20Something: Harrison

“You get people in the same room and good things happen.”

The incessant pulse of electronic bass thuds in my ears, filling the space around me so that the air hangs thick with it. I can feel its vibration all the way down to the toes of my stiletto-heeled boots. Lights flash past my eyes in an array of colors and patterns, cutting through the darkness to illuminate ornately-molded ceilings with chandeliers scattered every few feet. My phone buzzes, and I hold it up to my face to make out the text:

i have bottles up front

if you want a drink!

I very much do want a drink, and so I begin a strenuous pilgrimage through the crowd, elbowing my way through a thick cast of frat flickers and head bobbers until I reach the front of the venue. I’m greeted by a tall man in a cowboy hat, underneath which a silk scarf is loosely tied in a sort of babushka-esque fashion. He is Harrison Lippy, and he is the architect of this event. He gestures me toward a bottle-filled ice bucket and we stand there for a few minutes doing our best to chat above the din. Eventually, he breaks off to make some rounds, and every time he resurfaces in my line of vision, he’s doing something different: Embracing people in the crowd. Monitoring the door. Dancing behind the DJ booth. He seems to know everyone in this venue, present as both a director of and a participant in this hazy revelry. I leave around midnight, and he remains until the wee hours of the morning.

Harrison meets me at my apartment the following Sunday, two hours later than the time we had originally planned. He’s nocturnal, he offers by way of an explanation, and has spent the past few days jumping around to different events that are all affiliated, in some way or another, with his production company, First Choice Presents. The event I attended on Friday night was a birthday party celebrating 2 years of First Choice, and 27 years of Harrison. No, 28. No, actually, 27. Definitely 27. “I’m cooooked,” he laughs, the word drawn out with a gravelly vocal fry, which he will maintain for the duration of our interview.

I met Harrison 3ish years ago at a popular Chicago sports bar. He had the clean-cut look of a corn-fed (not derogatory) Midwest boy who moved to the Big City after college to work a Big Boy Job at a tech startup. The man who sits in front of me now wears a brightly patterned Grateful Dead t-shirt and brightly (differently) patterned pants, his longish, unkemptish hair kept at bay by a trucker hat and yet another babushka head scarf.

Much of our interview feels like we’re just catching up – I’ve only seen him a handful of times over the last year or so, a product of our busy lives slowly growing in different directions. In fact, it dawns on me that I don’t even know where he’s living now. I ask him this before we start recording, and he, in turn, asks if I wouldn’t rather wait until the official interview starts to hear his answer, seeing as it’s a really funny one. Not one to turn down an opportunity for a good pull quote, I oblige and wait patiently until the appropriate mid-interview time to pose my question again: “So, where are you living now?”

“Oh, I just follow the vibe,” he grins, pausing to let his really funny answer land. I oblige him a chuckle.

When we first met, he was working a fairly conventional job at a company called Matterport, which developed the technology that powers 360º virtual home tours. He followed a pretty traditional intern-to-full-time pipeline with the company, and says he enjoyed his time there until a change in leadership turned his experience sour. At that point, he left (“Slash, was fired,”) taking his talents to a similar company based out of Montreal. It was smaller, and his responsibilities ballooned over the year he was there, ultimately leaving him in a state of burnout. And so, once again, he left. (“Slash, was fired.”)

Serendipitously, it was not long before this that Harrison and his friends started their company, First Choice Presents. The name was born from the breeding grounds of all great and catchy nomenclature: the group chat. As he tells me about the inception of First Choice, he describes the energy of spending your early 20s in Chicago, a not-so-far-away time when we (the collective We, that is – the recently graduated, the newly professional, the blithely carefree) spent our days soaking in the exuberance of the city, meeting new people, trying new things, carving our spaces. Amidst this frenetic blur, he found himself surrounded by a group of new friends. “We would all go to so many concerts across Chicago,” he recalls. He was introduced to the world of house music by trailing his friends, many of them native Chicagoans, as they returned to venues they had grown up attending. Several of them had DJ decks of their own, and began to try their hands at mixing. And then on his birthday, nearly two years ago to the day we hold our interview, he gathered those friends and their DJ decks and put together a sort of quasi-concert in an empty Chicago club. When the club filled up more than it ever would have on its own, they realized they were onto something and thus, First Choice Presents was born.

“When people ask you, ‘What is First Choice?’ what do you tell them?” I ask.

“We’re event producers. We create unique experiences,” he says. “The tagline for First Choice is ‘first choice, only choice’… The overall energy of it is, like, I like spending time with my friends, I like taking care of my friends and family, and I want everyone to feel that love.” Why take over a table in the corner of Texan Taco Bar, he reasons, when you can take over an entire venue and curate an experience that you know all 150 of your closest friends will love? “Curating unique events, I would say, is what First Choice is about… it’s a brand that’s showcasing what our tastes are.”

And it’s growing rapidly: not only are their events increasing in numbers and frequency, but they hope to expand beyond events to other mediums of curation. One of its newer iterations is First Choice Radio, a streaming platform that features mixes by First Choice artists. In the future, he envisions adding a “blog-type” platform to the First Choice umbrella that acts as a guide for people as they curate their own experiences throughout the city.

I still can’t quite put my finger on Harrison’s role in all of this – he’s not a DJ, as most of his fellow co-founders are, but he seems to be sort of a driving force behind the whole operation. What does he tell people, I wonder, when they ask him what his job is?

(An aside: as I’m asking this question, I realize how deeply ingrained it is in me to define myself, and those around me, by what we do for work. Something to unpack later, perhaps. I digress.)

Harrison’s answer depends on where he is and, perhaps moreso, who’s asking. He does a lot right now, he explains: “I’m an event producer, I’m a stylist now… I like to call myself a designer when it comes to certain things. I’m definitely a creative that likes to execute on projects. I’ve done creative direction, I’ve done social media management. I do a lot of different things.”

He’s in the process of building his personal brand, Slipcorp, which he says will put him in the business of “dot connecting.” He’s also a “friendager” to many a burgeoning DJ. “I kind of like being… the man behind the curtain. I’ve never DJed any of the shows, I’m just more naturally inclined to help with securing the venue, doing marketing.” I saw this in action at the event I attended on Friday – he never once stood still, a blur of cowboy hat flitting around between checkpoints, making sure everything was running smoothly. By any partygoer’s standards, the night went off without a hitch.

So how does he bring his events to life? He answers me with a lengthy illustration of his process, the driving factors behind each event (the talent), the ways one can make money on an event (ticket, liquor, and merch sales), and have I ever heard the word promoter? He’s kinda like that. No, not like the skeevy type of promoter who spends his days DMing hot girls and plying them with bottle service, but if he needs to build a crowd, he can put on a promoter hat and really execute. He admits that up until recently, his process has been far from codified, even shaky at times. It’s something that he really wants to direct intentional energy towards. Executing, that is.

(Throughout our interview I discover that he is partial to a myriad of Link and Build-er jargon including, but not limited to: “I’m executing on that,” “You do whatever it takes to get it done,” “so dialed in,” and many references to “the industry.”)

Loath as I am to use a buzzword of my own, I’ll admit that the title “multi-hyphenate” fits him well. He seems able to adapt to any role, and he talks about all of his projects with equal enthusiasm. It’s rare these days to find someone who is not so wrapped up in corporate toil that they won’t try something just for the sheer fact that it excites them. I may not relate to the appeal of this nomadic, untethered lifestyle, but I fully commend it – his passion for what he does each day is tangible, enviable even.

At this point, he very politely asks if I mind if he rips his vape in my apartment. Go for it, I tell him.

He puffs on it thoughtfully as he considers my next question: How does he navigate living in a world where your success is driven by your ability to build relationships? “I’ve never been afraid to slip into situations,” he says. “I’m not afraid to say hello to people.” He tries to be more interested in people than interesting himself. Here, he imparts some sage wisdom: “You make other people almost bad in your head. You assume what they’re thinking about you… and that person’s probably not even thinking about you right now… You don’t have to make people bad in your head. Go talk to them and see, like, actually see.” I add my own two cents, which are by no means groundbreaking but feel topical nonetheless: people value in-person interaction and interpersonal relationships less and less these days, when we should be prioritizing them more in an effort to avoid falling victim to the isolation of this online age. “Yeah, that’s part of the reason I love live events,” he says in return. “You get people in the same room and good things happen.”

What I’ve gleaned from our conversation so far is this: Harrison has a million and one projects, passions, points of inspiration, and yet none of them define him completely. I can’t quite wrap my head around everything he is currently “executing” on, and frankly, it makes my head hurt to think of my own career being splintered into so many different moving pieces. But that, reader, is the beauty of this series: the myriad of ways in which we trek through our twenties (for it is indeed a trek) are endless.

Determined as I am to weave a common thread through his many ventures, I ask if he has a favorite. He leans back in his chair, twirling his pastel vape aimlessly around my table, and admits rather frankly that this is something he’s still working on figuring out. He loves music, and he loves styling, and he really loves the people he works with. “We’re basically a family. That’s probably my favorite part about the music and event industry… Yes, you’re working with these people, but the core unit are people that I literally say ‘I love you’ to… I get a lot of constructive criticism at work. I fuck up a lot, but I’ve also learned a lot.”

“So would you say your favorite part is not necessarily an industry–”

“It’s the people,” he finishes. “I love working with artists. I love working with people who are actually pursuing their potential.” He, like many of his colleagues, is in it “for the love of the game,” rather than for the money, which is often scarce. The event he threw this past Friday will barely break even, he says, but he doesn’t care. His friends were there. They had a good time. He had a good time. Screw a profit, Harrison just wants to vibe.

He readjusts his trucker hat so that it sits with even more space between it and his actual scalp, leans back in his seat, and takes a sip of water out of my Anthropology Icon glass (cherry). A question has been nagging in the back of my mind, growing more incessant with every piece of industry-speak he uses. “There are a lot of people who bill themselves as ‘creators,’ or ‘incubators,’” I begin cautiously. “This kind of fluid, creative role… There are a lot of people like that. And there’s a lot of room for it, but not without differentiation… Where is that point of differentiation for you?”

I hope my question doesn’t come off as dismissive – I’m genuinely curious because nowadays, there seems to be a “founder,” or a “creative,” or an “architect” of some obscure medium on every corner of the internet. How can there be so many people in these seemingly abstract roles, and what are they all building?

“I think my differentiator is that I’ve really curated the people that I give energy to. There’s a level of love and respect in those relationships where it’s like, I see the light in them, they see the light in me, and energetically I’m able to almost be a magnifying glass, right? Because I’m a natural social butterfly and connector.” In other words, what distinguishes him from this crowd of creatives is his ability to connect people to the right sources.

Case in point: Just recently, he worked with three larger companies (Diskonect, of which he is a minority partner, Third Eye Hospitality, and Casa Alta) to produce the Miami Music Week festival at Toe Jam Backlot in Miami. He, alongside a team of 100 other contractors, pulled together a 5 day music festival with 100 artists and 6,000 tickets sold each day. He “really got into the shit” with every team that was having issues, he says. Learning how to coordinate between so many different divisions so that they operate seamlessly is his biggest value add to the whole operation, and he’s confident that this will help him scale the creative ladder.

With scaling in mind, then, where does he go from here? I ask him, no holds barred, what he sees for the future of First Choice. As someone who has a very specific vision for what her ideal future looks like, this question would warrant an annoyingly lengthy and detailed explanation from me. Based on how he’s described his ambitions thus far, and also sort of based on his laid back demeanor (there’s the hat he adjusted so nonchalantly, now teetering in precarious balance atop his hair; the way he lounges comfortably in his chair; the plumes of smoke snaking their way lazily around my living room), I somehow have a feeling that his answer will be a bit more laissez-faire than mine would be. Indeed, I am correct: “I basically want to curate how to best live life,” he drawls.

“Elaborate.”

With a huffed laugh, as if to say he know his answer sounds a bit ambiguous, he sets the scene: “Okay, like, these are the best restaurants in these cities… the host there will take care of you, um, you know, if you’re in Chicago on these dates, you have to go to this art exhibit. [First Choice would be] almost like the seal of approval… if you like our energy and what we’re doing, this is something you should check out… this is our first choice for what to do.”

His vision for his personal growth, whether it’s tied to First Choice or not, remains somewhat muddied. He responds to my query about his own goals with a large, smoky sigh and an “I don’t know.” He’s always wanted to be successful, and for his lifestyle to reflect that, but above all he wants life to be enjoyable for himself and those in his orbit. He is a firm believer in the Butterfly Effect (the theory that one small action can have an exponential impact). “If you can impact one person’s life in a positive way, it’s such a beautiful thing because it just spreads.”

“Am I correct in assuming,” I venture, “that you could potentially see yourself taking a bunch of different avenues or trying out a bunch of different professions or careers, all with the same goal of bringing people together?”

Yes, he says, I am correct in assuming this. The through-line between all of his different projects is his desire to bring people together in an intentional, joyful way.

With a vaguely fruity scent lingering in the air, our conversation slows to a close. “Is there a story here?” he asks.

Nothing seems linear for Harrison. His thoughts weave in and around tangible concepts in a manner befitting of an intensely creative mind. His responses to my questions are long and meandering, filled with anecdotes and tangents, all of them returning to the same theme: he wants to create meaningful moments. I try digging into some of his more abstract responses, curious if there’s any concrete answer to be found with a bit of light interrogation, but my efforts are in vain and maybe that’s for the best. His interests, his purpose, are not to be put into a box or categorized by any traditional corporate title. His story is this: Perhaps the point of your 20s is not to find your dream job or to firmly establish yourself in any one role, but to decide what it is you want to contribute to the world, and allow everything else to fall in line.

In that sense, this year has been formative for him. “I had a really tough go of it this year after our event series during Art Basel… I didn’t know if I loved the live event space anymore… I think I was really questioning my ‘why.’” He spent some time with his family, focused on his health, doing the basic things that would keep him afloat. He doubted whether he should even go to Miami Music Week. But he went, he pushed through, he faltered here and there, and he did a lot of great things.

“So do you feel like you found the ‘why?’” I ask.

His “why” is living for his people, loving them, loving himself. He’s okay if his means to this end are less linear than others. His many different projects may seem desultory on the surface, but he’s confident that they’re steering him in the right direction.

“Where to next?”

He has another few weeks of events to get through in and around Chicago, and then he’ll probably hop on a bus. He hasn’t been home to Columbus in a while.

You can find Harrison and all of his ventures on Instagram: @harrisonlippy / @firstchoicepresents / @slipcorp / @chai.chicago