A Taste of Looptopia: More cops, fewer rappers make for a tame night

Last year, I arrived at Looptopia around midnight only to find that the cops had shut down Millennium Park. All that drinking for nothing. After I was nearly arrested for throwing a coffee cup at an unmarked police car, I finished out my night roaming randomly through Wrigleyville before heading back to Evanston.

In short, it wasn't going to take much for this year's Looptopia, an all-night party held in downtown Chicago, to top last year's inaugural effort.

This year I arrive at Millennium Park a little after 10 p.m. to find swarms of high schoolers and college students gathered around and above the ice rink. (The bean reeked of weed, not that I could tell or anything. -Ed.) Every group has a focal point and Quinn Costanzo, a sophomore at Columbia College, is one of them. While his friends looked on, he tries very, very hard to do a handstand. And fails. "I'm sorry, I can't do it," he says sadly as he stands, explaining that he's "a bit hammered." After performing a short dance, he tells me what his posse has been up to thus far: snagging wristbands and hitting up a hoedown. And that's about as exciting as things get at this year's event.

Looking around the park, I notice a very obvious difference from last year's event: This year's was so... calm.

[acidfree:1254]The police agree. "This year things are a lot more tame," says a Chicago police sergeant when asked about the almost eerie quietness. "There's a lot more enforcement."

The sergeant explains that most of his activity so far has involved ticketing people for open containers of alcohol. He also blames last year's hip-hop performances for the chaos that ensued (Though poor planning clearly had much to do with it. -Ed.)

"No rappers this year [makes things tamer]," he says, "They brought out a bad crowd." He also mentions the increase in available public bathrooms means there are less people peeing in alleys, which is encouraging.

After leaving the park I stop by Graham Crackers Comic Books on Madison, where I stumble in on the store's employees watching the latest Justice League animated movie with weary expressions. The store usually closes at 6 o'clock. "We've done a lot of business tonight," says Matt Streets, a store employee.

I descend into the core of Looptopia 2008, stopping at Reckless Records to watch a free jazz/electonica performance presented by Hieroglyphic Being. I'm impressed. The saxophonist walks out of the store and plays in the middle of the street. How often do you get a chance to do that? A bright green light catches my eye, and I follow it to the source, a yellow messenger bike in the adjacent alleyway. Carl Harris, the bike's owner, tells me to check out the Chicago Cultural Center, which will be open until midnight.

At the Cultural Center, more bright fluorescent lights shine on the several performances going on throughout the night. After lapping the first floor I sit for a cycle of "Stuck in the Loop," a sketch comedy program put on by Big Dog Eat Child. I watch a sketch that ends with one performer impregnated by a beach ball. Figuring that nothing else is going to top that, I leave for the Art Institute.

The Institute is packed with people trying to make the most of the place before it closes at 1 a.m. I walk around for about twenty minutes, realize I'm too tired to care about the Impressionists (sorry, guys) and head for the Grand El stop to make my trip home. I wind up sitting next to two freestyle rappers who had just met on the red line. And as I sit by these two new fast friends, I think to myself that Looptopia might still have a ways to go before it can honestly call itself an all-night party. But that doesn't mean it's not on the right track. Saxophone was played in the street. Handstands were attempted. A man was impregnated by a beach ball. That's a rocking party, right?

So how was your Looptopia?