Saturday, November 27, 2010
Empty Thoughts and Random Memories: After Hours at the funeral home (or, the only two ...
Empty Thoughts and Random Memories: After Hours at the funeral home (or, the only two ...: "I'm short on facts on how this came to be, so I'm going to go with the story as I know it. It's gotta be close. During my rave years, say 13..."
After Hours at the funeral home (or, the only two good things Rupe ever did for me he did the same day)
I'm short on facts on how this came to be, so I'm going to go with the story as I know it. It's gotta be close. During my rave years, say 13 years ago, there was a popular spot for after-hours parties. A funeral home. Kid you not. It was on 47th street in a ......well ethnicky area, not really a rats ass area. Lots of first generation latino immigrants, good people, just not the kind of area you would expect to find around a party spot. How this came to be, as I understood it, was a Polish kid and his brother inherited this funeral home from their grandparents. This made sense, because I'm sure that was a Polish neighborhood at some point. This is Chicago, after all. Every neighborhood was Polish at some point.
Anyway, these guys inherit the funeral home and the apartment above it. They move into the apartment, but instead of hosting funeral parties, they take a different course. Like any after-hours, their parties would start around 4am, prior to that the promoters would be attending the raves that night and handing out fliers. I don't remember what they charged but it wasn't much. The building was long and relatively narrow, and originally there was a large comfortably furnished room, then the area that the casket would sit. In the back of the building was a large workroom or stockroom or whatever (I shudder to think what that room was originally used for) that sealed off pretty well to the reception area. The place had last been remodeled in the 70's, and the furniture, carpet, and decor reflected that. What these guys had done, and it worked pretty well, was to take the stock room and line the walls with a hodge podge of anything that could contain sound, carpet remnants and the like. The turntables and speakers were back there. So you entered one end, paid your couple bucks, and walked through the narrow rooms of couchs, easy chairs, etc (all very 70's) where raver kids were lounging about. At the end of this area was a door that led to the dance floor/stock room. It was really a great idea, raves were fueled by a myriad of different drugs, so some people at 4am+ some would still want to dance, and others would want to relax. The problem, really, was that all the carpet remnants in the world couldn't deaden the kind of bass they were pushing into a pseudo-residential neighborhood. Most of the residents of this neighborhood spoke little English, all went to the church (almost directly across the street) Sunday mornings. See the disconnect?
I loved the funeral home after hours, and I probably went to a half dozen there, but you could see that this was not going to go on forever. One Sunday morning, probably 6am or so, a friend and I left to go pick up......chewing gum, because there was a lack of chewing gum and people wanted more. We walked out the front door,turned left, and were crossing an alley when we heard, "Hey! Hey you two!"
It was two chicago cops in the car at the other end of the short alley. Joe and I looked at each other with the same uncertainty. Granted, we had nothing illegal on us, but we sure looked like we did, white kids wearing bright raver clothing at that hour in that neighborhood. And Chicago police are incredibly hard to predict. Some people think they are meaner than suburban cops. Not true, at least not all the time. Suburban cops follow the "book" pretty much all the time, they aren't going to haul you out of your car and search it cause they feel like it. They also will almost never let you out of anything. Chicago cops play different. Finer points of due process are lost in their effort, but you stand a MUCH better chance of them letting you go if they do catch you with something they deem not a big deal. As long as you're not black, that is. Anyway, we glance at each other, trying to decide whether to run or not (instinct), and the cops must have sensed this cause they said ,"Hey wait guys. Did you just come out of the funeral home?"in a nice tone of voice. We called back, yeah, we had just left. They told us to go back and tell them to turn the music down, if they kept getting complaints they would eventually have to do something. And they drove off. Fair warning. When we got back an hour later we mentioned this event to a few people, none of whom seemed to care much. But it was pretty obvious to me, that unlike most rave locations, in industrial areas where no one is around for miles at night, a bass heavy, DJ featured (they promoted by booking known DJ's, at least known to us) party starting at 4am was not kosher in this neighborhood.
Now it's a couple weeks later, and I'm at a party (what we called raves) that's drawing to a close. There is a DJ there named Rupe (everyone was a DJ) and he was planning to play the funeral home. I wanted to go there anyway, he needed a ride, and walking in with him would save me the few buck cover (really the principle of getting in free). We went, hauled in his records, and basically went our separate ways. Well, not that separate, it wasn't that big. But before he even played, he finds me, tells me he has a bad feeling about being there, and wants to grab his records and go to another after hours. I was having a lovely time, and though my spider sense was not tingling, I knew the funeral home was precarious at best, so I agreed and we left. I don't remember where the second after hours was, but we got there, were there for five minutes, same thing. Bad feeling wants to go. Fine, fine. So we leave and head to a mutual friends house for a quiet small gathering. Not that this matters, but as I drove Rupe split a microdot of messcaline with his teeth, perfectly in half. A microdot is like a flat BB, maybe smaller. I was impressed. I would learn later in life it was a skill acquired from being a master mooch, and making people share what should be unsharable.
He was right about both parties! The second one was more a routine shut down, but when you're holding, there is no routine. The funeral home was a far larger deal. Apparently, on a couple of occasions Police had tried to stop by and tell them to turn the music down. The guys responded by killing the music completely when the cops were walking up, and not answering the door. There were no windows left exposed, city spot so thick metal barred door. And there was only one door left, the main front, the other in the stock room/club land had been sealed over in a vain attempt to soundproof. I guess having tried to openly come by before, the cops this time got sneaky. And there were a lot of them, paddy wagons already on hand, they planned on making arrests. So all of a sudden, boom, cops are filling the place. Some people ran into the dancefloor room and told them what was going on, they tried to bar the door between the two sections but the CPD took that out like it was paper (and really, where would they have gone? The door outside back there was sealed over. The party kid Masada, holding out back there until the Roman legions got through.)
So, stunned, nowhere to run, those holding illegal things (99%) did the one thing they could; they threw their shit onto the floor. As the cops took order, they rounded people up into areas, like ok you three sit on that couch and so on. And if you ended up next to something on the floor, you were one of the lucky ones to go to 26th and California. The details I have about this part are exactly factual. A girl who would go on to become one of the major girlfriends in my life was one of the unlucky ones that morning. They were drugs all over the floor, and a bag of coke by where she had been seated, with a couple other girls. All three were taken. (Coke, of all things. Not a party kid drug. She got busted because of what some imposter ditched.)
I had been hanging with her that night before Rupe got us out of there. In time, the charges were dropped, but she had to deal with a lot of people (family) doubting her story. I knew it was true. No way Kelly had coke (now if it had been ecstasy.....)
Rupe's intuition saved me, potentially big time. I was holding heavy that morning. And I would end up being rommates with the guy (and another guy) within 6 months. He was one of the worst roommates and worst people I had ever been around. The kind of guy who would ask you for a favor, and just not take no, keep asking, keep asking, until you literally had to scream at him. One of these favors was always to borrow my car, short time periods "for nothing". Heroin was not a major party kid drug, and at that time I was unfamiliar with it. That would soon change, as it brought down the house that tweak built. Next story.
Anyway, these guys inherit the funeral home and the apartment above it. They move into the apartment, but instead of hosting funeral parties, they take a different course. Like any after-hours, their parties would start around 4am, prior to that the promoters would be attending the raves that night and handing out fliers. I don't remember what they charged but it wasn't much. The building was long and relatively narrow, and originally there was a large comfortably furnished room, then the area that the casket would sit. In the back of the building was a large workroom or stockroom or whatever (I shudder to think what that room was originally used for) that sealed off pretty well to the reception area. The place had last been remodeled in the 70's, and the furniture, carpet, and decor reflected that. What these guys had done, and it worked pretty well, was to take the stock room and line the walls with a hodge podge of anything that could contain sound, carpet remnants and the like. The turntables and speakers were back there. So you entered one end, paid your couple bucks, and walked through the narrow rooms of couchs, easy chairs, etc (all very 70's) where raver kids were lounging about. At the end of this area was a door that led to the dance floor/stock room. It was really a great idea, raves were fueled by a myriad of different drugs, so some people at 4am+ some would still want to dance, and others would want to relax. The problem, really, was that all the carpet remnants in the world couldn't deaden the kind of bass they were pushing into a pseudo-residential neighborhood. Most of the residents of this neighborhood spoke little English, all went to the church (almost directly across the street) Sunday mornings. See the disconnect?
I loved the funeral home after hours, and I probably went to a half dozen there, but you could see that this was not going to go on forever. One Sunday morning, probably 6am or so, a friend and I left to go pick up......chewing gum, because there was a lack of chewing gum and people wanted more. We walked out the front door,turned left, and were crossing an alley when we heard, "Hey! Hey you two!"
It was two chicago cops in the car at the other end of the short alley. Joe and I looked at each other with the same uncertainty. Granted, we had nothing illegal on us, but we sure looked like we did, white kids wearing bright raver clothing at that hour in that neighborhood. And Chicago police are incredibly hard to predict. Some people think they are meaner than suburban cops. Not true, at least not all the time. Suburban cops follow the "book" pretty much all the time, they aren't going to haul you out of your car and search it cause they feel like it. They also will almost never let you out of anything. Chicago cops play different. Finer points of due process are lost in their effort, but you stand a MUCH better chance of them letting you go if they do catch you with something they deem not a big deal. As long as you're not black, that is. Anyway, we glance at each other, trying to decide whether to run or not (instinct), and the cops must have sensed this cause they said ,"Hey wait guys. Did you just come out of the funeral home?"in a nice tone of voice. We called back, yeah, we had just left. They told us to go back and tell them to turn the music down, if they kept getting complaints they would eventually have to do something. And they drove off. Fair warning. When we got back an hour later we mentioned this event to a few people, none of whom seemed to care much. But it was pretty obvious to me, that unlike most rave locations, in industrial areas where no one is around for miles at night, a bass heavy, DJ featured (they promoted by booking known DJ's, at least known to us) party starting at 4am was not kosher in this neighborhood.
Now it's a couple weeks later, and I'm at a party (what we called raves) that's drawing to a close. There is a DJ there named Rupe (everyone was a DJ) and he was planning to play the funeral home. I wanted to go there anyway, he needed a ride, and walking in with him would save me the few buck cover (really the principle of getting in free). We went, hauled in his records, and basically went our separate ways. Well, not that separate, it wasn't that big. But before he even played, he finds me, tells me he has a bad feeling about being there, and wants to grab his records and go to another after hours. I was having a lovely time, and though my spider sense was not tingling, I knew the funeral home was precarious at best, so I agreed and we left. I don't remember where the second after hours was, but we got there, were there for five minutes, same thing. Bad feeling wants to go. Fine, fine. So we leave and head to a mutual friends house for a quiet small gathering. Not that this matters, but as I drove Rupe split a microdot of messcaline with his teeth, perfectly in half. A microdot is like a flat BB, maybe smaller. I was impressed. I would learn later in life it was a skill acquired from being a master mooch, and making people share what should be unsharable.
He was right about both parties! The second one was more a routine shut down, but when you're holding, there is no routine. The funeral home was a far larger deal. Apparently, on a couple of occasions Police had tried to stop by and tell them to turn the music down. The guys responded by killing the music completely when the cops were walking up, and not answering the door. There were no windows left exposed, city spot so thick metal barred door. And there was only one door left, the main front, the other in the stock room/club land had been sealed over in a vain attempt to soundproof. I guess having tried to openly come by before, the cops this time got sneaky. And there were a lot of them, paddy wagons already on hand, they planned on making arrests. So all of a sudden, boom, cops are filling the place. Some people ran into the dancefloor room and told them what was going on, they tried to bar the door between the two sections but the CPD took that out like it was paper (and really, where would they have gone? The door outside back there was sealed over. The party kid Masada, holding out back there until the Roman legions got through.)
So, stunned, nowhere to run, those holding illegal things (99%) did the one thing they could; they threw their shit onto the floor. As the cops took order, they rounded people up into areas, like ok you three sit on that couch and so on. And if you ended up next to something on the floor, you were one of the lucky ones to go to 26th and California. The details I have about this part are exactly factual. A girl who would go on to become one of the major girlfriends in my life was one of the unlucky ones that morning. They were drugs all over the floor, and a bag of coke by where she had been seated, with a couple other girls. All three were taken. (Coke, of all things. Not a party kid drug. She got busted because of what some imposter ditched.)
I had been hanging with her that night before Rupe got us out of there. In time, the charges were dropped, but she had to deal with a lot of people (family) doubting her story. I knew it was true. No way Kelly had coke (now if it had been ecstasy.....)
Rupe's intuition saved me, potentially big time. I was holding heavy that morning. And I would end up being rommates with the guy (and another guy) within 6 months. He was one of the worst roommates and worst people I had ever been around. The kind of guy who would ask you for a favor, and just not take no, keep asking, keep asking, until you literally had to scream at him. One of these favors was always to borrow my car, short time periods "for nothing". Heroin was not a major party kid drug, and at that time I was unfamiliar with it. That would soon change, as it brought down the house that tweak built. Next story.
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