Got a tweet last night from a writer friend of mine who also used to be a stripper. She asked if I was going to report on the end of The Clubhouse, the golf-themed gentlemen’s club off Northwest Highway formerly co-owned by three-fourths of Pantera. I guess it makes sense that the place would cease to be, now that both Abbott brothers, Dimebag Darrell and Vinnie Paul, have died. And, OK, it makes sense to ask me, because I wrote a book about Darrell (which, my goodness, turns 10 later this year) and also a feature for the Observer about strip club DJs that heavily featured The Clubhouse.
(I will note here that the idea for doing the feature came about 10 minutes before a staff meeting and was purely suggested as a way to fill out my story list and I never really had any intention of doing it. The editor at the time, however, loved it. At the end of reporting the story, which I swear to you was grueling, I got as sick as I have ever been. I have only been to a club of this sort I think twice since then, once to pick up a check from someone donating to my mayoral campaign and another time because Mike Precker, the former Morning News reporter and now writer in residence at The Lodge, invited me and Tim for lunch, and we ate in a back room and I fell asleep at the table. True story.)
So I should know, maybe. But I don’t. She says Facebook chatter suggests Saturday night is the last for The Clubhouse under its current concept.
