A Soft Guide to Chill, in conversation with BBTCOR

We came up with the name 'bring back the chill out room' after we discovered chill out as a musical style. We were then wondering why there wasn't a dedicated space or culture for chill out sounds. That's where the name came from, because it's an active call out to bring it back.

We started on the radio in 2021 on TNP which is where we discovered a lot of labels, such as Waveform, Apollo, Warp, em:t, and Silent Records. At some point Claartje sent me an article about the history of chill out rooms, as we hadn't previously linked these concepts together. Instead, our name 'chill out' came from all these album compilations we had discovered.

We were already playing different types of downtempo music such as dub, ambient, trance, and we were heavily influenced by the CD collection of my dad which introduced me to artists and bands like Intermix, The Orb, and Lee Scratch Perry. 90s Mixtape compilations also caught our attention, such as The Global Psychedelic Chill Out series. That's when we realised chill out was an entire genre of its own.

Chill out has this classic genre defined idea from balearic sounds in Ibiza and so on, but what's more interesting for us is that it can be these crossroads between a lot of other stuff we were already listening to, such as sounds from Lebanon, Morocco, Egypt and Syria which blends really well together.

I think the influence of psychedelic music comes from my dad as he listened to a lot of classics from Jimi Hendrix and The Doors, which really was some of the starting points of this psychedelic sound that I became into.

We do the events in different spaces, such as Club RAUM for Spielraum weekenders, No Clubs at INGANG, Van Gogh museum, De Diaconie for Spirit of Amsterdam, and Club Records. By hosting events in both a listening and club context, we satisfy the project's way of intersecting the music and art scene. This is because we also have a big focus on spatial intervention and scenography. Museums can be a great way to exhibit this work, especially now that the museum space is becoming more democratized for young people to access as artists.

We also work with clubs because the foundational root of this project is to bring back the chill out room to clubs that carry an uptempo energy. We want to create a cozy environment in spaces that often feel dark. Over the years we have seen the need for this especially during long weekenders where people need a place to chill down and listen to slower sounds, and to accompany this with scenography that creates a warm atmosphere. All you need is a good space, good soundsystem and programming that fits.

To add, I think downtempo music can transport you to different worlds. Someone sent us a sweet message after our chill out room takeover at the opening weekender of INGANG with noclubs and giegling, saying they felt like they were floating high in a hot air balloon. But with being transported to these different worlds, it's not about escapism - we don't want to escape. It's about being present and the ability to dream.

With downtempo music, people can associate it with lying down. But for me that's not the vibe at all. You can resonate with really deep basses in a club, and it can be quite intense. What really helps is a good sound system. If you collaborate with systems like Addit Audio or Kantarion, like we have, it really changes the way in which you experience music. Here you can listen to the different layers of sound and become totally immersed.

I think in the first place, it's not about having it as the chill out place in the sense that you have to wind down from something high paced. That it can also be the primary experience you can go for. Or that it can be parallel to something else without it having to be an escape from something. I think it's a space to rest also, as slow movement can also be an act of rest and relaxation. We live in a capitalistic world where everything has to happen quickly. So this is really a space to be in the present, relax, listen, daydream and connect with people without feeling the pressure of having too many rules.

What's nice about a chill out room is that you can experience it both slowly and intensely. Depending on the other programming during an event or club night, the music could be contrasting or similar in depth and intensity.

This weekend at noclubs x giegling I was especially happy to see many people dancing and moving in the chillout room. That's when I understood that we achieved what we set out to achieve. Because I think a lot of people have a misconception of what downtempo music is. Or they call it the ambient room. Of course, there are ambient sounds, and ambient can mean many different things. But it's also a place to listen to a lower BPM, and to apply movement to that.

Exactly. It's not a 'no shoes allowed' policy.

I don't think you need a set of rules if you already create a certain kind of energy in the space. As well as the sound, we also work with scenography and utilise this to create and attract a certain warmth and friendliness. With this multidisciplinary approach, so far we haven't had to inform anyone how to behave in our space.

It's great to have this type of agency with the events. When we first started out we were invited to bars where they would always get mad at us for the style of music we played. It was too alternative. We were misfits everywhere we went. That's one of the key reasons we wanted to start our own events, to play freely.

I think what's also nice about people playing in the chill out room is that artists don't necessarily feel this pressure of pleasing a crowd, because there are no rules. It's a bit of a low-pressure environment for everyone involved.

With some club nights, I sometimes felt that the chill out room was considered an extra room, and not incorporated into the night itself. I think that's also something that we're still working towards. For example, fees for chill out room artists are typically lower, even though the artists who are invited are incredibly good. It would be nice to invite artists who play in main club rooms to also contribute to the chill out floor, as artists have other sides of their collection to show. For example, Waking Life did this in their Mimo stage curation, and we invited Mama Snake to play for one of our BBTCOR takeovers during Spielraum at Club RAUM. We're excited to see how this evolves.

It can be nice to expose people to our work who don't go clubbing, for example we held an event as part of the Spirit of Amsterdam in the Protestantse Diaconie which we transformed into a different realm with visual design and scenography. The scenography of what we're doing at W139 is different from what we're doing at clubs. The inspiration comes from stained glass windows you find in religious institutions that are highly symbolic. I find symbols interesting as it is an abstract way to express concepts and stories. A very influential artist who did this for theosophical concepts is Hilma Af Klinkt, a feminist modernist that was highly influential for modern abstract art. I have seen multiple exhibitions about early feminist modern abstract art and it fascinates me a lot: the endless possibilities of abstract art and rhythms you can create with it. I think it works well together with the abstractness and layeredness of the music we like. And it's an ode to women in abstraction.

I don't think a lot of people are familiar with the chill out room itself. It's nice to have a platform where people can actually understand the roots, to share where these sounds come from, and where the concept comes from. Not to recreate a sense of 90s nostalgia, but to develop a fresh perspective and also a critical lens on what chill out rooms could look like today. It comes from history and from the archives, and using that information to respond to why we created what we create today.

One thing that I'd like to keep from that era is the sense of joy that seems to come from it. That anything is possible. Our chill out rooms are not prescribing an idea or behaviour to someone. There's a bit of freedom around it.

I want to leave this whole nostalgia of only playing 90s music, because there's a lot of new artists that are very interesting that produce a lot of nice downtempo music. It's nice to have a mix, as within my own practice I like working with the past and present. So it's about finding this fine line between what happened in the past and what's happening today and to try to incorporate both of them. I would also leave behind this need to escape that I explained previously, and for there to be a softer and more feminine edge to it. Hence our new manifesto "A Soft Guide to Chill".

It's our new manifesto which is informing our upcoming exhibition at W139 this October. The manifesto reimagines nightlife through slowness, rest, listening, and care. It argues that nightlife doesn't always have to be about dancing, movement, consumption, and performance. A Soft Guide to Chill brings back the chill out room as a practice rather than a nostalgic recreation, a space where people can dance, lie down, listen, connect, disappear, or simply do nothing. It also connects this idea to the forgotten underground histories and communities that shaped chill out culture, while framing rest as a political act in a culture that constantly demands productivity. It's about making nightlife softer, more inclusive, more communal, and more human, somewhere between dancing and dreaming.

We want the energy we create with the sound and scenography to invite people into the space, and it is these components that show people how to interact and behave. You can direct people a lot with the scenography you choose. For example, the more pillows you put on the floor the more likely people are going to lie down. We designed our carpet in the first place for a space that had a concrete floor.

It's also to do with when and where it's programmed. We've also been programmed super early in the morning and then you really have this transition from night to day where people really do want to lay down and do nothing. Or it's a weekender and some people are sleeping, vs people who are building up energy in tune with the hype of the club. You get the crossover from creatures of the night to day time dwellers. The people dance, then the people chill. It's riding the wave of the weekend, that the chill out room also follows in a musical sense.

I hope to see the chill out room as a primary space you can programme at any time of the day, where government subsidies can understand that the chill out room is just as much part of the club culture of the day than it is of the night. I hope that more clubs will open chill out rooms as we live in a world where everything is super fast paced online, and with everything that is happening politically, people need some time to relax, dream a bit, and connect with others to think of a better world. That for me is the hope I wish to bring with this project.