It’s a safe bet to assume that people from anywhere other than New Orleans associate our home with one thing: Bourbon Street. Look at any commercial the city has put out. Amid the varying scenes of gumbo, beignets and Mardi Gras, there is bound to be a central image of the infamous avenue. On occasion, even a native New Orleanian would be hard-pressed to deny the lure of the lineup of smoky bars, clubs, strip joints and drunken tourists.
However, the real parties in New Orleans aren’t blown out on TV screens across America. They’re hidden in places like the Marigny or Uptown, in nondescript bars and restaurants frequented by locals and passed up by tourists. They don’t involve women bearing their chests for plastic beads and they even check ID’s from time to time. Many New Orleanians would even argue that this “hidden party” is not only more fun, but also more of an indication of the thriving culture in the Big Easy.
Monica Harris moved to New Orleans from Texas in 2003 to attend school at Loyola. After graduating in 2007, she made the decision to stay and began working at Loyola in the theatre arts and dance department as the Assistant Business and Box Office Manager. “Before you know it, (New Orleans) is in your blood,” Harris said. Her current favorite nighttime hangout? The Always Lounge and Marigny Theatre at 2240 St. Claude Avenue. “That’s not only where my theatre company (Cripple Creek Theatre Company) is this season, but they constantly have different music, dance and performance acts there. And it’s right on St. Claude, across from the Hi-Ho (Lounge). There’s always such a variety of different kinds of people there,” Harris said.
“I hang out all over,” Harris said. “Bourbon has never been my favorite.” Instead, she prefers the “entire underbelly to the city that goes completely unnoticed to the untrained eye. It’s beyond ghost tours and carriage rides.”
But for such an untrained eye, what are the steps towards learning the route to the real party? According to Harris, it’s as easy as striking up a conversation.
“Talk with the people who actually live here. Ask them where they like to go to hear music and eat. That’s the best way to get a true grasp of what being in New Orleans ought to be,” she said.
Not everyone thinks avoiding the tourist traps altogether is the way to work the city, though. “You have to go to the touristy places so you know how bad they are. Then go to Frenchman,” advised Maureen Dey, English literature senior. Though she’s only lived in New Orleans since moving from California in 2007 for school, she feels that she’s found her nightlife niche.
“My new favorite place is definitely Cure,” Dey said of the relatively new bar on Freret Street. “They’re the best drinks I’ve ever had in New Orleans. I think it embodies the cocktail culture that New Orleans used to have and updates it for a younger audience.”
Republic New Orleans, a club on South Peters Street, is also a popular spot among New Orleans locals as well as Loyola students. It caters to both the over- and under-21 crowd and hosts weekly events like Throwback night, an homage to the 1980s. “There’s no place like Throwback in the city. You dance all night long,” said Sherard Briscoe, theatre arts junior.
More than any individual bar or club in the city, though, students all seem to agree that Frenchmen Street is the epicenter of local entertainment. Pocketed between Elysian Fields Avenue and North Broad Street in the Marigny, block after block house bars and clubs inhabited by local jazz musicians and thick with down-home New Orleans culture.
“Frenchmen Street provides the vibe of a chill atmosphere of people who want to have a good time without necessarily hearing what is on the radio. So if you are looking for the stereotypical, hardcore drinking party lifestyle, Frenchmen is not the place for you,” Briscoe said.
Why even try to find a new hot spot? Bourbon is accessible by streetcar, it’s never quiet and let’s be honest, they hardly ever check ID’s. Is it easy? Yes. Is it New Orleans? Not even close.
For some of us, we’re only offered four years as true New Orleanians under the protective umbrella of Loyola University. That’s only four years to fully explore the over 350 square miles of bars, clubs, restaurants, bookstores, coffee shops and boutiques. By limiting yourself to Bourbon Street, you’re also limiting yourself to only a glimmer of what New Orleans really is. You may be amazed to find that not every night on the town requires drunk debauchery. Poetry readings and wine tastings can be just as picturesque for tourism commercials as begging for beads below a balcony. A ride on the St. Charles streetcar line can be just as adventurous as a drunk cab ride home. A 3:00 a.m. beignet may even taste better than that overpriced hurricane.
Maybe it’s not important to really know the city in which you spend your college years – especially if you’re only spending your four years here, like a flash in the gumbo pot. If you ask this New Orleanian, though, it may not be important, but it’s certainly not very respectable.
There are mysteries that lie behind the glamour and debauchery of South Peters-second-lines, live jazz bands and quaint lounges just to catch a martini. In order to catch a real glimpse of New Orleans party life, it’s in those mysteries where the true fun lies.
So go out. Explore. Even if you think you’re an experienced New Orleans veteran, you can still find something new, something exciting. A hidden party, if you will.
