#and then i had to immediately jump on the computer to write rapid response copy in response to the biden announcement

[imreallyloveleee]

It's been a truly weird day guys

[killitwithbleach-blog]

Goodbye to a World

I’m standing on the most sacred ground in American music history. In 2015 Bethel Woods, the site of the first Woodstock Fest, has been transformed into Mysteryland, a multisensory cultural experience for a new generation of starry-eyed electro lovers.  Between two hundred-foot-high rainbow-painted horse heads Porter Robinson is concentrating on the instruments before him where DJ decks had been stationed all weekend. My face is drenched in the effervescent glow of the stage lights and suddenly I’m thinking, “Fuck, it’s happening again.” My nose tingles as I recognize the delicate melody that gradually swells into a triumphant wall of sound. The bastard has me tearing up for the second time this set. When the towering euphony reduces to four crooned lines, I’m crying.

                       We’ll see creation come undone

                       These bones that bound us will be gone

                       We’ll stir our spirits ‘til we’re one

                       Then soft as shadows we’ll become

The lyrics don’t conjure any particular memory or evoke any particular emotion, but rather elicit the response of experiencing vivid beauty. “Sea of Voices” was Porter Robinson’s homecoming announcement, telling the world that the year-long hiatus, his recession to his parents’ home in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, was over. (Robinson, 2014)

Porter Robinson’s ascension to EDM superstardom was more a series of snatched opportunities than a pursuit. A 12-year-old recluse fascinated by role-playing and rhythm video games, he began trying to re-create his favorite 8-bit tunes on a pirated copy of Sony’s ACID software. By posting his unripe productions on Internet forums he found a mentor in vet producer Kyrandian, who pushed Porter until out popped a Beatport number one. “Say My Name” was a bona fide electro house banger, and at 16, Porter was instantaneously inundated with requests to DJ parties around the country. DJ culture was totally foreign to the small-city Carolina boy and clubs were uncharted territory until he started performing in them.  One year later he wrangled Ultra Music Fest, South by Southwest, and three Electric Daisy Carnivals on his first headlining EP tour. One year after that, he charted Billboard. (in Fusilli, 2012)

Oblivious to the dominating Dutch house sound of the first wave of the EDM takeover, Porter’s 2010 to 2011 singles were influenced by the music that raised him: chiptune, trance, IDM (intelligent dance music) and Japanese electro hyperpop from the interactive video game Dance Dance Revolution. The result was a moderately eclectic soundboard within the typical 128-BPM four-on-the-floor electro house format, which he coined “complextro.” It was a style defined by its lack of definition and an emphasis on detail, which Porter thought characterized the work of some of his biggest inspirations, Wolfgang Gartner, DirtyLoud, and Skrillex. Porter prematurely enlisted himself as another purveyor of complextro while these early singles—though inspired by several genres—still fit snugly into the electro house casing. (in Fusilli, 2012) That is, until he wrote “Language.” With its trance breakdowns, glitched-out buildups, and an ambient vocal interlude between progressive house drops, it defied the structural and tonal conventions of electro house. Finally, Porter had fulfilled his own prophecy. He was a complextro artist. The summer of 2012 it was impossible to avoid “Language” at any major festival. If you knew at this point what the letters E-D-M stood for, you knew Porter Robinson’s name.

It’s the all-American name of the fresh new face of the American dream, although as far as faces go, our 19-year-old protagonist hasn’t quite grown into his yet. Porter sits opposite his Billboard interviewer at Coachella, a tan, tattooed human stamp of the word “bro.” In the same frame, Porter’s skin appears blanched and his shoulders permanently hunched over from years of living behind the blue light of a computer screen. His upper lip is shadowed by sweat and baby hairs. As Porter recites responses about his age and influences, he absentmindedly slackens his mic hand so the audio feed fades in and out. Once Billboard Bro has filled his question quota, he flashes a farewell smile at the camera. Porter is sheepishly thanking the camera he thinks has been filming him this whole time, and you have to wonder if socializing is something he ever enjoys. (Brooks, 2012)

In between “Say My Name” and “Language” Porter Robinson made a crucial decision.  With Gesaffelstein and Brodinski added to his roster of idols in 2011, he flirted with the idea of making a sharp left turn into tech house, a hybrid of mechanical techno percussion and groove-infused house. (Brooks, 2012)(in easylove Records, 2010) After all, his proclaimed main objective at the time was to “maximize energy and write a song that was perfect for the dance floor,” an idea he traversed in the 2011 Spitfire EP with two dubstep tracks and the crassly aggressive moombahton number “100% In the Bitch.” (in Fusilli, 2012) But something was missing. The constraints of music that functions solely to energize the body left him yearning for a sound that would satisfy the soul. Goodbye tech house, hello emotional introspection. The uplifting and anthemic “Language,” his first true complextro track, was also his first artistic expression of sincerity. Its chart-topping success was all Porter needed to start a new chapter of his career: the decision for beauty.

“Easy” was the confirmation that the Porter we knew, booty-shake-maker big-beat-banger Porter, was never coming back. A collab with fellow touring producer Mat Zo, “Easy” one-upped “Language” in emotionally uplifting power. By connecting with his fans on a deeper, more personal level, it seemed Porter had unearthed his true identity as an artist over entertainer. He was gaining momentum. And then he disappeared.

The decision to abandon the DJ culture that nurtured him peaked in late 2012 when he was touring with Mat Zo, “Easy” in development. “I remember being in the back of my tour bus, and we were all just listening to our favorite music and sharing tracks, and we did that for an hour, and there was not a single dance record that any of us wanted to play for each other.” (in Knaggs, 2014) EDM was losing its appeal. Porter was becoming fed up with the creative limitations of dance music as functional entertainment, the hackneyed structure that builds and releases for the sole purpose of partying. The fear of creative stagnation, which he frequently refers to as “the enemy” in interviews, prompted a retreat to Chapel Hill. “I’m going to go back and listen to every album that inspired me and figure out what it is that I loved about that stuff, and try to channel this all into something that’s really me.” (Robinson, 2014) No interviews, no tours—he dissolved back into the Internet so that the only time we saw his face was in hieroglyphics, 【＝◈︿◈＝】. If Porter hadn’t withdrawn at his peak, we might’ve lost interest in that year of Soundcloud inactivity and festival absence. But we didn’t. We were hungrily awaiting the big reveal.  

Worlds was Porter Robinson’s dissent from EDM, but it materialized less as a middle finger than a hug. It wasn’t 21-year-old Porter who emerged from the blue light portal of his parents’ basement, it was 12-year-old Porter, the boy consumed by the various universes of massive multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs). (in Knaggs, 2014) Porter constructed Worlds as a universe with different doors, where you could enter Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time or Diablo, Mario 64 or World of Warcraft, enter the fictional fantasy that he’d been living while “Say My Name” was still in the making. He forged a sonic trip down memory lane to the “cheesy 2000-era pop rock,” the late-90s/early-2000s video game chiptunes trapped in 8 bits, and the Japanese media that defined his childhood. To effectively and obviously reference this era in Worlds he went straight to the source, plucking out presets from General MIDI and SoundFonts, programs created in the 80s and 90s to facilitate seamless transitions from recorded to synthesized audio. (Robinson, 2014) “Most people would hear those and they wouldn’t think that it sounds retro, they would just think that it sounds bad. But for me, that’s moving the nostalgia forward.” (Robinson, 2014) This conglomerate of “retro” and contemporary synthesized sounds gives the album a timeless quality. Stadium-sized snare hits à la Phil Collins dance with unfamiliar modernity through advanced glitching effects. Every human voice on the album—including the many guest artists—is processed with an ethereal futurism. The album’s keyword was ‘escapism,’ the medium a projection of our imaginations. (Robinson, 2014)

In contrast to the discordant hues of the spitfire album cover, Worlds displays pastel softness. Deviating from the rapid-fire 128 to 140 BPM pace of Spitfire. Worlds hovers mostly around 90. Although 128 BPM rhythms do occur, they project a refined delicacy, as in the case of “Sea of Voices,” which actually feels like it floats through 32 BPM. If you were looking for a dance floor banger, Worlds was not the place to look. Crowds wouldn’t jump up and down at his shows anymore, but pulse the air with their outstretched hands, embracing each other affectionately and swaying in sensual undulations.

“Sad Machine” emerged as the immediate hit. An infectious opening hook carries the intro into Porter’s most singable verse yet. It’s a wistful post-apocalyptic duet between Porter and Avanna, a female character from a Japanese singing synthesis platform called Vocaloid. (Robinson, 2014) Boy meets robot. Boy and robot comfort each other in the wake of the end of the world. Porter embraced the role of vocalist out of necessity as the album’s due date rushed up, his vulnerable rawness as a singer contrasting with his computerized counterpart. (Robinson, 2014) His reference to Avanna in interviews as “she” and “her” is more endearing, rather than disturbing or pathetic, and he could care less that some label him an internet-certified pussy. “The best hate tweet I ever got was ‘hey loser go hang out with your imaginary robot girl’ I was like hell yes this dude gets it.” (twitter.com) K-k-k-kawaii, Porter!

Avanna resurfaces in tracks like “Fresh Static Snow” and “Goodbye to a World,” though not in the most Japanese of all, “Flicker.” In her place, a text-to-speech program spits out a nonsensical, whimsical rap of seamlessly chopped up and reconnected album titles translated to Japanese, albums like Daft Punk’s Discovery, his all time favorite. (Robinson, 2014)  This is one more example of how Porter cleverly repurposes his sources of musical inspiration directly into the product. “Flicker” is an ode to the Japanese ideal of the appreciation of beauty and color. He searches for the recreation of this ideal he’s absorbed from the timbre of Japanese video games through pensive breakdowns that bloom into optimistic chord progressions.

The most literal representation of Porter Robinson’s resignation from aggressively beat-driven EDM is “Fellow Feeling,” where a weeping violin multiplies into a mournful symphony worthy of a blockbuster soundtrack. The first two minutes of this elegant lament recall the piece Porter has claimed to be “the most beautiful song [he’s] ever heard,” the orchestral version of “Serenity” by Afternova, an expansion on a trance beat, within which also lurks the melody of “Language” and the movement of “Sea of Voices.” (in Harper, 2011) “Fellow Feeling” is conducted by a girl’s whispered narrative filled first with regret, then optimism.

           I cried, for I didn’t think it could be true

           That you and I might’ve always known one another

           And that we could not only evoke,

           But conjure a place of our own

           And that everywhere that has ever existed

           It was all in service for our dream

           Now, please, hear what I hear

A chugging techno monster abruptly infiltrates the symphony, assaulting the vulnerability of the strings with mechanical grime.

           Let me explain

           This ugliness, this cruelty, this repulsiveness

           It will all die out

           And, now, I cry for all that is beautiful

This duel between the two conflicting aesthetics then morphs into a hard-hitting complextro beat guided by a driving side-chained kick drum. To Porter, this was the easiest way to declare his separation from the perfunctory functionality of dance music. The hybrid house climax at the end, though, references “Language” and “Easy” to make clear that mellifluous music at 128 BPM is still a possibility.

If you visit Porter Robinson’s Soundcloud page you will find it cleansed of the “ugliness” and “repulsiveness” to which he refers in “Fellow Feeling.” Missing are his moombahton and dubstep releases, the faux-complextro pre-“Language” singles, and the bass-heavy Spitfire remixes. The density and grit of these tracks cannot, in his mind, coexist with his newly refined artistry. I wonder if Porter can even listen to “100% In the Bitch” now without cringing at its vulgarity. As for Soundcloud’s music discovery function, he spends at least an hour daily searching the server for new ideas rather than “crazy production prowess.” Rejecting the negative connotation of the word ‘novelty,’ he embraces its implication of distinctiveness. “When I hear something that I’ve never heard before, I love that feeling, and I think that’s one of the greatest things about electronic music.” (Robinson, 2014)

The conception of the Worlds tour was as immense an effort as the album itself. Porter handed everyone in his art department a 20-page document with explicit instructions on the visual concept. Surrealism based on glitch and role-playing video games rather than trippy drug-inspired imagery was the goal. (Robinson, 2014) The outcome was a multi-screen cinematic journey through flashes of vibrant and prismatic glitches and Japanese calligraphy, skies of floating islands, pixilated flower fields, molten orbs, and the familiar forests we experience vicariously through recurring anime characters that leap, fly and fall through Porter’s low-poly imagination. Full immersion in his vision is essential, so he performs only original compositions edited for the sake of novelty, triggering samples on drum pads, playing dominant melodies on keys, and singing wherever possible. He defies the odds against a single DJ possessing so much virtuosic musicality. Inevitably, the experience begs the emotional participation of his audiences, which is guided by narrations, the most memorable of which is the following:

Every place you’ve ever imagined

It’s real

There is a fictional city in your

mind and you know every corner of it

Your mind is a world

Each of us is a place

This shit really takes you on a feel trip.

The conclusion of the album and the live show is Avanna’s swan song, “Goodbye to a World.” In the most heartbreaking instance of the overarching apocalyptic theme of Worlds, Avanna devolves literal bit by bit into her monotone death. The fragility that leads to worlds’ destruction references the MMPORGs so significant to Porter which, “once the company goes under, or the game is no longer profitable...these worlds are completely inaccessible. They basically just die.” (in Knaggs, 2014) I imagine young Porter’s eyes welling with tears as the server shuts down and he is forcibly returned to reality. “Worlds doesn’t really have a place in reality,” he tells us. (in Knaggs, 2014) As he grapples with the imminence of adulthood, he preserves a child-like fantasy. It’s a vessel of fiction and escapism, which is really the guiding spirit of EDM as a whole, though Worlds has liberated Porter from the shackles of the conventionally vapid modes of this ideology. As he noticed EDM curating its own obsolescence, he mapped out his immortality in an alternate universe with an open invitation and warm welcome for those of us who wish to join him.

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