The French underground is mutating, and Virtual Forest is at the forefront of this movement.
Natural Limit, Solma, and Fluid Matter all come from completely different backgrounds, yet they found common ground in their love for intelligent, deep music.
Noticing there wasn’t a space for this specific sound in France, they decided to create one themselves, and so, Virtual Forest was born. With this label, their mission is to bridge the gaps between isolated electronic music scenes.
Four years and 14 releases later, they have done exactly that. Their output covers the entire spectrum, ranging from the darkest dubstep to the most abyssal tribe.
We sat down with the label heads to talk about what inspires them, how they fit into the evolving French underground scene, and what lies ahead.
Your latest EP, Diplopia, came out recently. Can you tell us more about the story of this VA and how it came together?
Natural Limit: This is our biggest project to date. An ambitious collaborative release, which took us two years to complete, consisting entirely of duos or features. We wanted to push the idea of confronting two worlds and two different vibes, hence the name Diplopia, meaning double vision. It resonates with the wider French scene at the moment, linking two different worlds of electronic music: the deep and techno world with the bass music universe. That’s why we have both techno and bass artists on there. Some of the collaborations on this compilation are artists who have never worked together, so it’s nice to make that happen. It’s also one of the most international releases we have been working on, with even some Australian artists, such as LOIF. We booked him for a festival a few years ago, and it ended with a track on this compilation. It’s really nice to have the opportunity to work with artists whom we look up to.
How did you pick the artists you wanted to work with for this project?
Solma: The first tracks we got sent in were all collaboration tracks by chance, and then we thought, let’s do a collaboration EP. At first, we contacted friends, like Trois-Quarts Taxi System and Kick21, whom we know in real life.
Natural Limit: I’m a huge fan of Formant Value and Simone Bauer. They produced one of the best ambient albums I’ve ever listened to in my life a few years ago, and they are close friends. After high school, one moved to Berlin and one to London, so they don’t have a lot of opportunities to make music together anymore, but when I met Simone a few years ago, I told them that I would love for them to collaborate again for our VA. Working with artists that we genuinely listen to every day has always been one of the label’s goals. And this Italian duo is the perfect illustration of that. Talking about another international duo that we’re deeply looking up to is Sha Ru and Christian Coiffure. They are more affiliated with the bass scene, but they never managed to do a track together. I’m close friends with Sha Ru, and I knew that they were up to collaborate with French artists like Christian Coiffure. The idea behind this collaboration actually came from them, and it went very smoothly. I also want to mention the guy who mastered our album, AES Dana. He’s a legend in ambient music, and he did an amazing job. We deliberately wanted to apply a ‘deep and ambient’ mastering to the tracks, even though it’s a bass music compilation, so choosing AES Dana was a conscious choice. We really wanted to achieve a soft, introspective feel on all the tracks, rather than something too punchy.
You’re saying there are different genres and different perspectives on music. That’s exactly how you describe your label.
Fluid Matter: All three of us have very different backgrounds, but we got to know each other through Antoine (Solma). I’ve been friends with him since forever, but he went more into the techno side of things pretty early on, and I got into bass music. We went to the same parties when we were together in Paris, but I would mostly listen to bass music. At some point, Antoine went to Berlin, and he met Charles-Lim (Natural Limit), and that’s where they connected. They also had different backgrounds, because Charles-Lim was more into trance and IDM. Antoine and Charles-Lim decided to start the label, and they asked me if I wanted to be a part of it. This worked out perfectly because I had been thinking about wanting to make music that crosses boundaries for a while. In Paris, genres were isolated from each other: there’s the techno scene, the bass music scene, and people don’t really talk to each other. I was thinking about how we should do something about this and try to build more bridges, so I’m really happy to be a part of this.
Solma: When we started the label, the genre that brought us together was Berlin electro, so we went from there, and we also took inspiration from our French environment and all the music that had been released during COVID. Before COVID, all of the different music scenes were very separated, but thankfully, we’ve noticed this has gotten better after the pandemic. Still, it’s important to keep building bridges.
Fluid Matter: This new underground scene is a bit of a mixture between all the different scenes, which is exactly where we want to be.
Natural Limit: The music we are releasing on Virtual Forest is the melting point of the three of us. This is one of the things that has amazed me since the beginning, because all of our musical tastes are present on the label. At some point, we were thinking of releasing more techno, but Julien (Fluid Matter) said no to that, because not one genre is above the others, and this, for me, is the most important thing that drives us to release cross-genre music. It’s not only a way of thinking, it’s also the average of our three musical tastes. That’s why this idea of having different musical universes collide is so important to us, because it’s the initial purpose of the label.
There is this diversity of sounds. What’s the common thread? Is there something that ties it all together?
Solma: The common thing is always some kind of minimalism and left-field influence.
Fluid Matter: There’s this general emphasis on sound design. The tracks that we end up releasing are often pretty detailed, and although they are minimalistic, they can also be very realistic. I wouldn’t say that we are the label with the craziest sound design, but it’s still an important thing to us.
Is that where the name “Virtual Forest” comes from?
Fluid Matter: Exactly. It’s about using technology to make something organic and natural. On one hand, we use the most advanced technology we can find, with the latest plugins and software that is updated every year. On the other hand, we use these tools to make music that feels like you’re in nature. I think that one of the most primal things that you can do as a human is dance to music together with other people.
Natural Limit: Our first idea was to call the label “Random Forest”, but it’s the name of an AI model, so we decided to switch it up a little bit. One thing we knew was that we still wanted “forest” in the name, because it captures the whole natural organic side. In the end, our goal was to represent two different sides and to link something organic, natural, with something digital and recent. At the time, we were listening to IDM, growing up with Aphex Twin, Autechre, all of those artists, and it was that music we wanted to showcase.
Solma: I remember that we wanted to have “forest” in the name because we wanted to release music that could be played in a forest.
Something else that defines your releases is the artworks. How did you come up with this visual identity?
Fluid Matter: We work with different artists almost every time, and we always try to find artists that we like. People who work with abstract 3D objects, convoluted shapes… We also always stay in the blue-green spectrum, because those colours are our main palette.
Natural Limit: The one thing that’s difficult about working with a graphic designer is that the artwork always needs each of our validations. We were super strict at the beginning, because we wanted to have artworks that we were all proud of, and now we’ve got a clear identity that’s the average of all three of us. When we work with a designer now, we just share our catalogue and show the artworks. That way, they get to know our universe and what we’re looking for.
Fluid Matter: It was difficult at the start, but it is much easier now, because they know us better now. They can anticipate what we’re going to need, and the relationship is a lot more fluid. Now that Charles-Lim, Antoine, and I have been working together for a while, we can make decisions much faster, because we know each other much better.
Let’s talk about the growing grassroots movement in France. How have you seen this scene grow since you started the label?
Solma: One of the most important festivals in this movement is “Positive Education”. They have managed to create a huge community of people who like discovering new music, and I’ve discovered some of my favourite sounds at that festival. They’ve got three stages, one mainstream, a bit more techno, a second one with bass music and a third one that’s deep techno oriented. All three stages are super close to each other, so when people go from one stage to the other, they would also pass the third stage, so people at that festival always end up discovering new sounds and artists.
Fluid Matter: I think France is the country with the most festivals in Europe, and there is a big festival culture. After the pandemic, a lot of people seemed to be thinking, we have to organise a festival now. They assembled a group of friends, invited people they knew, and then, before you know it, you ended up with 200 people in a small field in Brittany.
Natural Limit: The number of festivals in France is linked to the restriction policy. We don’t have many cultural venues in France, especially for our type of music. The problem is that the government doesn’t like raves at all. Over the past years, we’ve had a lot of organised illegal parties in Paris and Lyon. It’s really just like a normal party, but in a warehouse or some other desolate location. They became huge around 2015, but obviously, around COVID, this number dropped massively. So, after COVID, there was this desire to gather and to meet again with friends, and that’s why we have so many outdoor festivals right now, which makes it easier for people to discover new artists. There are so many new French artists at the moment, all thanks to this movement.
How does Virtual Forest fit into this whole scene?
Solma: I have to mention “Positive Education” again. They managed to create a community where all people know each other. Being part of that community has helped our sound evolve by meeting a lot of people and seeing what they do, which is super inspiring.
Natural Limit: We are defining ourselves as a label that releases music from artists all over the world, and we want our music to be listened to in Australia, Japan, and all over. That’s why our whole communication is in English. I think that’s also the reason we’re not looking to organise events any time soon, because when you throw an event, you need an audience in the same area, but Virtual Forest’s audience is all over. So, one of the decisions we made recently was to focus more on the label and on the releases. Which doesn’t mean we don’t play at parties, because we love doing that as well. For example, I’m involved in the organisation of a few festivals in France, especially an event called La Vallée Électrique, a festival in the South of France, and these are the kind of events we play or organise a showcase at.
With the whole scene growing, where do you see Virtual Forest going?
Natural Limit: The growth of the scene affects us in a really positive way. We are trying to release more mind-bending music, the scene is growing, we’re releasing more… It’s a win-win. When we started, the scene was way more scattered around in sounds, but it feels more homogenous now, which is good to see.
Solma: What surprised me was hearing people say that Virtual Forest was a central label of the scene. At the start, we were just doing our own thing, and at some point, people started recognising that. As we said before, it’s a community, we know the people, and what we’re doing, artistically speaking, is also part of this movement.
Fluid Matter: I would love to keep growing and to keep releasing stuff that makes people want to listen to more of it, and have more people from outside this scene discover it. A lot of people, especially internationally, are still discovering this kind of music. The more people are inspired by it, the more people will be down to play it.
You’re talking about growing a movement so that more people are down to play this kind of music in a club. Do you think this sound is fit for a club, or do we need to find other places to play this music?
Solma: There are no club parties with this style of music. Sporadically, you hear this music at a festival, and even more rare are the one-off club nights, but they always struggle to make people come. There is a wave of interest coming from social media like Instagram, but in terms of people going to clubs, there is no movement yet. I think that clubs in France aren’t really adapted to this style of music, because the way people go to clubs in France is, you get drunk after work, you go to the club for an hour or two, and then you go home. The people want big club bangers. They’re not prepared to hear introspective music. Especially in Paris, where the rent is crazy expensive, and the city is really condensed, clubs have no space.
Fluid Matter: In general, the clubs in Paris are really struggling right now, probably in the rest of France as well. There was a small boom after COVID, but the people are tired. They have no money left to go to clubs, and everyone is struggling. The first thing that disappears when you squeeze people is culture, and unfortunately, that means that they have to optimise for the best, the biggest, the craziest parties that bring the most people in. Because of that, it’s even harder to get our music to clubs. Don’t get me wrong, some spaces accept this music, but there are not many of them, and they are the ones at risk of closing. It’s a sad time right now for clubbing in Paris, especially for our scene.
Natural Limit: If only the charges for the club weren’t so high… I’m living in Lyon, France, and we have this club called Le Sucre. It’s one of the only clubs in France that puts on events for our kind of sound. The main problem is that there’s no other decent club in Lyon. A lack of funding from the government and a very restricted policy have led the cultural venues to close, one by one, and that lack of funding is probably the reason why people are organising their own small events once a year with their friends. Because even big festivals are struggling in France. The average loss of a festival in 2025 is 1.5 million euros, a statistic from the French National Music Centre. Artists are charging crazy fees for their sets, and it’s all getting a bit messed up. All of the movements we are into are an answer to that. Keep coming together despite all restrictions and lack of venues.
Fluid Matter: The only answer that I see would be to start doing illegal raves again. At some point, there were a lot of them, but they died out because of COVID, and maybe because people were tired of the same industrial techno being played all the time. I think our scene would work pretty well at those raves, because there, a lot of people go for the vibes and the music, not so much for the DJs or headliners. I see the future of our scene there, and during the summer we’d have the festivals.
Absolutely! Let’s go back to the underground. Let’s go back to where it all started.
Fluid Matter: That’s it! If we could have a Virtual Forest rave in an actual forest, that would be amazing. There are possibilities, so maybe in the future…
Interview conducted in December 2025 by Annelies Rom
You can support Virtual Forest’s latest project, Diplopia, here.
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Article produced in commercial collaboration with Virtual Forest.
