True Confessions From The Strip Club DJ Booth

True Confessions From The Strip Club DJ Booth

Being paid to watch naked women all night isn’t quite the dream job some guys might think it is
Published April 2, 2009 by Josey Vogels in My Messy Bedroom

It’s a delicate ecosystem of mostly unscrupulous club owners, dancers, customers, bartenders, and doormen — and the DJ is at the centre of it, playing psychiatrist, babysitter, and punching bag. So says Tom, a strip club DJ who got into the job because people always told him he had a voice for radio.

But strip club DJing isn’t exactly the dream job some guys might think it would be, says Tom. Sure, the position gives you the power to make or break a girl’s set by using a cellulite-enhancing red light as opposed to a more flattering blue light, but you also have the responsibility of ensuring the girls aren’t too drunk or high to get onstage and, just like strippers, you carry the stigma of the job into the “real” world.

“It’s one reason why I’m still single,” Tom laughs. “You strike up a conversation with a woman and as soon as she finds out what you do, forget it! You’re automatically a creep or, if she doesn’t have hangups about the job, she’ll assume you’re fucking all the girls.” As a result, says Tom, most strip club DJs end up dating strippers or other women who work in the club, simply because they understand.

But don’t feel too sorry for these guys, says one dancer: “No matter how much they complain, it’s just another story to tell the guys when he gets home.” And it’s not like they don’t act inappropriately from time to time. “I’ve seen guys jerk off in the booth,” admits another.

That is, when they’re not reading. Tom said he started bringing a book to pass the time after the novelty of his unusual workplace wore off. Of course, that was before DJs evolved into the hucksters they’ve become today. Back then, you simply introduced the girls and thanked them at the end of the set. These days, you have to be more of a salesman.

Or a sports announcer. At least that’s what accidentally worked for Rick when he stumbled into the job through Hire-a-Student, back in college in Red Deer. The local biker bar needed a DJ and Rick applied, thinking it would be for the rock bar. But the owner took him downstairs to the strip club and asked Rick if he was comfortable with a microphone. Rick had worked in college radio, so he said sure. Next thing you know, Rick, who had never even seen a stripper before, was giving the play-by-play as Sandra Dee peeled her clothes off onstage. “She’s taking off her G-string, she’s on the floor, look at that!”

The guys in the bar figured it was his shtick. They loved it and got him so drunk afterward that he woke up the next morning in Sandra Dee’s hotel room. Nothing happened.

Honest.

In fact, contrary to the stereotype, Rick made a point of never getting involved with the dancers he worked with. He says he actually developed the greatest respect for women working in strip clubs, especially single mothers who were obviously willing to do whatever they had to in order to provide for their kids.

Rick admits he was lucky. He mostly worked for higher-end clubs where he made good money and was more ringmaster than DJ. “I’d wear a suit and tie and get the crowd going.”

Still, no matter how much of a star he was in that world, he still had to live with the stigma in the outside world. Trained in electronics, he had a tough time getting a “real” job when potential employers discovered his previous work experience.

Nevertheless, Rick loved the strip club world; there, he felt like a “rock star.” Sure, there was bad stuff — seeing a guy jump off a hotel roof over a stripper who cheated on him, guys getting gunned down over cocaine — but that just went with the territory.

Until it all came to a head.

It was a hot night in the club, and Rick had gotten the crowd nice and fired up and a women came up to him and asked him to kick her husband out. This guy was one of the club’s best customers; he treated the waitresses well, even staying after closing time some nights to help clean up. That was the problem, this woman told him. They were living on welfare and her husband was spending all their money at the club.

“I told her I couldn’t do it because her husband hadn’t done anything wrong,” explains Rick. “Then he watched her go up and kneel on the floor beside her husband who was seated in ‘gynecology row’ and beg him to come home. All of sudden, right there, I grew up.”

That was Rick’s last day as a strip club DJ.