Chloé Caillet

While the world’s online, Chloé Caillet’s in the club. Her music and kaleidoscopic DJ sets recall utopic rave histories of the past: dance factories, the Balearic bliss of the ‘90s; a time when smartphones didn’t mediate the clubbing experience. Caillet’s music encourages your full presence, your phone deep in your pocket.

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Within just a few years Caillet, a DJ, producer, multi-instrumentalist, has become one of dance’s most vitalizing forces. In 2024 alone she logged tens of thousands of miles playing sets and curating global communities with SMIILE, her queer-centered club night. From playing B2Bs with Jamie xx to closing the terrace at Ibiza’s Circoloco with Kylie Minogue in attendance, Chloé Caillet has become your favorite pop star’s DJ, your favorite DJ’s DJ, soon to be your favorite, too.

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A musician first, Caillet brings her near-perfect pitch to the decks. She mixes in key, thinks in textures and tonalities— fifths, thirds— and instinctively knows the sounds that will mesh together best. Always at least three steps ahead of the track, she creates fine musical details within her sets, setting up perfect harmonies on the fly. Her layering is subtle, but if you lean closer you her years of classical study; her background in improvisational jazz.

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Initially drawn to rock music, she played keys and bass in a small psychedelic outfit named The Clockwork as a teenager in Paris. Throughout her adolescence she performed in an array of blues, garage and alternative rock bands across Paris and London before ending up in the dance music space during Ed Banger’s most prolific era. By the time she moved to New York City in her early twenties, LCD Soundsystem and DFA Records had overtaken the scene with their dance-rock revival, inspiring Caillet to carry over her prog credentials into her first DJ sets. Initially drawn to production through her background in A&R, she quickly became a sensation in the NYC dance music scene, playing and creating rock-embellished electo reminiscent of Greg Wilson’s early mixtapes, and later inspiring Beck to personally commission her for a remix of his track “Chemical” in 2021. As her star began to rise further, Caillet gradually moved away from her proggy roots and towards groove-heavy house. “But I’ve definitely been feeling a pull back to my roots lately,” says Caillet.

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Here To Make You Smile, her EP released in November 2024 marks a transitional chapter for Caillet. It’s a package of music that matches the giddy energy of her live sets and wears its cheekiness on its sleeve. Featuring collaborations with some of her favorite artists, as well as a dash of her own vocals, Here To Make You Smile wraps a bow on the bracing year that Caillet’s had.

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