“Turn off the Lights” is a 2018 Black Book Records single by Chris Lake and vocalist Alexis Roberts, made during a studio session that Lake later identified as one of the clearest examples of chasing a specific sound until it matched the idea in his head. Released February 23, 2018, the record became part of the early Black Book catalog and remained important enough to Lake’s sets that he was still playing it near the finish of major shows in 2025 and 2026.
The record’s durability is easier to understand through its making than through a popularity statistic. Lake has said he was in the room with Roberts and his wife Gita, now known musically as Aatig, who he identified as a co-writer. He was not casually experimenting. He remembered driving the session toward a precise emotional and sonic target until the track felt exactly right.
THE SESSION: A VERY SPECIFIC RECORD
In a 2023 Forbes interview, Lake was asked which song he had made was his favorite and what was happening in the studio when he created it. His answer was immediate: “Definitely ‘Turn off the Lights.’”
Lake recalled being unusually driven that day to make one particular kind of record. Alexis Roberts was in the session, along with Gita/Aatig. Lake identified Gita as a co-writer and described pushing both collaborators while he tried to get the exact feeling he could already hear internally. His retrospective description is concise: “my vision is exactly how it sounds.”
That is important context because the record does not behave like a production exercise. The vocal is not simply placed on top of a functional house groove. Roberts gives the track its emotional center, while Lake’s production repeatedly clears space around the voice so the title phrase can carry the tension.
ALEXIS ROBERTS IS CENTRAL TO THE RECORD
The release is officially credited to Chris Lake and Alexis Roberts. Apple Music, Qobuz and Chris Lake’s official YouTube delivery all identify Roberts as the co-artist or vocalist on the original. Her own current artist links continue to foreground the song alongside later work with Lake, including “Falling.”
That continuity matters. Roberts is not an anonymous sampled voice attached after the fact. The track’s identity depends on the contrast between an intimate vocal performance and a production designed for large rooms. The refrain is direct enough to be remembered after one listen, but the performance retains enough ambiguity to avoid turning into a conventional pop chorus.
Lake’s 2023 account also clarifies another piece of the writing history that platform metadata does not always display consistently: Gita/Aatig participated in the session and was identified by Lake himself as a co-writer. Where database credits conflict or omit contributors, that firsthand account is the stronger evidence for the creative history.
THE BLACK BOOK RELEASE
“Turn off the Lights” was released on February 23, 2018 through Black Book Records. Beatport identifies the extended release as catalog number BB003; Apple Music and Qobuz carry the same date and label.
That timing places the record near the beginning of Black Book’s development, after Lake had used the label to regain release control around “Operator (Ring Ring).” The record therefore belongs to more than a run of successful singles. It is part of the period when Lake’s modern identity—as a house producer working on his own label and shaping releases around club use—was becoming coherent.
The original single also included a Cages remix on release day. That detail is easy to lose because the original became the better-known version, but it shows that remixability was present from the start rather than added years later as catalog maintenance.
WHY THE PRODUCTION STILL SOUNDS LIKE CHRIS LAKE
There is no verified public plugin chain for “Turn off the Lights,” and inventing one would be exactly the kind of production mythology this editorial series avoids. What can be heard—and what aligns with Lake’s later firsthand production interviews—is the emphasis on low end, negative space, short disruptive details and careful control of attention.
The record gives the vocal room. The drums and bass establish physical movement without filling every frequency. Small changes hit harder because the arrangement does not constantly compete with itself. Those principles are documented more broadly in the site’s Chris Lake production workflow, where Lake’s confirmed Ableton process, kick/bass focus and preference for speed over needless complexity are separated from internet guesswork.
DJ Mag’s 2023 profile of Lake made a similar observation about the record, highlighting Roberts’ vocal performance alongside Lake’s vocal treatment, driving drums and pitch manipulation. The useful point is not that “Turn off the Lights” contains one magic technique. It is that several small decisions all protect the same central idea.
CONTEMPORARY DJ SUPPORT WITHOUT AN INFLATED CLAIM
The track did not need a conventional pop-chart story to become meaningful in dance music. One narrow but useful contemporary data point comes from DJ Mag’s 2018 Top 100 DJs profile of Lost Frequencies, which lists “Chris Lake ‘Turn Off The Lights’” as his favorite tune of that year.
That does not prove universal consensus, and it should not be presented that way. It does show that the record was circulating strongly enough among prominent DJs in 2018 to be singled out beyond Lake’s own sets. The later evidence of durability is stronger still because it comes directly from Lake’s performance history.
THE CLOONEE REMIX GAVE IT A SECOND CLUB LIFE
Black Book returned to the record on January 21, 2022 with the Cloonee remix. Beatport lists the extended version at 128 BPM and categorizes it as Tech House. The remix is officially credited to Chris Lake, Alexis Roberts and Cloonee, and Black Book remains the label.
The release did more than modernize the drums. It placed a 2018 record inside the sound of a younger Black Book-associated producer who was becoming increasingly visible in house music. Later that year Lake and Cloonee released “Nightmares” together, reinforcing that the remix was part of an active creative relationship rather than an isolated catalog exercise.
The Cloonee version also stayed useful in the wider Chris Lake/FISHER world. Apple Music’s official 2023 FISHER x Chris Lake: Under Construction in LA DJ mix includes the remix, evidence that the reinterpretation moved from release back into the live ecosystem.
SEVEN AND EIGHT YEARS LATER, IT WAS STILL NEAR THE END OF THE SET
The strongest evidence for “Turn off the Lights” enduring is Lake’s own set construction. In his official full-set upload from Brooklyn Storehouse during Chemistry release weekend in July 2025, the record appears at 2:00:27 of a set lasting more than two hours. In his official San Francisco full-set upload from November 2025, it appears at 1:54:12, immediately before the final “Move Your Feet” edit.
The pattern continued in 2026. Live Nation’s featured setlist for Lake’s June 20 Los Angeles State Historic Park show lists “Turn off the Lights” as track 25, immediately before the encore. A separate setlist record from the same show reports the same placement.
Set order is not a scientific measure of artistic importance, but repeatedly placing a 2018 track near the emotional peak or close of major sets years later is meaningful. It indicates that Lake still trusts the record after hundreds of newer tracks, IDs and releases have entered his library.
WHY IT ENDURED
The explanation is partly musical and partly structural. Roberts’ vocal gives the track an identity that survives changes in production fashion. The arrangement leaves enough space for the record to remain mixable. The low end gives it physical utility on a club system. The song can be remixed without losing the part people recognize.
There is also a simpler explanation: Lake still likes it. When he was asked in 2023 to choose a favorite song he had made, he did not select the newest release, the biggest collaboration or the record with the cleanest career narrative. He picked “Turn off the Lights” and remembered the intensity of the original session.
That combination—personal attachment, a recognizable vocal, DJ utility and a structure that can survive reinterpretation—is why the track belongs near the center of the Chris Lake songs career map rather than as a period piece from 2018.