Metropole GoGo (Times Square)

[fastsupra]

I went by Lace a coupl eof weeks ago to kill some time waiting for some friends. Lace is a total tourist spot so the girl there was asking me where I was from. When I told her NY she said that it is unusual to find people from NY in here. She asked if I had been there before and I told her a long, long time ago this place used to be called Metropole GoGo and it was the first strip club I had ever been in. I remember I was 17 and I went in there and I met this beautiful Brazilian bartender and I was sitting at the bar making out with some other dancer who was sitting with me. It was really wierd and I guess that's why I am such a big fan of strip clubs. Ever since I was really young I have always gotten really high mileage from strippers, I really never seem to have any problems hooking up with them. The problems usually come after I've hooked up with tehm, LOL.

Does anyone remember this place? It was dark and dirty but I always had a good time when I went there. I'm still friends with the bartender I met there and what is unbelievable is that her number and where she lives is still the same after 18 years, that is rare with a girl in this business.

[justlooking]

I first went there when it was Runway 69.

[justlooking]

Whoops. Wrong Lace. You mean the one on 8th Ave., right? I was talking about the one on 7th.

[RuffToy]

Does anyone remember this place? It was dark and dirty but I always had a good time when I went there. I'm still friends with the bartender I met there and what is unbelievable is that her number and where she lives is still the same after 18 years, that is rare with a girl in this business.


I do indeed remember the Metropole. It was also the very first SC for me as well. Went there with my rat pack back in the early 70's. I was nervous and excited. We ordered beers and some bruiser bartender brought us over two warm beers each to cover the minimun. It was my first look at adult tits. Times Square was nice and sleazy those days.

[rough1]

My 1st strip club too!

In the late '80's, a friend and I started a tradition of going out after the big meal on Thanksgiving and non-family type activities. The first year was dive bars on the LES and Alphabet City. Year two we went to the Metropole. I was pretty underwhelmed--a bunch of bored-looking small-titted Filipinas dancing on the area above the bar, slowly getting the mirror greasier and greasier.

IIRC, there was an equally bored-looking pretty older woman (I was about 20--"older" meant 30) we assumed was a call-girl (as distinct from whore or hooker--I equated those terms with "streetwalker" then).

I think we went to Show World after that. He hit the peeps and I went upstairs and watched two USDA grade-z fat skanks jam dildos into each others pussies. [Remember, this is Thanksgiving night.]

Ah memories.....

[seeker6591]

ahhh the Metropole...

went in there in the early days of the hobby....

wearing a light grey brooks brother suit...

sat down at one of those tables along the back wall.

above average looking stripper sits down next to me.

got her a 5 or 10 dollar drink...

next thing i know she is giving me an OTPHJ right under the table.

nothing was ever discussed..she just did it.

tribute was 10 or 20.

was able to salvage the suit as well without the ex finding out.

.........the good old days! ( except for the ex, lol)

[seeker6591]

sorry, i forgot to add this.

that place reminds me of Fifth Avenue (in NJ).

tribute is about the same today, with UTPHJ's.

[Mr. Wet Wooly]

Metropole was the one on 8th Ave on the west side of the street? Kind of a long narrow place with the bar on the left-hand side when you walked in?

[seeker6591]

Metropole was the one on 8th Ave on the west side of the street? Kind of a long narrow place with the bar on the left-hand side when you walked in?

east side but yes!

also the long dirty mirror

[Mr. Wet Wooly]

Oh. I think I'm confusing it with the Big Top Lounge or Big Apple Lounge, whatever the hell that place was.

[Mr. Wet Wooly]

also the long dirty mirror

They all had the long, dirty mirror. I think that was de rigueur in those places.

[ciscook]

Remember it well.
When I was in the area in the 70's I stopped in there on a regular basis. I became friends with a dancer there and had take out a few times. Several years later, I was drunk one night in the city and went to Showworld and she was working there. The years were not good to her.Got her to leave and spent the evening with her. That was about 15 years ago.

[seeker6591]

They all had the long, dirty mirror. I think that was de rigueur in those places.


yes but this one was particularly dirty@! just like some of the dancerss

[justlooking]

Wait a minute. Now I'm confused. There's a Lace on the east side of 7th Ave., and there's a Lace on the west side of 8th Ave., but there's no Lace on the east side of 8th Ave. What place are we talking about?

[seeker6591]

Wait a minute. Now I'm confused. There's a Lace on the east side of 7th Ave., and there's a Lace on the west side of 8th Ave., but there's no Lace on the east side of 8th Ave. What place are we talking about?


your right

its east side of 7th ave

[Mr. Wet Wooly]

Wait a minute. Now I'm confused. There's a Lace on the east side of 7th Ave., and there's a Lace on the west side of 8th Ave., but there's no Lace on the east side of 8th Ave. What place are we talking about?

I can't recall any strip joints at all on the east side of 8th ave.

Lace is on 7th ave in what used to be Runway 69, right?

There's another Lace on 8th Avenue? The only strip club I picture on 8th is Stiletto's on the west side of the street btwn 43rd and 44th.

[justlooking]

your right

its east side of 7th ave

Oh. OK. I'll go back to saying that, by the time I started going to that place, it had morphed into Runway 69.

Not that anyone cares.

[justlooking]

I can't recall any strip joints at all on the east side of 8th ave.

Lace is on 7th ave in what used to be Runway 69, right?

There's another Lace on 8th Avenue? The only strip club I picture on 8th is Stiletto's on the west side of the street btwn 43rd and 44th.

Didn't they change that to Lace within the last few months?

[justlooking]

You know, just to be confusing?

[justlooking]

It turns out that, before it was a strip club, the Metropole was a rather famous nightclub, where most of the significant mainstream jazz musicians of the era played:

http://www.globalgallery.com/enlarge/019-25484/

[seeker6591]

interesting...that was quite a switch!!

[Thorn]

I can't recall any strip joints at all on the east side of 8th ave.

Lace is on 7th ave in what used to be Runway 69, right?

There's another Lace on 8th Avenue? The only strip club I picture on 8th is Stiletto's on the west side of the street btwn 43rd and 44th.

The Metropole was on the west side of 8th, a couple of blocks north of Show World.

I recall it well. Never was really crazy about it though I had been there a bunch of times. I preferred the Melody and later, Harmony, burlesques/Mardi Gras.

[justlooking]

I don't know if this is true, but I've also heard that Flashdancers occupies the former basement site of the incredibly famous jazz club Birdland, "the jazz corner of the world."

[Thorn]

Didn't they change that to Lace within the last few months?

Lace and Stilettos are owned by the same people.

The Lace chain is topless, Stilettos is nude.

If they changed the policy of the place from nude dancing to topless, I am sure they would change the name to coincide.

[justlooking]

Yeah, that's exactly what I think happened. (I'd guess they decided they wanted to sell alcohol at the club.)

[justlooking]

I don't know if this is true, but I've also heard that Flashdancers occupies the former basement site of the incredibly famous jazz club Birdland, "the jazz corner of the world."

To be clear, this has nothing to do with the current "Birdland" jazz club, an unrelated entity recently opened at a different address, years after the original Birdland closed.

[justlooking]

I've confirmed that Flashdancers is in fact in the old Birdland space.

That's so fucking cool.

I have a bunch of records that were recorded live there.

[seeker6591]

I've confirmed that Flashdancers is in fact in the old Birdland space.

That's so fucking cool.

I have a bunch of records that were recorded live there.

i kinda like it as a t&a place. lol.

i wonder how many hot women have danced there? (inc Kit Kat Klub)

10000?

20000?

[fastsupra]

I also remember that there was a Burlesque place above the Howard Johnsons in Times Square, does anyone rember what the name of that place was?

[panchax]

Yes, if my memory serves correct, if was Melody Burlesque.

[stevana]

Yes, if my memory serves correct, if was Melody Burlesque.
Me too but never having been there I am thinking that it might have been a gay place. Am I thinking of someplace else right smack in the middle of TS (second floor - maybe over Chock-Full - O - Nuts) that was the gay place or was it Melody that was gay?

[justlooking]

Melody wasn't gay. Melody was the original incarnation of the Harmony.

[greyfox]

There was a Gay burlesque joint next to the Melody on 48th St. for a while.Both were on the second floor,but the upstairs straight strip joint over Hojo on B'way was the Paris. The Birdland ghosts inhabiting Flash reminded me that Private Eyes on 45th was called Ted Hook's Backstage during the 70's.My mom would go there after a show and enjoy the chorus boy waiters and gay piano bar ambience.The likes of Liza and Carol Channing would drop by and camp it up once in a while.The TV bar the Gilded Grape was around the corner on 8th where the trannies looked like Liza and Carol only better.

[SidneyFalco]

I also remember that there was a Burlesque place above the Howard Johnsons in Times Square, does anyone rember what the name of that place was?

That was the Follies. In the mid-80s, added some back-room action to the menu

[panchax1957]

Ah yes, thats it, The Paris!
Now that brings back old memories

[Thorn]

Yes, if my memory serves correct, if was Melody Burlesque.


47th at 7th, around the corner from the old Pussycat.

Dominque took it over when her husband died, sold it, and used that money to create the Harmony at Church St. Later expanded to 22nd St as well.