Before ASCII snowflakes cascade down the screen behind him, Porter Robinson asks his audience a few questions in Helvetica. “Do you remember skinning your knee? Do you remember being bored in the summer? Do you remember the last time your mom held you?”
They’re emblematic of everything his SMILE! :D era, the promotional cycle named after his latest album, stands for: a particular pixel–washed nostalgia for a time before the screens and the fame. This ethos, brought forth through electropop takes on indie sleaze and lyrics that oscillate between impersonal irony and aggressive sincerity, comes as no surprise to fans—it’s a natural evolution of the brand of intense self-reflection that has defined Robinson’s work for over a decade. When his SMILE! :D world tour arrived at the TD Pavilion at the Mann in Philadelphia, this brand came to life in ways that his prior tours had never achieved.
Split into three sections, each representing an album from Robinson’s discography, the SMILE! :D tour experience progresses deep into a well of classics, threaded by synth leads long baked into the EDM and indietronica canon. It’s a multi–course feast for fans who’ve stuck with him since the beginning and for newer ones looking to experience the tours they missed. But, perhaps more powerful than the retrospective into Robinson’s music itself is the show’s triumphant visual identity.
Arriving at the venue, I was immediately struck by the giant inflatable cat on the right end of the stage, courtesy of artist Audrey Mai. To its left, a neon–lined LED billboard screen is installed in front of an even larger one. There’s an element of depth that is rare for EDM shows, which is a hopeful sign of things to come. When the first portion of the show finally kicks off with “Knock Yourself Out XD,” SMILE! :D’s dizzying opening track, the crowd erupts into song, the stage floods itself in pink, and the first of many confetti bombs shower the pavilion. The next song, “Perfect Pinterest Garden,” launches a series of tailored lyric displays and stage setups with incalculable attention to detail.
Along with Robinson himself as director, the show’s production involves a diverse array of artists, including CGI and screen content lead Alex Futtersak, editor and assembler Ryan Sciaino, and artists, animators, and motion graphics veterans such as yadoog, Haoyan of America, Biibocc, Théo Le Pen, Guandanarian, lilcode, Seamus Edson, Soyu Han, and snailwar. Each contributor helps to fuel Robinson’s singular, post–internet vision, with details only recognizable to an online generation. It’s obvious as early as the lyric display goes up for “Kitsune Maison Freestyle,” whose tastefully garish fonts and gifs allude to aughts–era web design, when GeoCities reigned in place of crypto advertisements. In “Everything To Me,” a blinking cursor types and deletes lines of text as “<3” symbols flood the screen backdrop, a personal reminder of Tumblr blogs awash with ASCII illustrations. Before the live rendition of “Shelter,” a model of the music video’s protagonist, now animated by Kanauru, ambles along the billboard screen, in a nod to VTuber culture (and Robinson’s career–long attachment to Japanese aesthetics).
But, it isn’t all electronic aesthetics and internet references—an integral part of Robinson’s music has always been pairing these digital elements with the natural world: 2021’s Nurture was primarily illustrated with landscapes of grass, trees, and water, and 2014’s Worlds venerated the sky and featured sprawling vistas. While he’s translated these values to a live environment before, the depth offered by Cassius Creative’s stage production elevates the immersion tenfold.
In “Easier to Love You,” a bright outline accentuates the billboard screen, presenting a stop–motion music video while rain pours down the even larger screen behind it. In “Is There Really No Happiness?” this rain turns into snow. It reads like a cityscape, with artificial lights standing tall and becoming weathered by the atmosphere. “Everything Goes On” brings the crowd to the top floor of a high–rise, with the back screen exhibiting a half–circle window that opens up onto a sunlit skyline. In the Worlds portion of the show, the two screens often coalesce and display the same starry visuals, heightening one iconic drop after another.
In an especially touching moment, Robinson asks the audience to vocalize to the slow–moving chorus of Nurture’s “Unfold.” After three repetitions of reverberating piano and guitar strums, the turquoise pavilion becomes an ocean and the audience a choir of sirens. In a world tour first, the Philadelphia crowd claps to the song in unison and extends the trance for over two minutes before Robinson interjects, “Alright y’all, it’s time for the next song, shut the fuck up!”
After two hours of playing his greatest hits front to back, Porter Robinson finally arrives at “Cheerleader,” the opening single to SMILE! :D, with a synth lead that shines brighter than the sun and belted lyrics directed to his own fandom. After a final pixelated screen projection of Robinson, the chorus explodes in pink and confetti, and the crowd collectively cheers—it’s a full circle finish for both the show itself and the last decade of Robinson’s output. Through the digital, the natural, and the vividly sentimental, the SMILE! :D world tour guides audiences through Robinson's inimitable career and delivers a fresh experience for new and long–time fans alike.
