Ninajirachi, Porter Robinson - WannaCry

This one genuinely made me sit up. Ninajirachi has been one of the most exciting producers in the hyper-melodic corner of electronic music for a while now, and getting Porter Robinson onto a track called “WannaCry” is the kind of pairing that could go either magic or mess. It’s magic. The whole thing has that specific 2010s-internet-nostalgia sheen both artists do so well, all pitched vocals and sugar-rush synths that somehow land as genuinely emotional instead of merely cute. Porter’s fingerprints are all over the melodic writing, but Ninajirachi’s production keeps it weird and a little broken, glitchy in the exact places a glossier version would have smoothed over. The title nods to the ransomware, a very online joke I refuse to explain and you either get or you don’t. Underneath the cleverness is a real song: a proper hook, a build that means it, a payoff that arrives as a euphoric, slightly overwhelming wall of sound. There’s a breakdown two-thirds through where everything falls to a single pitched vocal and a heartbeat kick, and it’s the part I keep rewinding. It sounds like the future the way certain records did fifteen years ago, before the future got boring. Turn it up and let it overwhelm you a little.

Buy / stream this track →