Album Review: Smile! :D by Porter Robinson

After a long hiatus and seemingly endless struggle with writer’s block, Porter Robinson returned in 2020 with "Get Your Wish," the lead single from his long-awaited sophomore album, Nurture. Alongside the release, the former EDM luminary took to Twitter to detail the crushing process of trying to make music in the preceding years and the turning point represented by "Get Your Wish. " He explained, "You know how every once in a while, when you're driving or something, the music you're listening to just moves you in this amazing, transcendent way? It's this sublime experience that can't really be described, but for me, it's like this: I feel like the world is beautiful and filled with possibility, and that I want to cherish every second that I have to be alive.

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At the beginning of his career, Robinson played rave-y, aggressive EDM while having anxiety attacks on stage, unconvinced by the music he was making. He channelled that discontent into fantastical escapism on his debut Worlds, crafting a new emotional, tender production style that forever changed the electronic music zeitgeist. His following album Nurture recounted the difficulty of seven years of post-Worlds writer's block and depression, largely through the lens of optimistic hindsight.

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SMILE! :D is an album of swerves. Both in its sonic choices - usually multiple times in a song, from Y2K rave to pop-punk to acoustic guitar - but also tone. Maybe this is to be expected from an album Porter Robinson intended to have "no sincerity", until his emotions kept bubbling up in the writing process, but the result is still startling - neither jaded nor earnest, self-consciousness without cynicism.

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so you just affirmed your life, now what? The release of Nurture, Porter Robinson's second album, coincided with me receiving my first dose of the good old covid vaccine. It was a weird experience: I had to face one of my worst fears (needles) in one of my favourite locations that I hadn't visited in well over a year (a concert hall) while listening to an album that I might not have connected with otherwise (a bombastic pop album with just enough drem to draw me in). After the anti-sickness juice entered my bloodstream, I sat down on a bench in Amsterdam's least scenic neighbourhood, hit the repeat button on "Something Comforting" and "Look at the Sky", and felt a genuine bit of optimism and, dare I say, happiness for the first time in quite a while.

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Porter Robinson's new 10-track, alternative hyper-pop album 'SMILE! :D' (via MOM+POP) feels like the most 'true to himself' music he has released recently, as he has moved away from the more heavily EDM-influenced tracks he was once known for. Opener 'Knock Yourself Out XD' is an honest and personal track from Porter which actually sounds quite upbeat and has a playful, Y2K sound. He cheekily quips, "Bitch, I'm Taylor Swift".

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