From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article does not cite any references or sources. (October 2007) Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed.

Chill out (sometimes chillout or Chill), a term derived from a slang injunction to relax, emerged in the early and mid-1990s as a catch-all term for various styles of relatively mellow, slow-tempo music made by contemporary producers in the electronic music scene. The term "Chill out music", as well as the genre itself, originated in chill rooms that were set up by DJs off to the edge of club dance floors to give patrons a chance to take a break from the hectic dance vibe and chill out with this style of music. The earliest mentioned 'chill out room' was at the legendary Madchester nightspot, Konspiracy(1). In these rooms, visitors would find couches, comfy pillows, psychedelic light shows projecting trippy images and music that was decidedly downtempo, especially when compared to what was going on a few feet away on the dance floor. Its history began in the UK, with new wave band The Durutti Column being an abstract influence on the genre in the '80s. Higher Intelligence Agency (the HIA) helped move the chill room concept from sideshow to main event with their Oscillate chill party events in Birmingham and elsewhere in the early to mid nineties. Their first releases came out on the now defunct Beyond record label and soon thereafter in the U.S. on the Waveform label - who describes the music as 'exotic electronica.'

A number of compilations with "Chill Out" in their titles were released in the mid-1990s and beyond, helping to establish the genre as being very closely related to downtempo and trip hop but also incorporating, especially in the early 2000s, slower varieties of house music, nu-jazz, psybient, and lounge music. The genre also includes some forms of trance music, ambient music, and IDM, and it has entirely subsumed the older genre Balearic Beat, although that term is still used interchangeably with chill out. Chill out (sometimes called "soft techno") is generally tonal, relaxing (or at least not as "intense" as other music from the styles it draws from), and generally does not incorporate music that emphasizes "hard," "deep," or particularly hypnotic rhythms, although when used to describe the music played in chillout rooms at raves, it can also encompass extremely psychedelic experimental sounds of great variety.

An entire culture surrounding chill out music has evolved, with many fashionable bars and clubs, designed with a retro or retro-futuristic ambience, devoted to the genre. Ministry of Sound in London has hosted many chill out events in places such as Ibiza and there are hundreds of mix compilation titles including the words "chill out" or just "chill" that cater for the chill out audience. As of 2005 "chill out" is recognized by all major UK dance magazines and their charts.

The chill out styles are similar to the Leftfield scene inspired by the group of that name. There are many bands that make chill out music, such as A Man Called Adam, Lemon Jelly, Urban Myth Club, Mooli, Sundae Club and the Chillage People; DJs that specialise in chill out like Youth, Alex Paterson, Dr. Chill, Unity Dub, The Only Michael, Chris Coco, Pete Lawrence and Mixmaster Morris, the latter known for having released Global Chillage; record labels like Liquid Sound Design, Vagalume, Ultimae, Waveform and Interchill; radio stations such as Groovera, Soma FM, radioioAMBIENT, Musical Starstreams; and events such as The Big Chill and Sundaze. Often music is mixed with video art mixed by VJs with gentle, relaxing images of nature or electronic graphics.

The Big Chill festival is a large annual event catering for chilled out clubbers and families in Eastnor Castle, Herefordshire with resident acts including Gilles Peterson and Norman Jay.

Chill out rooms at dance clubs fill a safety need for users of Ecstasy, which has had frequent problems and deaths due to dehydration or heat stroke. In 1992 a UK rule required dance clubs to provide free water and chill out rooms in response to a number of Ecstasy-related injuries and deaths^[1].

(1) The Chillout Room at the Konspiracy nightclub was mentioned by journalist James Style, in his review of the Madchester scene, for the Independent Newspaper, May 23 1990.

• Ambient
• Back to Mine
• Chambao
• Downtempo
• Groovera
• Illbient
• KLF
• Odysseywerx
• Psybient
• Trip hop