions of art and writing. My intellectual autobiography, in this sense, is the documentation of my arduous pursuit of truth. While I firmly believe that one’s truth must be discovered 1) by themselves and 2) through a meticulous and unforgivingly candid diagram of their psyche, the intellectual pursuit of truth is certainly not a lonely one. I would have to begin this intellectual autobiography by tracing back to its nativity, when discovering Joseph’s unique approach to art gave life, body, soul, and purpose to my intellect.

Intellect is inherently intangible and invisible, and therefore, can only be documented in its external manifestation. When I first began creating, whether it was art, music, or writing, I would find myself frequently confined by the limitations of the craft. I gave up writing because I couldn’t find the right words. I viewed language as an archaic and primitive medium reserved for interpersonal communication, and I felt disabled in the skill of introspection. In my aimless pursuit of truth, I maintained composure by holding onto Joseph’s inspiring verse, “faith is to be awake, and to be awake is for us to think, and for us to think is to be alive.” To live a purposeful life, the least I could do was be relentless in my pursuit.

When I write music, the fusion of introspective poetry and sonic patterns reveals that music’s distinct purpose is to serve as a vessel of expression transcending the boundaries of language. Whether it is “pain,” “fear,” or “joy,” English falls short in merely using these words as descriptive placeholders. I will never be able to feel pain as another does, because our language renders it impossible to truly experience the visceral and elusive fervor of individual emotion.

Joseph’s frustrating ambiguity with the word is both intentional and powerful. In restraining from imposing a rigid denotation to the word, Tyler Joseph creates the first and only word that takes on the personality and function of a work of art.

When I first listened to “Bandito” and researched Joseph’s story behind Dema, I was fascinated by the intricate intertwining of poetry and music that had produced such a powerful yet inexplicable piece of art. I had no idea what Sahlo-Folina meant, yet is just felt right. The musicality, texture, and tone that composed this word gave it character, depth, and belongingness. It perfectly encapsulated a cry of desperation and helplessness that is the foundation of pursuing one’s truth. Joseph had found a way to transcend the rules of language as a universalized medium of communication and music as a personalized medium of expression to create a world where there are no boundaries to materializing his process of introspection. I experienced a shift in my intellectual approach to creation and exploration. Intellect was no longer about creating art by piecing together traces of a belief within a rigid system of the status quo; intellect became the ability to think and create in a manner that is free, purposeful, and authentic.

Sahlo-Folina is consistently reincarnated in function because its definition is contingent on the subjective perception and cathartic experience of the listener. While many words in the English language carry powerful connotations to evoke feeling, there is no word such as Sahlo-Folina whose singular function of existence is to communicate customized emotion rather than absolute definition.