Pole vaulting to success

You hear the stories. Some CEO or head of A&R happens to be in a club, hears an artist perform, and next thing you know, the industry is singing their song — even if they haven’t recorded one yet. Of course, you hear the other stories, too; of self-made CEOs whose songs end up center stage, literally, way before labels get involved. This happens at a whole ‘nother type of club — clubs where it’s not a handshake that seals a deal, but rather ass shaking. These are clubs named Magic City, Strokers, Pin-Ups and Body Tap — the Atlanta strip clubs that play Apollo for hip-hop tracks, making or breaking artists daily.

Once a year, artists converge on Atlanta for the four-day Atlantis Music Conference, paying a registration fee to be introduced to “key players” and key moves that potentially contribute to successfully navigating the aqueous industry. Through a series of daytime panels — such as “Final Frontier: The Indie Distribution, Marketing & Internet Panel” on Sat., July 24 — and showcases in clubs strewn across the city, nascent and veteran artists of all regions/genres are instructed how to build bridges and boats in case the levy of their careers, or the industry, breaks. But in Atlanta’s strip clubs, for hip-hop artists engaged in a very different, homegrown distribution system, it’s a different set of moves that spell success for a song.

Watching beautiful women shake all that their mommas and God gave them to your song could be everything some artists wish for. But to those who can keep their heads out of asses — their own, or someone else’s — the strip clubs are just one part of a bigger picture.

“What people don’t really understand about the strip clubs in Atlanta is that it’s more of a club atmosphere than it is just going to see naked ladies,” Ludacris explained to Launch.com in an interview earlier this year. “[I]t’s a place where so many music industry people come together and make a lot of business moves. You see a lot of artists and producers there. It’s just almost like a networking facility, basically. You’re going there to see Jermaine Dupri, or see L.A. Reid, because everyone is in there and it’s just a lot of stars. You’d be surprised how many artists get on different songs just because they saw each other at a strip club in Atlanta, Georgia.”?

Dupri, an Atlanta mogul with an eye for flashy talent, is not close-mouthed about attributing a lot of his success to the strip clubs: “I test all my records in the strip club. I feel like that’s the place where you can get the most spins on your records, anyway — in the strip club. If the girls really like to dance off one of your records, nine times out of 10, it’s gon’ be a hit record.”?

Citing another example of the roles strip clubs have played — from early ’90s post-Miami bass booty music to contemporary Dirty South crunk — Dupri says neither Atlanta producer/performers Lil Jon and the East Side Boyz, nor the group’s record label TVT, knew that Jon’s breakthrough single “Get Low” (featuring fellow ATLiens the Ying Yang Twins) was a hit. At the time, says Dupri, TVT was pushing a song Lil Jon had with Fat Joe.?

“He didn’t really understand what I was saying, ‘cause he was out there on the road and he was out there working in so many different markets and he wasn’t going in the club as frequently as I was,” says Dupri. “And every time I went in there, I didn’t even know that was on his album, but the girls was requesting the song, and as soon as that song come on, everybody in the club just used to go crazy. And they used to be singing the song just like how the rest of the world eventually caught on. So I saw that firsthand how that song was going to be a smash — from the strip clubs.”?

Magic City DJ Fernando cosigns that: “We had the Youngbloodz song [‘Damn’] before it even came out ... JD will bring a song to the club. Like [bass-heavy J-Kwon single] ‘Tipsy.’ JD brought me ‘Tipsy’ the same night that he did it.”?

One of the draws of breaking a track in the strip clubs is that, unlike with breaking a song on radio, you don’t have to be an industry juggernaut like Dupri, whose many accomplishments include “So So Def Radio,” a weekly hour-long show on V-103. In Atlanta, there are only two urban-formatted radio stations, V-103 (WVEE 103.3 FM) and HOT 107.9 (WHTA). With limited outlets, no matter the street work, few artists possess the influence to get a record on the airwaves. It’s this reality that’s turned Atlanta’s urban strip clubs into urban music oases.

Many of the local clubs boast independent music nights such as “Independent Tuesdays” that V-103 DJ Toss Swaid hosts weekly at Strokers. Those nights cater to new artists and/or independent record labels. Artists perform as well as have their records spun.?

“It’s just a melting pot of people that are trying to get in the game and people that have been in the game,” says Swaid, a Chicago native. “The Atlanta strip scene has been known as a stage where people have their records heard for the first time, and a lot of records, powerful records, come out of the strip clubs. Some people actually try to tailor some of their songs for the strip club. You hear Lil Jon and Ying Yang mention some of the strip clubs in Atlanta in their songs because that scene has always been a familiar scene ... friendly to new music.”?

That power was never lost on Michael “DJ Smurf” Crooms, also a former recording artist and DJ. “Everybody knew you broke records at the strip club, but we actually were the first ones to make records strictly geared for that,” says Crooms, referring to his artists the Ying Yang Twins. “They’re why [my label] ColliPark Records, as an independent, was able to survive, especially when radio was so political.?

“I don’t care if you from New York, Cali, wherever, if your record ain’t hitting in Atlanta, you don’t got no legitimate hit,” continues Crooms. “Atlanta is the mecca for all records that break down South. After us, everybody started trying to make records that could move the strip clubs. And by us having the biggest records at the time that they come out, we are able to be a force in the music business.”?

Underground rap diva Rasheeda took note of the literal force of strip club music — music so explicitly heavy and grinding that the drums, bass and yelping synths give off heat like bodies bumping — while crafting her stripper anthem “Vibrate,” whose chorus chimes: “(Hey, hey) make that ass vibrate/Shake that shit till you start an earthquake.”?

And when Rasheeda, in passing, shared that song with White Chocolate, one of the city’s top strippers regularly featured in videos by artists such as Nelly, Nas, Master P and Petey Pablo, the buzz was incredible.?

“Weeks later, people who had been in the strip clubs was like, ‘Oh Rasheeda, White Chocolate be dancing to your song. That shit is off the chain,’” says Rasheeda. So much so, Rasheeda is now a Jive recording artist and her hit has been recrafted for labelmate Petey Pablo, who recently hit with “Freek-A-Leek.”?

But hitting off a dancer with a record doesn’t work for all clubs. According to Fernando, at Magic City the DJ rules. So first make a good track, then make the right friends. While Crooms acknowledges that some dancers do have the power to choose their records, it’s a tradeoff. A stripper may play an artist’s song, but only if it’s already droppin’ like it’s hot. Crooms notes that strippers are not doing anyone any favors.?

“They got to have some hot shit to make their money off of. You can see the difference between a ‘Get Low’ and some regular shit. When ‘Get Low’ come on, the whole club jumps. It makes a motherfucker want to spend some mo’ money.”?

Rapper/producer Al Biggz, who recently released his album, The Rebirth, on the independent circuit, sees it another way. For Biggz, an Atlanta native who has been frequenting strip clubs for more than 10 years, an artist working a record in the strip clubs makes all the sense in the world. ?

“I look at it like an experience. You know how many niggas that it’s their first time being in a strip club? So, nigga, if Al Biggz is playing the first time, she is putting those titties in my face, that song is going to stay with me,” says Biggz. “That’s how I look at it. Those nights be memorable nights for motherfuckers, historical nights for motherfuckers. New beginnings, first ever this, first time ever that.”?

So, July 21-24 during Atlantis and its panels/exhibitions, or in several Atlanta strip clubs, artists of all genres will be thinking about exposure — of several types. Whether offering music that’s ass shaking or balls out rockin’, unsigned artists look for those “historical nights,” the kind you hear stories about. In the music industry, whether you’re in a pay-to-play strip club or conference showcase, exposure that memorable is priceless.

music@creativeloafing.com