Clubs that are no more

25 comments

• chandler

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  17 years ago

  We had this same topic here a few months ago. I have fond memories of Fantasia, north of Toronto and the Tanga Lounge in Tampa.
• DandyDan

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  17 years ago

  Just coming across this topic, it never dawned on me how many clubs I've been to that have since closed up. But I really only miss two, the Only Chance Saloon in Omaha, which was the site of where I hooked up with my first OTC experience (it ended up an exit ramp) and Boomers Lounge in Fremont, NE, which was good to go to if the Lariat Club, the other club in Fremont, which still exists, sucked. In fact, the end of Boomers indirectly ended up the cause of me stopping going to the Lariat, because once I realized how bad the Lariat had become, it wasn't worth driving there anymore because the other club didn't exist. The one other club I went to that people might wish was still open was Jake's in Coates, MN, south of the Twin Cities on Highway 52. I only went there once, but it was highly regarded and I had a fun time with a lovely latina girl there.
• dennyspade

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  17 years ago

  For those of you who travelled to Chicago in the 80's and 90's; you have got to miss the TOP SHELF Club located in the tourist mecca of River North. Some say that was why a full-stocked bar & nude club was destined for imminent closure. You gotta shield these puritans from sin when they come to Chicago. I would also include: The CHERRY CLUB on Mannheim Road in Franklin Park The BODY SHOPPE in Lansing, IL The entire strip of clubs on Ogden Avenue in Lyons, IL
• Clubber

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  17 years ago

  Lipstick just south of Miami. It became somewhat famous, at least down here, when a US attorney bit a dancer. I saw the pictures, since she was the wife of a guy I worked with. The attorney was visiting the club after he had lost a high profile case. A drug case, as I remember it. Bulldozed and just a strip mall, now.
• FONDL

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  17 years ago

  The two I miss the most were both in Key West, FL. Pirate's Den, which closed nearly 10 years ago, is probably the best club I've ever been to. It had everyhting you could ever hope for in a club, which is maybe why it no longer exists. It's also the first place I ever experienced an LD. The other is Teaser's II, which moved downtown. It used to be a great laid-back locals place, but now it's in the tourist area. I haven't been to the new location but I can't imagine that it's as good as it used to be. Or as inexpensive. It was my #2 all time favorite place.
• trojangreg

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  17 years ago

  chasman... Don't forget the North Burnaby Inn (NBI). The great thing there was that above the club you could always get a room. The girls were gorgeous and friendly,a great buffet and cold beer. Another place gone. I also heard that the Gold Club here in Atlanta was great but it is no more and I moved here to late to try it out.
• motorhead

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  17 years ago

  Have to agree with chandler....the Tanga Lounge in Tampa. The Mons may be the more famous club, but I really had some great times at the Tanga. At the Tanga, I had a dancer with perhaps the most beautiful stripper I have ever seen. She was a new dancer, so her technique may not have been the greatest, but what a face and body!
• Book Guy

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  17 years ago

  Chandler: ditto on the Fantasia score. North of Toronto, in the suburb of Richmond Hill, about a half-hour drive through the beltway bedroom communities, was a place that had all the best combination of brothel and strip club, called Fantasia. Hot girls gyrated on the stage, hot lap-dances could be had, and much more services were available in various downstairs and upstairs upgrade-rooms. Everything was on the bill with almost any dancer, but the thing that sets Fantasia apart (at least in my memory) from other brothel-style clubs was, that it really FELT like a strip club for most of the time. There was a party atmosphere, the girls rotated on stage and looked good, the level of experience was chosen by the customer to the point that he only did what he was comfortable with. And golly the chicks were hot! Eastern Europeans, lots, plus Jamaican immigrants, etc. A sister club named Bunnies opened down the road in the next suburb to the East for a while, too -- similar set-up, a little less loose and anything-goes than Fantasia. I also miss the Tanga in Tampa, though I didn't find it AS stellar as some of the other Tampa offerings. And I miss the "old version" of the House of Lancaster on Bloor in Toronto. Throughout the 1990s, plenty of Eastern European immigrant / dancers cut their dancing teeth there. They had regular dollar-a-dance, and then lappers (full straddle, hands everywhere, and often the girl would kiss you and make out with you as though you were her boyfriend) went up to Cd$10 per song. If a 2-for-1 came by, you were getting roughly US$3 per song for unfettered horniness! And I miss all the old peeps and sleepers on Times Square. Only got there once in my mongering career before Juliani "improved" it but oh my ...
• chandler

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  17 years ago

  How could I forget Chez Paree in San Francisco? HQ for the SF contingent of ASSC's Chinese mafia. A truly unique club. Half performance art, half sleaze den. Guys and gals typing live chat messages on laptops....in 1996.
• Clubber

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  17 years ago

  FONDL, How could I forget those two! You are so correct about them. There was also another one near the "Den", almost right beside the police department. You remember that one?
• snowtime

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  17 years ago

  Private Dancer in Nashville. Closed 3 or 4 years ago with the crackdown on all adult entertainment. Absolutely the best place I have been in. Although technically not a strip club it had everything you could want. Once you entered you chose a beautiful young girl (no fuglies here) from among the 4-10 on duty. Place was always busy so plenty of cute girls available. Twenty dollars for 1 dance, 50 for 5 got you a totally nude dance in a closed room ( place was a two story house with about 6 bedrooms). Girl was nude and all over you with full contact everywhere for the whole time. A twenty dollar tip would always get you hand relief and most offered more at very reasonable/cheap prices. Would always look forward to visiting this place any time I was in the area. Will probably never see anything this great for that price again. There were several other similar establishments in Nashville at that time but none had the quality of girls as Private Dancer. Surely some of the rest of you remember this place.
• FONDL

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  17 years ago

  Clubber, I don't remember that club, I was never there. One of the things I always liked about the KW clubs is that the girls are always from somewhere else and are often there on an extended vacation, so there is always more of a party atmosphere. Combine that with low prices, no bouncers anywhere, almost no supervision of what went on, fully nudity and full bar, and high contact - I've never seen anything else like it anywhere. I met my #2 ATF at Teasers II - she was visiting from Jacksonville for a couple of months (to get over n ex-BF) and was paying her way by dancing. I've never met a girl who was more friendly and more comfortable with nudity. And she was very young (20?), kinda shy and drop-dead gorgeous without knowing it - maybe the best looking dancer I've ever seen. Definately my type. She didn't have any friends in town and wanted to hang out OTC, but I couldn't because I was with other people. Which was just as well, I coulda gotten in big trouble with her. I did manage to spend 5 wonderful afternoons in the club with her, which I'll never forget. We stayed in touch for nearly a year afterwards. Last I heard she was back in Jax working at a Hooters.
• Clubber

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  17 years ago

  FONDL I guess, I too, would have to say my very first ATF was found at Teasers. She was a local, but once was a Navy wife. Stayed in KW instead of heading back home. Young? not at all. She was the oldest dancer I've known, at 39. Made her show me her ID before I would believe her. Great body, OK face, and very nice. Spend many a times with her on my trips to KW. Last I heard, she retired at 43 and went into photography.
• shadowcat

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  17 years ago

  I am sure that there are many that I don't remember, but the one I do remember is Danny's in Memphis. I was driving across country from L.A. to Atlanta. I was driving me dads car and towing a 5'X 9' Uhaul trailer with all of their personal stuff. I spent the first night in Flagstaff AZ. The next in Shamrock TX. The dirtiest place I have ever stayed in outside of Mexico. The next day was going to be a relatively short drive. So I deceided to see some Memphis nightlife. I pulled into a Ramada Inn (If my memory is good) because it had a big sign that said there was a lounge inide. I got cleaned up and went to the lounge only to find it closed. Went to the front desk. Only to find out that lounge was not open that night. I asked where can I go for a drink. She said go left to Denney's resaraunt. About 1 1/2 blocks or go right 2 1/2 blocks to that nasty girl place. Humm? Left or right. I wound up a Danny's ( not Denny's). The place was a dump but they had nude dancers on stage. I stayed. The chairs were all wooden. Not confortable but when you had your first real 2 way contact lap dance, Who cared? All dances were out in the open but again, who cared? Since this was all new to me, I tried for an OTC expierence. and was hit with "I don't know you well enough." I don't remember the exact price of the dances but it seemed resonable to me at the time. Went back to Memphis 5 or 6 years later and Danny's was nowhere to be found. But I did find Tunica and Platinum Plus. Which became my favorite club for 2 or so years utill it got temporairly closed. Then I discovered its sister club in Columbia SC. Which has been my favorite for about 6 years. Who knows if the Memphis PP will ever reopen again? But it will be membered by a lot of us
• Book Guy

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  17 years ago

  Shadowcat: the Danny that you reference devolved to smaller-range cities, including (but not limited to) ownership in Jackson MS of all places.
• chitownlawyer

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  17 years ago

  One of my early strip club experiences was at "Paradise" on Northwest Freeway in the Houston area. At its apex, in the mid 90s, it featured an upstairs balcony area where essentially everything went. They had beautiful latin ladies, some from Mexico and Guatemala. You could sit at the edge of the balcony and signal your preferred dancer to come "up top" after she got off stage. Very efficient, like ordering from [view link] but without the FedEx charge. Although the balcony area was open, with no private dance areas, I overcame a lot of shyness in that club. I had a case that took me to Houston about once a month during the mid-90s, and this club was always on my itinerary in the evenings. The first time I went, when I pulled into the parking lot and saw a guy getting blown in the car next to mine, I knew this was no ordinary club. In retrospect, I don't know why he was getting a blow job in his car. It was much more comfortable inside the club. Paradise started to go downhill around 1997 when they closed the balcony area. I believe that the club is now known as "Cover Girls", but I have not visited it in its current incarnation.
• imnumnutz

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  17 years ago

  two come to mind. Valentino's in Wash. D.C., one of the first I ever visited...and where I met one of my first ATFs. And a club in Seaford, Delaware burned down a few years ago. It was the first place I saw Playmate/Pet Linn Thomas dance. I could start a whole 'nother thread on what a beautiful and nice person she was and, I presume, still is.
• jimmyblong

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  17 years ago

  Back in the early 90's washington Park, Illinois had two sister clubs "main street" and "cheeks". Dyashifts were the best. You would pay a $5 cover and have a free lunch buffets and the girls would come of the stage and grind on you for $1 tips. If you were the only one at the stage it usually lasted the whole song. Owners got busted for illegal gambling machines and the place was then actually run by the FBI for awhile to recoup their investigation costs. It went downhill pretty fast after that as the letter of the law was always followed. I also miss Delilah's in Gary Indiana. A lot of nastiness happened behind those beaded curtains. Same with Wild J's in Las Vegas.
• lotsoffun201

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  17 years ago

  Jimmy....definitely Wild J's. Best time I ever had in a club with my wife and a dancer in a VIP. We still talk about that one! On my own, it would have to be the Peek-a-boo in West Palm Beach. That place used to be completely sleazy extras were the norm (figured one time I had a hottie who was the only girl who didn't offer them, but we still had fun). It was the Adelita's of Florida!
• laundryman

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  17 years ago

  Add my name to the list of folk who miss the Tanga in Tampa. It was easy going and fun. Nothing pretentious-sometimes you would 10 working the place-but normally gals in the 6 to 9 range. The place had atmosphere that I have yet to find matched. Other places have more sizzle and spice-but the Tanga was the best.
• minnow

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  17 years ago

  My choices aren't top clubs, but those that I'd gladly go to now and then for variety: Tanga Lounge(Tampa), Bottoms Up(Sunrise,FL, Ft. Laud. suburb, Tanga Lounge kinda place), Total Exposure(Troy,OH- May still be in business as adult video store, but no longer club,afaik).
• FONDL

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  17 years ago

  I just remembered another place I really liked in Washington, DC (13th or 14th Street between K and L?), which closed many years ago when the building was torn down. It wasn't really a strip club though, it was a fairly typical fancy cocktail lounge except that all the waitresses and bar maids wore shorty see-through nighties with nothing underneath. I remember one time a group of Japanese businessmen thought it was a whore house and tried to hire some of the girls, and couldn't figure out why they kept getting turned down - it was pretty funny. Great place to stop in for a drink. Do places like that exist any where anymore?
• mmdv26

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  17 years ago

  Tanga was first and last time I ever paid for a nude lap dance. Chez Paree was enjoyable - had some memorable moments there. I suppose the old C. Mowes Key Club in ESL could be included in this category after it burned. I doubt that the new metal building version of the "older and fatter" club will be quite the same.
• luckyone

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  17 years ago

  I remember Main Street and Cheeks very fondly from a few visits to ESL back in the 90's and they were a lot of fun. Closer to home, there was a club in Kansas City, KS called Leggs that was my one-time regular club. Still think it is my all-time favorite. Then the DA closed down all the adult entertainment in that county (sure they were pretty mobbed-up) and Leggs was one of the victims.
• chandler

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  17 years ago

  I hit Main Street and Cheeks on my first visit to ESL in 1995. My next time back they had both closed. The buildings were still standing the last time I noticed. That's a weird thing about ESL - after a club shuts down, the building remains. It doesn't get converted or get bulldozed, unless it burns. Weeds grow up around the building, but the name can still be made out on the side. Meanwhile, a new club is opened across the street. Brooklyn has the short-lived Fantasyland, and Centreville has at least two old ghosts of clubs past. One that did burn and get bulldozed was the notorious Red Garter in Brooklyn. I spend a couple of memorable times there knee-deep in sleaze.