Death Cab for Cutie’s Ben Gibbard continues ‘tradition of music’ with Twenty One Pilots opening gig

Monday, August 17, 2026 at 10:29 AM

Death Cab for Cutie is opening for Twenty One Pilots for an Oct. 17 show at Ohio Stadium in the "Stressed Out" duo's hometown of Columbus, Ohio. Frontman Ben Gibbard tells ABC Audio that the gig came together thanks to mutual admiration between the two [...]

Death Cab for Cutie is opening for Twenty One Pilots for an Oct. 17 show at Ohio Stadium in the "Stressed Out" duo's hometown of Columbus, Ohio. Frontman Ben Gibbard tells ABC Audio that the gig came together thanks to mutual admiration between the two bands.

"They've been big fans of our band for quite awhile, and they're great dudes, they're really great people," Gibbard says of Tyler Joseph and Josh Dun. "They asked us to play with them, and we were like, 'Yeah, hell yeah! Let's do it.""

In opening for a band that came after them, Gibbard feels that Death Cab is continuing "part of a tradition of music."

"We're getting to that point in our lives where by the sheer fact of having been around for a long time, we're starting to see bands that grew up on our music the same way that we grew up on, like, The Cure and Fugazi and Built to Spill and that kind of stuff," Gibbard says.

As for how he thinks the Twenty One Pilots audience will receive Death Cab's set, Gibbard laughs, "I don't know how it'll go over."

"But those guys [Joseph and Dun] are happy, so that's all that matters to me," Gibbard says.

Death Cab for Cutie recently wrapped a U.S. tour of their own in support of their new album, I Built You a Tower.

Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

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