A Weekend in Chicago: Chance the Rapper's Coloring World Was a Gift to His City

Courtesy of Rene Marban for Pigeons & Planes

By Alex Siber

“Where’s the pizza?!”

Chance the Rapper’s famous voice filters through the tinny speakers of a walkie-talkie. The 23-year-old’s request comes in the midst of his magnificent Coloring World event, a jolly celebration of friendship, family, and faith in the wake of Coloring Book that doubles as his biggest gift yet to the city of Chicago. He announced the event last Thursday without explanation. Two days later, it’s almost over—a logistics miracle that attests to the power of a motivated team with a driven leader.

The final wave of fans is assembling in a fenced bullpen that points to the single-door entrance of this mysterious Chicago gathering ground, located minutes from Humboldt Park. Three rounds down, one to go. Both staff and attendees are relieved by the sunny weather, a subtle nod of approval from Mother Nature.

Hours earlier, I immersed myself in the interactive playhouse / art exhibit / listening party for the first time. The day’s journey really began, however, in a surprisingly picturesque parking lot at the Pulaski International School.

I arrive at 1 p.m. local time to find a group of early birds—a handful of teens and twenty-somethings whose home states range from Ohio to Texas. Jovial and good-spirited, they wonder aloud whether Chance inspired The Life of Pablo’s tainted gospel. Eddy, a baby-faced 20-year-old, proudly references Good Enough, a 2009 mixtape of Bennett’s that served as a stepping stone to the detention thesis that is 10 Day. I ask some of the locals if they’re proud of Chance’s rise, and the response is overwhelming. Chicago’s rising prince is bringing the city with him.

100 feet away from Chance’s disciples, a member of his team leads a small crew in constructing the secret event’s standalone merch tent. He’s moving dozens of boxes of Coloring Book clothes at record speed under a hot sun, but can’t seem to stop grinning.

The first fans to arrive at Pulaski.

Hundreds of ticket buyers now line the streets around Humboldt Park, the first of two destinations vaguely emailed the night prior. Ten yellow buses report for duty, and I’m reminded of bygone May afternoons, when a metallic bell meant it was time to leave school.

Soon, the first wave of people—350 strong—file from the sidewalk into the lot. Chance’s transportation team maintains control over step one of the process. They’re buzzing and cordial for now, but the crowd is one bad egg away from a stampede. If the team doesn’t work fast enough, the whole plan could collapse.

Fortunately, they keep the peace. Fans present their tickets and check in with four or five White Shirts—temporary hires donning Coloring Book tees, locally recruited to supplement Chance’s in-house staff.

“I can put this on my résumé!” one of the workers realizes. It’s a minor moment, but it’s one that wouldn’t exist had Chance permanently relocated to the industry hubs of New York or L.A.

“It’s been kind of 24/7 since I got on, but in a good way,” another staffer tells me as we ride the first bus to the undisclosed location. She had joined the fray on Wednesday, just 72 hours ago.

We arrive at our destination—a sprawling warehouse, bland and dreary, that doesn’t exactly scream “fun.” From the outside, the building looked like a holding facility for cement mixers, or a giant storage unit containing unwanted household appliances.

Chance’s manager, Pat Corcoran, would later say that the building belonged to the Goose Island brewing company—the same company Chance partnered with last year to create a flavor of beer for “the hardworking people of Chicago.” In the makeshift venue’s parking lot, a lone deer appears. The bus’ passengers scramble to capture it on Snapchat.

“This is some James Bond shit!” someone hollers as we circle the perimeter of this seemingly unremarkable place.

The bus halts at long last. Julio, Chance’s head of security, climbs the vehicle’s steps and smiles.

“Are you guys ready?” he asks.

“We don’t know what we’re ready for,” a guy sitting behind me says, “but yeah, we’re fucking ready.”

Pat the Manager helps maintain order as the first wave enters Coloring World.

Courtesy of Rene Marban for Pigeons & Planes

The only entryway leads to a dark room with black curtains on either side, and a white sheet marking the midsection. As the last of us cross through the portal and kiss sunlight goodbye, the door closes and a projector turns the sheet into a screen—equal parts nostalgic documentation and teasing animation. OJ Hays, Austin Vesely, and Bob Zegler, three of Chance’s trusted artistic collaborators, created the video.

“A lot of it is footage that I took around the making of 10 Day,” Austin tells me after the second round concludes.

I asked Austin about the challenges of creating such a complex event in so little time. “Constraints can be the mother of invention,” he says, suggesting a whirlwind week endured by the team. “That made us cut ideas that were too fantastical. The first meeting was a week ago and we were able to communicate amongst a team. We established a brain trust and made it kind of like we’d make a movie.”

Each time Chance appears on the projection, the crowd reacts like he’s right there in front of them. Childhood footage of him dancing syncs to the lyric “I used to dance to Michael” in the reprise of “Blessings.” Chance appears at a long-ago show in his signature letterman jacket, spliced between clips of Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory. Fandom hits a fever pitch when the final verse on Coloring Book concludes and the reprise begins.

“Are you ready…”

Courtesy of Rene Marban for Pigeons & Planes

Courtesy of Rene Marban for Pigeons & Planes

The curtains around us fall, and the warehouse’s 15,000 square feet space overwhelms the senses. We walk over glossy green turf, flown in from Colorado at the last minute to cover concrete. “All We Got” roars through a surround sound speaker system. As Coloring Book continues to play, it’s clear how much Chance wanted to bring his third project into real life. If Kanye West’s TLOP listening party at Madison Square Garden was a triumph of excess, Coloring World is a toast to youth.

The scene is straight out of a child’s dream: a life-size chess board, two-foot-tall Connect 4 set, and a carnival-ready cutout of the Social Experiment crew wait to the left. To the right? A bouncy house, giant inflated slide, drawing wall, and recreation of Chance’s living room (complete with classic board games like Operation and Candy Land).

Courtesy of Rene Marban for Pigeons & Planes

A lighting rig that stretches the length of the room flashes a rainbow of colors through the dark. It’s a colorful twilight zone designed to spark memories of childhood, the physical manifestation of the state of mind found on Coloring Book: Smiling is nothing to be scared of.

Nods to the “Sunday Candy” video set and 10 Day favorite “Brain Cells” illuminate the leftmost corner. Streamers and plush, movable barriers hang from the high ceiling rafters, offering a sense of boundary without restricting movement, museum exhibits that comprise the same piece. “Summer Friends” guest star Francis and the Lights passes out treats. Pink and purple bowls of Fruit Roll-Ups, Reese’s Peanut Butter cups, and Ring Pops rest atop makeshift lemonade stands.

One of the more pivotal parts of Coloring World is also one of its smallest. Strawberry Kiwi Mistics grace iced coolers scattered across the grounds. Fans sip the sugary drinks everywhere I look, a wink back to Acid Rap: “Flamin’ Hots with cheese and kiwi Mistic,” Chance rapped on “Smoke Again.” Bennett is the sum of his musical parts.

“We went and got 114 cases or something of kiwi Mistics,” Vesely says with a laugh. Another flavor was being considered while Chance had to abandon preparations for a business trip, but Austin made the right call: “I kinda know how Chance’s brain works now.”

In later shows, basketball mascot Benny the Bull bounds through the crowd. Artist Hebru Brantley makes an appearance, as does Brandon Breaux, the artist behind all of Chance’s cover art thus far.

Courtesy of Rene Marban for Pigeons & Planes

A church stands as the centerpiece of it all.

Three wooden pews encourage passersby to sit and stare at the large, sunny cathedral painting in front of them.

“I painted the church in one day,” OJ tells me after the event, disbelief lighting his face. “It was a small team, but everyone put in hella overtime.”

Dance troupes form on the fly. One woman, Chelsea Jordan, often leads the pack, channeling Chance’s music as others follow. Almost instinctively, kids congregate around the pews for “Blessings.” The gospel song functions just fine as a manifesto for karmic balance, and religion isn’t required to believe in that.

An odd pattern surfaces by the fourth and final wave of visitors. Although the later rounds had no way of knowing, the church became an increasingly popular focal point. Girls and boys stood on top of the wooden benches, balloon pets in hand. The third pew toppled over when “Angels” arrived. Several fans shouted, “AIGH AIGH AIGH!” at the top of their lungs.

After a tiresome afternoon at the merch station, the White Shirts who aided transportation come to catch the last showing. I spot one of them near a circular table, where fans amass to write Chance notes (“You ARE Chicago”) and volley an inflated, four-foot orca whale—the one you might expect to see in a swimming pool—back and forth.

“I was here yesterday,” he starts, eyes wide. “I have no idea how they did this. It didn’t look anything like this.”

Courtesy of Rene Marban for Pigeons & Planes

Backstage, if you can call it that, Chance sits on a chair next to an ensemble of mixing boards and light controls, phone in hand. Hundreds of wooden barrels are stacked to the ceiling and form dimly lit corridors. The event’s headquarters share space with brewery storage—this isn’t your typical green room. The Chicago Children’s Choir practices in a clearing apart from mission control.

Beyond the bodyguard-manned entrance to this secret lair, fans have begun to search for their hero. Every so often, when several songs have passed and giddy screams erupt, folks hurriedly flock to the origin of commotion and investigate.

For the first wave, much to their disappointment, it’s a false alarm.

Those who attended the following round were more fortunate.

With only minutes to spare before the second exhibition concludes, pandemonium strikes the church. A forklift, planted behind OJ’s painting, lifts Chancelor Bennett at least ten feet into the air. Applause drowns his initial attempts to speak.

“I just want to say thank you to my team,” the Chicago star states with a grin, a “3” cap on his head and a Derrick Rose jersey on his chest.

Courtesy of Rene Marban for Pigeons & Planes

Members of Chance’s team gather outside a private side entrance to the warehouse. Here, security’s tightest, but the energy remains loose and cheerful. I sporadically cross paths with Pat “the Manager” Corcoran, Mike Ahern, Colleen Mares, and Eric Montanez. Together, these four form the nucleus of a small staff working to enact Chance’s ultimate vision. It was evident that there had been little sleep among them, but they had pulled what seemed impossible: a listening experience to end all listening experiences, designed and constructed in less than seven days.

The logistics of it all lend a new meaning to teamwork.

“Chance called me after the project dropped and wanted to throw a listening party Saturday night,” Pat remembers. The three-day lead time wouldn’t work, so they set their sights on the following weekend. “It became a huge project.”

Before merch, Chance and his team grossed $63,000 the afternoon the tickets became available—three sets of 350 tickets for $40 a pop, and one last 350-cap event that cost $60 per head (alcohol on the house). With that said, it became clear Coloring World was not devised to serve as a money maker: the custom lights and Void speakers alone might have cost that much, let alone staff and transportation. He likely invested far more than he recouped, and lost more sleep than he might have liked. But sometimes you can’t put a price on creating a moment.

It’s a breath of fresh air for the music business. The industry has a long history of money-hungry execs and arrogant artists, and it has been branded into the American public’s perception of entertainment (Rule #4080). There aren’t exactly an abundance of businesspeople or creatives actively reversing pop culture law.

One song, one event at a time, Chance is providing an alternative. The altruistic listening party was a display of fan-first generosity; fitting, given the collaborative process behind Coloring Book.

In 2016, Chance the Rapper transitioned from a true talent with his eyes on the future to a legitimate powerhouse, one whose name deserves mention alongside global superstars like Kendrick Lamar and Kanye West. Perhaps more importantly, it solidified the skyrocketing artist as a fixture in his own city.

anything is possible through God, teamwork and faith. #magnificentcoloringworld #coloringbookhttps://t.co/URlyCyAUNU

— Lil Chano From 79th (@chancetherapper) May 25, 2016

Fans leave notes for Chance.