Me: What took them so long?
(September 26, 2025) – Billboard Magazine is nothing if it isn’t the purveyor of everything that can be charted.
After experimenting this decade with new charts ranking tunes on TikTok and TouchTunes, the 131-year-old institution has finally set its sights and its digital monitoring systems on Atlanta’s gentlemen’s clubs. The inaugural chart — tracking the most played songs in Magic City and two other legendary ATL nightspots during August 2025 — arrived this week alongside a companion ranking of the most-played artists.
Seriously.
My first reaction — and everyone else’s I’ve told so far — was: “What took so long?” Followed immediately by: “Is this really Billboard’s first time checking the poles?”
I couldn’t resist.
Billboard finally made it rain — not singles and fives, but hits and stats — and DJROBBLOG has them printed below, but keep reading.
ATL’s Champagne Room of Hits
If you’re wondering why Billboard started with Atlanta, then clearly you’ve never been. A pilgrimage to Magic City is basically Strip Club 101 — a rite of passage for anyone who claims they know the culture. It’s part nightclub, part launchpad, part cultural institution, and now, apparently, part Billboard chart data source.
In the article announcing this bit of titillating news, Billboard did invite other U.S. club owners who’d like to contribute to future rankings to send an email to [email protected]. I wonder if ATL’s historic Clermont Lounge featuring the legendary dancer Blondie Strange will be among them.
Billboard’s plan is to continue tracking monthly playlists using digital music recognition technology installed in the clubs. Think Shazam meets the champagne room. (Next step: tracking who racks up the most frequent patron miles. Jermaine Dupri once bragged about dropping $10,000 a week at Magic City for two decades. At those rates, Jeezy wasn’t lying when he called the legendary club “his office.”)
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The Sounds of the Stage
As you’d expect, hip-hop dominates. Nine of the ten inaugural Strip Club Songs were rap tracks. The lone exception was Chris Brown and Bryson Tiller’s R&B slow-burner “It Depends” — although the song’s refrain “You bad as hell, I treat you well, I will” is the kind of lyric that’ll make any pole dancer swing a little harder for some bill bombardment.
On the artist side, men run the show, claiming all ten spots. The only woman to appear is Sexyy Red, in a feature role, on the appropriately titled “Nookie (Pu$$y).” If you thought the pole wasn’t co-ed, the playlist lowers the bar even further.
Future, Atlanta’s crown prince of strip club culture, was the No. 1 artist with over 1,400 plays, more than double the runner up (Lil Baby). At this point, the rapper whose last name is now legally Cash might as well have a permanent VIP booth with his name engraved on it. Superstar Metro Boomin slid into third, contributing three of the top four songs. When the DJ is basically your ghost producer, the odds are stacked in your favor. And, as expected, Atlanta-based artists rule the clubs with six of the ten spots, including the top three.
Too Late to Catch the Legends
All of this raises the question: why only now? Hip-hop and strip club culture have been joined at the hip (and the hips) for decades. If Billboard had launched this thing in the late ’90s, Juvenile (“Back That Azz Up”) would’ve retired with more top ten plaques than the champagne room mirrors. Ying Yang Twins would have owned the chart with classics like “Salt Shaker” and “Whistle While You Twerk.” And Tag Team’s “Whoomp! (There It Is)” might’ve been crowned the patron saint of Magic City (the ‘90s phrase was practically coined there).
The ladies also got shortchanged by Billboard’s late arrival. Classic anthems like Ciara’s “Goodies,” Rihanna’s “Work,” Nicki Minaj’s featured spot on Big Sean’s “Dance (Azz),” Megan Thee Stallion’s “Savage,” and Beyoncé’s “Crazy in Love” deserved their shot at pole-dance chart immortality. Go back half a century and Donna Summer’s “Love to Love You Baby” and LaBelle’s “Lady Marmalade” practically invented the slow grind. And who could forget 1958’s “The Stripper” by David Rose and his Orchestra?
Billboard missed the tip jar on all of those.
Here were the top Strip Club Songs and Artists in ATL for August, according to Billboard (Spotify playlist follows):
August 2025’s Top Strip Club Songs
Rank | Title | Artist | Plays
1. “Clap” – Metro Boomin ft. DJ Spins & Waka Flocka Flame (81)
2. “They Wanna Have Fun” – Metro Boomin ft. Travis Porter, Young Dro & Gucci Mane (77)
3. “BTA” – Young Nudy (72)
4. “Take Me Thru Dere” – Metro Boomin ft. Quavo, Breskii & YKNIECE (70)
5. “All There” – Jeezy & Bankroll Fresh (64)
6. “WTHelly” – Rob49 (63)
7. “Nooky (Pu$$y)” – 21 Lil Harold & 21 Savage ft. Sexxy Red (58)
8. “Mo Chicken” – Bossman Dlow ft. French Montana (58)
9. “Dum, Dumb, and Dumber” – Lil Baby ft. Future & Young Thug (58)
10. “It Depends” – Chris Brown ft. Bryson Tiller (53)
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Top Strip Club Artists, August 2025
Rank | Artist | Plays | Repping
1. Future – 1,406 (Atlanta)
2. Lil Baby – 636 (Atlanta)
3. Metro Boomin – 624 (Atlanta/St. Louis)
4. Bossman Dlow – 436 (Tallahassee)
5. Moneybagg Yo – 380 (Memphis)
6. Jeezy – 363 (Hawkinsville, GA)
7. Gucci Mane – 306 (Atlanta)
8. Drake – 286 (Toronto)
9. Young Nudy – 276 (Atlanta)
10. Gunna – 253 (Atlanta)
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Final Lap Dance
So here we are: the first official Billboard Strip Club Songs chart. Some charts measure streams. Others measure sales. This one? It measures which songs made it rain the most!
And hey, if your favorite jam didn’t make the list, don’t stress. In the strip club, just like on the Hot 100, there’s always another song — and another set — around the corner…at least until closing time.
So, readers: which jams will soundtrack your next lap dance? Drop your favorites in the comments. Just remember: no touching.
DJRob
DJRob (he/him) is a freelance music blogger from the East Coast who covers R&B, hip-hop, disco, pop, rock and country genres – plus lots of music news and current stuff! You can follow him on Bluesky at @djrobblog.bsky.social, X (formerly Twitter) at @djrobblog, on Facebook or on Meta’s Threads.
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