Rave Review
“P.L.U.R.,” spelled Nic, pointing to the letters painted vertically on the wall. “It means ‘Peace, Love, Unity, Respect.’ It’s iconic for ravers everywhere: It’s what we live; it’s what we breathe.”
The floor was reluctant to release the soles of my shoes, as though I were attempting to cross a large glue mousetrap instead of a warehouse expanse. Random art clung haphazardly to the walls, with no discernible flare or direction. (I use the term “art” loosely here, as the decor was essentially post-modern bullshit: multicolored, ejaculatory stains oozing down the canvas and off onto the floor.) Thrown everywhere that was most inconvenient in the room, rotting couches bled cotton fluff out of the exposed orifices of their overturned cushions. The space teemed with people, their eyes brimming with energy—I could tell when they looked at me, their eyes darting across the room altogether, like a clan of primeval beings. My eyes latched onto theirs, and I could feel my heartbeat accelerate, as if something were about to happen that would transcend any possibility of communication (verbal or otherwise). I was on the verge of something visceral, something you can’t quite grasp—something that flicks between your fingers like dying sparks sputtering between neurons. Possibility loomed.
At least it loomed more than it had at the beginning of the evening, when mostly boredom filled the cocktails that Laura and I guzzled on the thirty-seventh floor of her building on Michigan Avenue. Our eyes traced the landscape of the city from the balcony, and we were laughing as gusts of wind pulled her hair along their current beneath the autumn stars. Then Nic joined us, sporting a form-fitting V-neck sweater. He draped his arms over our shoulders.
“I just heard about this rave over on Kedzie; they just sent out the address. You guys in? We’d have to leave now, though. It’s way out there.” I looked at Laura hesitantly. She beamed back, confident in her enthusiasm (or in the fact that she now had something to be enthusiastic about). I set aside my reservations and followed them both west on the Blue Line.
Blinking blue police beacons heralded our destination. They adorned every corner, burning silently in the darkness. Cars sped down the road at velocities upwards of seventy miles per hour, as hecklers leaned out of the vehicles’ windows, cursing loudly over the din of their stereos. Shattered glass littered the sidewalks like cheap confetti from a party favor. The street signs along the way were sometimes crooked, sometimes upside-down, and sometimes beaten to the ground at a ninety-degree angle. (“I found myself within a forest dark,” the line goes, “for the straightforward path had been lost.”)
“They put the party out here,” Nic explained, chuckling, “because nobody’s gonna give a shit how loud you play the music, not gonna care if you’re dealing or rolling or whatever—because the police don’t come out here anyways: They wouldn’t risk their own lives for a bunch of kids.”
We could hear the beat pulsing through the night air from two blocks away, the musical current surging through our toes as we approached our mark. A neon aura of glowsticks and colored strobe lights flashed above, winding in a cloud of artificial fog through the warehouse’s shattered windows. We crossed the threshold of the building, and I felt the beat stir like a demon within me.
All around us swerved strangers drenched with sweat, make-up smeared and dribbling down their faces. Our shifting gaze alighted on an uncanny mix of clothing styles and accessories: vests and V-necks, fuzzy slippers, fairy wings, devil horns, animal tails, guitar cases, bikinis for both genders—nothing appeared to be off-limits. In fact, some weren’t wearing any clothes at all. Bracelets strangled some arms as though painted directly on the skin, while others donned so many colored strings and fluorescent beads that no skin at all was visible in between. Hair was shaved, spiked, dyed, or layered. Most tried to dress fantastically, their aim being to blur their gender identity (if they had any). There was no order—it was mayhem.
The main vestibule, apart from the artwork on the walls, had a makeshift “bathroom” off to one side. Sectioned off by wood panels reaching to the ceiling, it contained a giant porcelain tub, lined with hair and waste, whose rusted piping had disconnected from the wall years ago. The line for the bathroom was stationary in the flux of the crowd, as if the people in it were flaunting their post-alternative aesthetic on a stage. The more of them I saw, however, the fewer of them I noticed; the strength of the rave’s stimuli blights the senses almost immediately.
Laura made a genuine effort to make conversation with the other participants and learn more about them. She spent most of her time in the back room, astride one of the many porch chairs lining the smoky, makeshift bar (This was a plastic, folding table with a piece of paper that read, “SHOTS – 1$”). People passed around paraphernalia of all shapes and colors; cigarettes and drinks were shared by dozens. A tall man with cornrows distributed tablets in the dark. There was a strong sense of camaraderie—the substances used were communal rather than individual, as suggested by the accelerating contact high that Laura and I began to experience.
