Nightlife reports: a tour of Amsterdam's bar and clubs

With its flower boxes, cycle lanes and fairy light-strewn canals, Amsterdam provides a blissfully pleasant backdrop for a big night out. But behind the quaintness is a progressive nightlife scene, which culminates each October in one of the world’s biggest electronic music showcases, Amsterdam Dance Event (ADE).

Ahead of next week’s five-day festival and conference – which draws more than 2,000 international electronic artists, who can be found performing in any corner of the city that can fit a sound system – I dropped by for a snapshot of the after-dark experience. I recruited local DJ and producer Marco Sterk, better known as Young Marco, to take me on a tour of his favourite spots that tell the story of how, over the past two decades, Amsterdam has grown into one of Europe’s most important dance music destinations.

We meet in the city centre, in an alley outside Red Light Radio – a former brothel that’s now an important hub for local DJs – before cycling over to another historic base for the city’s electronic scene; Rush Hour Records. “If you don’t know what to do for the night, this is the place to find out what’s going on,” says Marco, handing me a slickly designed flyer for the last party he played at. “For the last fifteen years it’s been the most important thing for underground dance music. It’s been a platform for people to come up through, like local heroes San Proper and Tom Trago, and even myself.”

As it reaches 7pm we nip over to Café Belgique for our first drink. Vintage beer signs fill the walls of the tiny pub, and a giant pair of red lips hangs from the ceiling in the corner. “I think the tourists are scared to walk in, it looks too local,” says Marco. The pub may be one of the smallest in the city, but that hasn’t stopped it squeezing a set of decks in, providing a tiny yet atmospheric stage for undergound DJs. I ask Marco what makes his city’s nightlife special. “It’s an extremely concentrated city,” he says. Then he adds what, for me at least, will always be the clincher: “And you can always be home in five minutes on your bike.”

We take a detour, via the IJ ferry, over to the ever cooler Amsterdam Noord to drop in on Tolhuistuin, a chic venue with an outdoor stage enclosed by trees and twinkling lights that is one of the city’s newest cultural spots. By 2016 the Noord district will host an even bigger, more commercial venue: the Adam tower, once a Royal Dutch Shell office block, which is being renovated into a complex “for creatives”, that will include basement club, bar, restaurant and viewing platform.

Back in the main city, we head south to the Leidseplein area for a drink at one of the city’s long-running bars, Cafe Lux, which Marco tells me is “the only non-seedy late night bar in the city”. Lux and Weber (a neighbouring sister bar run by the same people) have been favourite drinking spots for the city’s creative types – or indeed anyone who doesn’t need to get up early during the week – for almost 30 years. A relaxed door policy (“anyone is welcome as long as they behave”, the manager tells me) means both are crammed full most nights. It’s also the perfect bouncing-off point for two of Amsterdam’s biggest venues: the elegant Paradiso concert hall and Melkweg housed in a former dairy. And not too far away, mid-way up the Overtoom, is former squat OT301 – an arts venue with a cube-like interior that hosts regular club nights.

Next up is another old favourite, De Nieuwe Anita. Dressed up like a vintage living room, with stylish retro furniture, patterned wallpaper and a jam jar of single cigarettes for sale on the bar, it’s an easy-going venue popular with the art school crowd. “It’s like a party in someone’s house,” says Marco, as we walk down the staircase into the basement club, where DJ Alex Figueira is playing a selection from his funk and afro-beat collection. “You can have any kind of night here.”

Ready to hit a club, we cycle to Studio 80 on Rembrandtplein. Hidden but for a dark doorway and the queue outside, it’s a small, old-school venue – “like a black box,” says Marco. The club has been around for a few years, but has a new, young, programmer who keeps the line-ups fresh and uncompromised. Inside, young clubbers dance to thumping house music from its bespoke sound system, surrounded by flashing strip lights.

Our final stop is at one of Amsterdam’s most important underground dance music venues, Trouw. Filling a former newspaper printworks in the east of the city, the minimalist concrete rectangle is packed with a crowd who have come to see local Joris Voorn DJ tech-house all night long (literally), with label partner Edwin Oosterwal holding up the basement room. The blinds on the long windows are down and Voorn is hard at work behind the decks, almost lost in the sea of people dancing on the stage behind him.

“Trouw and ADE have made the biggest contribution to getting Amsterdam to take itself seriously as a clubbing city,” says Marco. “Trouw created a crowd, educated a crowd.”

The work was continued by ADE, which started in 1996 with 300 delegates and 30 DJs: “People probably wouldn’t have thought Amsterdam was a good setting for a dance music conference ... until ADE tried to do it.”

But the clubbing landscape of Amsterdam is due to change: with the lease running out at the end of the year, Trouw is closing. After a final year spent turning up the intensity Berlin-style, bagging the city’s first 24-hour licence, banning photographs in the club and ending pre-booked tickets on most of its nights, the club is going out with the “absolute climax” its team wanted. Founder Olaf Boswijk is vague about the exact details but promises me there will be a follow-up. But after six years the club leaves behind a changed area; this summer the Volkshotel, with rooftop club Canvas, opened opposite, joining a number of new bars and restaurants around the Wibaustraat. And even the Trouw building, which will be turned into another hotel, may still retain its clubbing heritage under a new moniker.

As a cold day begins to dawn, we head out of Trouw, leaving the crowd in the sound-infused time warp that makes the place so special. The night has jumped between vintage bars, Belgian pubs and underground clubs, and we’ve mingled with students, professionals, tourists and ravers, but somehow it still feels cohesive.

“Everything’s very mixed,” says Marco, “but that’s what Amsterdam represents – a mix of influences. The city is too small to have separate clubs for everyone. People have to interact with each other, and that’s what creates an exciting dynamic.”

• Amsterdam Dance Event runs from 15-19 October. Flights were provided by KLM (klm.com), which flies to Amsterdam from £18 UK and Irish airport from £89 return. Accommodation was provided by Volkshotel , doubles from €79 room only) whose Club Canvas and Doka cocktail bar host a range of club nights during ADE

Amsterdam Dance Event: key nights

Rush Hour
The Amsterdam label has called in Chicago-based DJs Ron Trent and Traxx to head their night, with backup from local hero San Proper.
• Trouw Amsterdam, 15 October, from 10pm, €18, amsterdam-dance-event.nl

Warp x LuckyMe showcase
Expect some seriously buzzed up electronic swagger at this big-name night headlined by Scottish “aquacrunk” producer Rustie, with support from Mount Kimbie and Benji B.
• Paradiso, 17 October, from 11pm, €20, amsterdam-dance-event.nl

Mason presents Animal Language
Alt-ravers Mason are hosting what will inevitably be a groove-filled night of nu-disco and house, featuring Alex Metric on the decks.
• Club NYX, 17 October, from 11pm, €15, amsterdam-dance-event.nl