what exactly is chill-out music? just a lazy marketing term?

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i can't figure out if "chill-out" is just music for accountants who go to clubs and take Es to "come down to", or if it's just anything a bit languid, lush, a bit Easy Listening for youngish folks. to me "chilled out beats" or whatever, seems to mean generic, clinical background beats perfect for trendy cafes, but then i notice that some cool stuff that i don't think sounds like that at all gets stocked in the "chill-out" section of a record store. so what's the story? is it just marketing folk casting the net so far and wide, it's not really a clearly defined genre at all?

― national mint, Thursday, 20 November 2003 11:54 (twenty-one years ago)

It's relaxing music, i.e. the genre definition is based on the consumer's presumed intentions not the artist's, which is why people think it's not a 'proper' genre I suppose.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:01 (twenty-one years ago)

i think it is just a lazy marketing term. The worst rekkid by a long way I've heard in the last few years was a "chill out" compilation that came free w/the observer newspaper. It was horrible.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:02 (twenty-one years ago)

norman- so you're saying its a lazy marketing term bcz you don't like it?

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:04 (twenty-one years ago)

but anyway, you have to give name to things things that sound similar. they may not be satisfactory but there you go.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:06 (twenty-one years ago)

I think it's a good practical trend in music marketing - categorising music by what you mught actually USE it for, eg "Hairbrush Divas" or whatever it is that so horrified Chris a while back*. The music can then be judged on how good it is at performing that function, and here most chill-out stuff falls apallingly flat.

*this may have been on a mailing list now I think about it.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:08 (twenty-one years ago)

Julio, I think he's saying it's a lazy marketing term because of the extremely large volume of chill out compilations which flooded the shops a few years back. Whether it's lazy is a matter of opinion but there is definitely a major commercial thing going on with Chill Out. Possibly no more so than with any other sort of dance compilation, and like any other sort the comps range from great to absolutely awful.

I don't think it's about them sounding similar either, cos they don't all sound similar, there are too many to say that. I think it's more about record stores and some record companies using the name "chill out" to sell to a certain type of audience. Marketing.

Mind you, articles bemoaning chill-out became more boring than the comps themselves.

― Ronan (Ronan), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:15 (twenty-one years ago)

equally unsatisying are the terms 'ambient' and 'downtempo' though

― stevem (blueski), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:15 (twenty-one years ago)

I must say I liked it more when it was ambient.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:16 (twenty-one years ago)

i like the word but people always moaned 'oh but ALL music is atmospheric'

― stevem (blueski), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:18 (twenty-one years ago)

other cliched moan "what ELSE are you doing when listening to music but CHILLING OUT"

It's a good point though, I don't tend to think of music for specific instances, possibly cos I'm so concerned with the same two or three genres.

― Ronan (Ronan), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:19 (twenty-one years ago)

What I meant was what Ronan said I meant Julio!! I think the nadir of "chillout" was when they started packaging classical & jazz music thusly. Like "gregorian chillout vol4" or s.th. like that. The whole concept - strip a bunch of downtempo numbers from out back catalogue and market them to people who are coming down just seems to me to be more than usually cynical. "japanoise chillout" or "throbbing gristle live bootleg chillout" wd poss be borderlinbe acceptable haha.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:21 (twenty-one years ago)

"throbbing gristle live bootleg chillout" is certainly a possibility, it wasn't all sturm und drang y'know

― Dadaismus (Dada), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:24 (twenty-one years ago)

Y3S 3Y3 HAEV TR0D TH|Z \/\/34r'/ P/-\+H B3F0er!!!!1!

"chillout" = MuZaK"?

I forgot what I especially didn't like about the chillout comp - its aggressive blandness. Ugh.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:26 (twenty-one years ago)

enya for tosspots

― bob snoom, Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:34 (twenty-one years ago)

chill out is bland ibiza shite w. saxophones

― Jay Kid (Jay K), Thursday, 20 November 2003 12:59 (twenty-one years ago)

example?

― stevem (blueski), Thursday, 20 November 2003 13:01 (twenty-one years ago)

Dunno about the saxophones, Jay- but I can think of another ubiquitous chill-out intrument!!!! I was eating in this otherwise jolly good Chinese Noodle bar in Narf Lahndan last weekend, and they were playing that peculiar sub-genre of chill-out known as "panpipe moods"!!!!!! Now, that's a type of music that's really become supermarket music for tha New Millenium!!!!!! You just wonder if anyone's actually putting any conscious thought behind this stuff, or there are people sitting around in music-land that actually think: "Hey!!!! What sort of music does your average dinner paty need in the background to get them in a nice relaxed mood?!?!?!? I know!!!!! How about a CD full of some bloke with a panpipe tootling over karaoke discs of:

Stevie Wonder's "I Just Called To Say I Love You"!!!!!
David Sneddon's "Living The Lie"!!!!!
Abba's "Thank You For The Music"

And the piece de resistance- Elvis' "Love Me Tender"!!!!!!!!That'll really get them in the mood!!!! They'll not been rolling on the floor laughing at all!!!"
― Old Fart!!! (oldfart_sd), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:02 (twenty-one years ago)

.. End tag.

― Old Fart!!! (oldfart_sd), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:02 (twenty-one years ago)

Electric cellos are the new panpipes.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:03 (twenty-one years ago)

What is chill-out music? It's the sound of sunsets, of a spliff burning in your ashtray as you sit in your living room, shades drawn, lights low, watching the red wine swirl in your glass. It's the sound, or soundtrack, to your life, or the life you want to have.

― Mark (MarkR), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:05 (twenty-one years ago)

worst music ever = what they play in bathroom shops. one hour last weekend was soundtracked by orchestral arrangements of e.g. Handbags and Gladrags etc. Didn't make me want to fucking chill out in any way shape or form -- or drop several grand on taps, either.

― alext (alext), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:15 (twenty-one years ago)

dunno abt the saxophones either, but chill out has, ever since it was pronounced a genre, turned into that music like that saxophone stuff they play in supermarkets.

i have respect for intelligent and curious dj's playing mood music, or 'chill out' (everything from jan johansson to boards of canada to sun ra to air applies here, in my book at least), but i don't have respect for that keybord-wawesplash-feline vocal-soft trumpet-heavy stuff that is lazily being sold on fabricated 'chill out' cd's. when oakenfold, rampling et al got enchanted by the smooth tones from café del mar in the ibiza summer 1987, it wasn't played from 'chill out' cd's but from grammophone records, intelligently collected by Jose Padilla or whoever.

― Jay Kid (Jay K), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:19 (twenty-one years ago)

haha mark i ended up with another copy of that series - "03", maybe? - and i think the same text is in that one!

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:22 (twenty-one years ago)

anyway, like any genre-not-a-genre, it's all about whatever the compilers throw on there. on that one i have amidst all the expected dido-lite toss there's also a gorgeous jam & spoon dub remix of a moby track and "papua new guinea"!!

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:23 (twenty-one years ago)

yeah, mark, those are truly one set of depressing sleevenotes.

― Jay Kid (Jay K), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:23 (twenty-one years ago)

yeh they are very much like the Now! compilations in terms of range of stuff and quality i find.

― stevem (blueski), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:25 (twenty-one years ago)

TS: "pop" vs. "chill out"

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:26 (twenty-one years ago)

>i like the word but people always moaned 'oh but ALL music is atmospheric'

Well they are wrong because its not true at all.

― fletrejet, Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:31 (twenty-one years ago)

What I want to know is: if chill-out is a silly marketing term, who is it marketed toward and why? Obviously a segment of the population really needs to chill out in order have a whole genre targeted at them. And, who buys this stuff? I see a zillion of these compilations when I go to Borders Books, but I don't know and have never heard of a single person who owns one.

― scott m (mcd), Thursday, 20 November 2003 14:59 (twenty-one years ago)

it's the people who also buy hed kandi or naked music house comps.

― Jay Kid (Jay K), Thursday, 20 November 2003 15:28 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah, it's a lame term. I'm finding it difficult to figure out how to market my band for gigs...I wonder how, say, Telefon Tel Aviv markets themselves. I always want to say 'like, downtempo, but, you know, good.'

― Jordan (Jordan), Thursday, 20 November 2003 15:34 (twenty-one years ago)

Chill out isn't the same as ambient! Ambient can be moody, scary, paranoid etc, while chill out definitely can't. Another noticeable difference is that chill out is never experimental, because it's by definition background music.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 20 November 2003 15:38 (twenty-one years ago)

I don't see why background music shouldn't be experimental?

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Thursday, 20 November 2003 15:41 (twenty-one years ago)

they mean the same thing as far as i'm concerned Tuomas - it's not a specific genre as such imo.

― stevem (blueski), Thursday, 20 November 2003 15:46 (twenty-one years ago)

http://nihilistdisco.matterwave.net/images/klf%20chill%20out.jpg

― Cheerful Nihilist Grocery Store (mjt), Thursday, 20 November 2003 21:35 (twenty-one years ago)

awful expression used to describe such a wide variety of music that inevitably some of it is great and some of it is terrible

― robin (robin), Thursday, 20 November 2003 22:52 (twenty-one years ago)

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