living under a ROCK 
GreenDoberman said:
Yeah, no crazy look but I felt a little gay writing a note! All this talk about food and the focus has been on cheap eats. Fellas, some of the worlds best restaurants are litterally within a mile of the IP. Hope some people plan on splurging a bit, because all this talk about gravy and buffets is making me feel queezy.
WC Bias, want to get Steak with me at Michaels??
Fish or Doberman,
I've heard nothing but great things about the steakhouse at Barbary Coast, Michaels. Can you guys vouch for it?
Last time i was in town i ate at the steakhouse at Circus Circus and wasn't blown away, Ruth's Chris or Morton's kicks its ass left and right..
Fish or Doberman,
I've heard nothing but great things about the steakhouse at Barbary Coast, Michaels. Can you guys vouch for it?
Last time i was in town i ate at the steakhouse at Circus Circus and wasn't blown away, Ruth's Chris or Morton's kicks its ass left and right..
Brock Landers said:
Always up for a good steak BL, we'll figure something out as the date approaches. I've never been to Michaels but I've heard it's fantastic so I'm up for something new. Can also strongly recommend Boa's at Caesar's, Nine at Palms (the extracurricular activities are a bonus), among others.
"WC Bias, want to get Steak with me at Michaels??
Fish or Doberman,
I've heard nothing but great things about the steakhouse at Barbary Coast, Michaels. Can you guys vouch for it?
Last time i was in town i ate at the steakhouse at Circus Circus and wasn't blown away, Ruth's Chris or Morton's kicks its ass left and right.."
Always heard outstanding things about Michael's. I'd call it more of a gourmet room than a steak house. Boa is outstanding in the forum shops (right across the street from IP), but is a bit pricey. Capital Grille in the Fashion Show Mall is another excellent steakhouse.
Almost every hotel has a pricey "gourmet" steakhouse, some worth it and others definitely not.
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Fish or Doberman,
I've heard nothing but great things about the steakhouse at Barbary Coast, Michaels. Can you guys vouch for it?
Last time i was in town i ate at the steakhouse at Circus Circus and wasn't blown away, Ruth's Chris or Morton's kicks its ass left and right.."
Always heard outstanding things about Michael's. I'd call it more of a gourmet room than a steak house. Boa is outstanding in the forum shops (right across the street from IP), but is a bit pricey. Capital Grille in the Fashion Show Mall is another excellent steakhouse.
Almost every hotel has a pricey "gourmet" steakhouse, some worth it and others definitely not.
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For myself I was never enamoured with the Imperial Palace.
Always thought it was a low rollers paradise and the current
clientel prove that.
The palace has been on a downwards spiral the last few years
so dont go blame Harrahs and there bad decision making alone.
Another poster mentioned it was a poor mans STARDUST and thats
keeping it mild.
Regarding the former sports boss Mr. Dressler the only difference
from a year ago is less patrons and the ones there are ready for a
role in "skid row" which should replace the "imposters in concert".
Not many people might have liked Mr. DRESSLER but he kept the
crud out.
Have a good time RXers but be careful and watch your wallets.
Always thought it was a low rollers paradise and the current
clientel prove that.
The palace has been on a downwards spiral the last few years
so dont go blame Harrahs and there bad decision making alone.
Another poster mentioned it was a poor mans STARDUST and thats
keeping it mild.
Regarding the former sports boss Mr. Dressler the only difference
from a year ago is less patrons and the ones there are ready for a
role in "skid row" which should replace the "imposters in concert".
Not many people might have liked Mr. DRESSLER but he kept the
crud out.
Have a good time RXers but be careful and watch your wallets.
Michaels is by far the best place in Vegas IMHO ! I used to get comped there in the old days when Linda Lewis was in charge of the Fun Club.takeyourbase said:
However don't expect the bill to be cheap as it's a 4 Star Restuarant but a great place to celebrate a good Win. Give it a 4 Star by me !
Question of the Day
August 5, 2006
Q: Can you recommend 3 or 4 really good steakhouses for the money in Las Vegas?
A: We couldn't possibly narrow it down to three or four! Steakhouses are the longest-lasting restaurants and, probably, the most crowded cuisine category in this traditional meat-and-potatoes town. But the thumbnails of the following ten steakhouses will narrow it down for you and point you in a direction that you can pursue.
Old Las Vegas
Bob Taylor's Original Ranch Steakhouse is about 15 miles north of the city (take US 95 to Ann Road, go west for a half-mile, and turn left on Rio Vista; it’s three-quarters of a mile at 6250 Rio Vista St., 702/645-1399), but it’s been in the same location since 1955. It’s famous for its mesquite-grilled steaks, ranch-style dining room with Old West memorabilia and movie posters, and a 32-ounce New York strip; if you finish it, your dessert’s on the house.
The Golden Steer isn't much younger; it opened on West Sahara just west of the Strip (look for the big gold bull on the sign) in 1958, 702/384-4470. Although you won’t know it from the outside, the Steer is cavernous; lots of small intimate rooms break up the space. It features a Rat Pack look: dark-wood interior, red leather booths, and stained-glass. Steak, ribs, and game are the mainstay of the huge menu. The food is huge too -- and not as expensive as most.
The Steakhouse at Circus Circus, 702/794-3767, is a big surprise. After muscling through the madness of kids, clowns, and casino, you enter the cool, quiet, and dark restaurant; it's one of the most extreme and immediate transitions in Las Vegas. Everyone raves about the steaks here: They're aged in a glass-enclosed walk-in for 21 days, then grilled over mesquite in the open kitchen. And the prices are good.
Non-Strip Casinos
Two LVA staffers recently ate at T-Bones Chophouse at the Red Rock Resort, 702/797-7595, and loved it; they weren't surprised, since this place is garnering rave reviews both public and private. In fact, they liked it so much they closed the place! You can sit at the piano bar, on the outside patio complete with a firepit, or in the main dining room. T-Bones is already known for bone-in steak (with a 48-ounce T-bone option), but there's also lamb and seafood; the wine list is monumental.
At the other end of the spectrum, the coffee shop at Ellis Island (on Koval at E. Flamingo, 702/733-8901), isn’t a steakhouse, but it serves the best steak in Las Vegas for the money: $4.95. It’s a 10-ounce filet-cut sirloin (thick), grilled to order and served with a big house salad, garlic green beans, potatoes, and rolls. This is a $20 meal, at least, anywhere else in the country.
The Ranch Steakhouse at Binion's, 702/382-1600, fits in a number of categories, actually: venerable, view, and quality. It's been around forever; it was in the original casino, then moved to the top of the old Mint tower when the Binions took over the Mint in 1988. The steaks and prime rib here are huge.
N9NE at the Palms, 702/933-9900, is where publisher Anthony Curtis winds up, more often than not, when he has a taste for a good steak. It can be noisy, but the filets and ribeyes are renowned; you'll also like the Garbage house salad (a little bit of everything) and lobster mashed potatoes.
Strip Casinos
Charlie Palmer Steak, 702/632-5123, is in a nice room off the lobby of the Four Seasons Hotel in the Mandalay Bay building. Palmer is known for searching far and wide for the best and freshest ingredients. All the beef here is black Angus, dry-aged for 21 days. He's also known for signature potato creations, such as steak fries, baked truffle potato, Yukon Gold potato purée, and three-cheese potato gratin.
Prime at Bellagio, 877/234-6358, decorated like a 1930s-style speakeasy, is located lakeside with views of the fountains. The menu is changeable and small (for example, a veal chop, lamb chops, a filet, and a porterhouse in the meat department), but whatever they're serving, you can be sure it's among the best in town.
And finally, there's Delmonico's at the Venetian, 702/414-3737. This steakhouse has a big rep, thanks to the fame of executive chef (and owner) Emeril Lagasse's ubiquity on the Food Channel. The signature dish is a bone-in prime-rib 22-ounce steak for $48. No sides, just the slab. This place is expensive, but from everything we can tell, it's worth it.
As mentioned above, this is just a sampling. Let us know if you have a favorite steakhouse (and favorite steak there) and, as usual, we'll post the feedback in an upcoming QoD.
August 5, 2006
Q: Can you recommend 3 or 4 really good steakhouses for the money in Las Vegas?
A: We couldn't possibly narrow it down to three or four! Steakhouses are the longest-lasting restaurants and, probably, the most crowded cuisine category in this traditional meat-and-potatoes town. But the thumbnails of the following ten steakhouses will narrow it down for you and point you in a direction that you can pursue.
Old Las Vegas
Bob Taylor's Original Ranch Steakhouse is about 15 miles north of the city (take US 95 to Ann Road, go west for a half-mile, and turn left on Rio Vista; it’s three-quarters of a mile at 6250 Rio Vista St., 702/645-1399), but it’s been in the same location since 1955. It’s famous for its mesquite-grilled steaks, ranch-style dining room with Old West memorabilia and movie posters, and a 32-ounce New York strip; if you finish it, your dessert’s on the house.
The Golden Steer isn't much younger; it opened on West Sahara just west of the Strip (look for the big gold bull on the sign) in 1958, 702/384-4470. Although you won’t know it from the outside, the Steer is cavernous; lots of small intimate rooms break up the space. It features a Rat Pack look: dark-wood interior, red leather booths, and stained-glass. Steak, ribs, and game are the mainstay of the huge menu. The food is huge too -- and not as expensive as most.
The Steakhouse at Circus Circus, 702/794-3767, is a big surprise. After muscling through the madness of kids, clowns, and casino, you enter the cool, quiet, and dark restaurant; it's one of the most extreme and immediate transitions in Las Vegas. Everyone raves about the steaks here: They're aged in a glass-enclosed walk-in for 21 days, then grilled over mesquite in the open kitchen. And the prices are good.
Non-Strip Casinos
Two LVA staffers recently ate at T-Bones Chophouse at the Red Rock Resort, 702/797-7595, and loved it; they weren't surprised, since this place is garnering rave reviews both public and private. In fact, they liked it so much they closed the place! You can sit at the piano bar, on the outside patio complete with a firepit, or in the main dining room. T-Bones is already known for bone-in steak (with a 48-ounce T-bone option), but there's also lamb and seafood; the wine list is monumental.
At the other end of the spectrum, the coffee shop at Ellis Island (on Koval at E. Flamingo, 702/733-8901), isn’t a steakhouse, but it serves the best steak in Las Vegas for the money: $4.95. It’s a 10-ounce filet-cut sirloin (thick), grilled to order and served with a big house salad, garlic green beans, potatoes, and rolls. This is a $20 meal, at least, anywhere else in the country.
The Ranch Steakhouse at Binion's, 702/382-1600, fits in a number of categories, actually: venerable, view, and quality. It's been around forever; it was in the original casino, then moved to the top of the old Mint tower when the Binions took over the Mint in 1988. The steaks and prime rib here are huge.
N9NE at the Palms, 702/933-9900, is where publisher Anthony Curtis winds up, more often than not, when he has a taste for a good steak. It can be noisy, but the filets and ribeyes are renowned; you'll also like the Garbage house salad (a little bit of everything) and lobster mashed potatoes.
Strip Casinos
Charlie Palmer Steak, 702/632-5123, is in a nice room off the lobby of the Four Seasons Hotel in the Mandalay Bay building. Palmer is known for searching far and wide for the best and freshest ingredients. All the beef here is black Angus, dry-aged for 21 days. He's also known for signature potato creations, such as steak fries, baked truffle potato, Yukon Gold potato purée, and three-cheese potato gratin.
Prime at Bellagio, 877/234-6358, decorated like a 1930s-style speakeasy, is located lakeside with views of the fountains. The menu is changeable and small (for example, a veal chop, lamb chops, a filet, and a porterhouse in the meat department), but whatever they're serving, you can be sure it's among the best in town.
And finally, there's Delmonico's at the Venetian, 702/414-3737. This steakhouse has a big rep, thanks to the fame of executive chef (and owner) Emeril Lagasse's ubiquity on the Food Channel. The signature dish is a bone-in prime-rib 22-ounce steak for $48. No sides, just the slab. This place is expensive, but from everything we can tell, it's worth it.
As mentioned above, this is just a sampling. Let us know if you have a favorite steakhouse (and favorite steak there) and, as usual, we'll post the feedback in an upcoming QoD.
Jul. 27 - Aug. 2 | Weather Search the Weekly:
A Man Without a Lounge
Lon Bronson and the decline of a great Vegas tradition
By Spencer Patterson
Photo by Benjamen Purvis
"You're Lon Bronson, aren't you?"
The excited inquiry finds a mellow, middle-aged man in a "Let's Do Funk" T-shirt with deliberately ruffled, sandy-brown hair, who's relaxing near the back of a throwback Vegas lounge in an old-school Vegas casino scheduled to be a pile of dust this time next year. Once, not long ago, this same man—who is indeed Lon Bronson—reigned supreme in a room not dissimilar to this one, commanding a reputation as leader of the best lounge band on the Strip and far beyond. But those days have passed, and today the trumpeter sits in the Stardust's Starlight Lounge solely as a spectator, and a source of considerable interest to the stranger who has noticed his presence.
"You guys are great, man. I used to see you all the time."
As it turns out, Bronson's admirer also plays music, manning the drum seat for local five-piece Rated TG, which has just finished a three-song soundcheck before a two-week run beginning later that Tuesday. Following a handshake and a brief, friendly exchange, Bronson returns to his seat, in time to observe the elevated stage's velvet curtain close behind the curved center bar. "I've gotta take my hat off to these guys, 'cause they're really in the trenches," he says. "A band like this might get booked for two weeks, and then they might be off for two or three months before they get another gig. You used to have 30 or 40 lounge bands doing day shifts, night shifts, making a living doing the lounge circuit full-time. Now there's just no lounges like this left."
Bronson spent 13 years holding down first Monday nights, and then Fridays and Saturdays, at the Riviera's Le Bistro Theatre with his All-Star Band, so named because its dozen or so members earn their primary paychecks performing in the pits at such ongoing shows as Mamma Mia!, Legends in Concert and Phantom of the Opera. Then the Riviera succumbed to the lounge scene's increasingly popular "pay to play" entertainment scheme—the casino leases space to acts, who then recoup via covers and ticket sales, rather than hiring acts directly and allowing patrons in for the traditional two-drink minimum—and Bronson's group packed up its horns and saxes and trekked to the Golden Nugget in 2004.
"I wouldn't entertain the notion of selling tickets because inevitably you can't compete in that market," Bronson explains. "Plus, I don't think it would be fair to the people who have been seeing us all these years to start charging a cover. We've always prided ourselves on being a throwback to that Louis Prima-type, mid-'60s Vegas lounge band, and once you start charging a ticket price you're a headliner."
The All-Stars found a lustrous showroom waiting for them at the Nugget, with first-rate lighting and the most impressive sound system the 47-year-oldBronson has experienced in a career that stretches back to his days as a young performer in New Hampshire and Boston. The Theatre Ballroom's third-floor location drew fewer walk-ups, but hordes of locals and tourists in the know made the journey upstairs in search of hot, late-night music, as did the celebrities the band has long been famous for attracting, from Penn Jillette and Drew Carey to the Barenaked Ladies and Tower of Power.
New ownership brought cost-cutting changes at the Nugget last year, however, and Bronson & Co. didn't receive an extension when their final six-month contract expired in October. "They came in with axes, slashing every department, including entertainment," says Bronson, who immediately began entertaining offers to remain Downtown or return to a Strip hotel. But nine months later, save for a few corporate gigs and other private functions, the All-Star Band—an ensemble so good other bands routinely spent their off nights watching them—has been conspicuously absent from the lounges and showrooms of its past.
Recently emerging from public hibernation, Bronson and his group have popped up in an unexpected new home along the Strip but outside the casinos: Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville. "I swore after the Golden Nugget next time it would be location, location, location, and Margaritaville isn't on the Strip, it's in the Strip," says Bronson, who has played a handful of shows at the locale and hopes to land a regular Sunday slot there soon. "In a typical lounge setting, in the course of an evening we might have been reaching 100 or 200 people at a time. At Margaritaville they pipe your music out onto the street, so in addition to up to 1,500 people inside, you're reaching thousands walking by outside."
Squeeze into Margaritaville while the All-Stars are onstage and you'll hear the band envelop not just the ground-level bar, restaurant and dance floor, but also second- and third-floor seating areas with dramatic views of Caesars Palace. Images of Bronson, his male and female vocalists, guitarist, sax and horn players and rhythm section hover on screens throughout the tavern, while tourists snap photos of what must be the best bar band they've ever stumbled upon on a trip to Las Vegas.
Here, Bronson's lineup has slimmed from 13 to 11 in accordance with a slightly smaller stage. Gone now are the sleek, black getups of the Nugget years, replaced by T-shirts, shorts and, in some cases, flip-flops. And though the versatile ensemble still works funk and jazz into its sets, the band plays to its rock side slightly more now, diving into material by Frank Zappa, Jethro Tull, Sly & the Family Stone and the Motown legends, to the obvious delight of the crowd.
"It's our ultimate clientele—middle-aged people there to hang out in Jimmy Buffet's house. They're drinking a lot, and they're ready to rock with us," Bronson says, becoming markedly more animated as he speaks about the new location. "And we don't have to compete with casino noise or deal with pit bosses pointing decibel meters at us."
Satisfied as Bronson might be, he often doubles back to the topic of lounge decline, saying he's not so much saddened by it as embarrassed. "The two-drink-minimum lounge entertainment was something that set Las Vegas apart from almost everywhere else," he says. "And now it's the reverse. You can go to Mohegan Sun in Connecticut and see a name headliner in the lounge for two drinks on the weekend. It's embarrassing that something that we pioneered and something that we're famous for has really gone the way of the dinosaur here."
By way of example he refers to Vegas veteran Freddie Bell, a performer Bronson has respected since they shared a stage during the All-Stars' formative years. "He was a star in his own right in the late '50s, and I learned a lot about Vegas history and Vegas culture from him," Bronson says. "But the punch line of the story is that there are no lounges in town for Freddie to play anymore. Now he plays at that Italian restaurant on the outskirts of town, where they do karaoke on Mondays, the Bootlegger. It's gotten to the point where even Freddie Bell, one of the pillars of the lounge scene in Las Vegas, is playing at a freestanding Italian restaurant instead of being the centerpiece at a casino lounge in Las Vegas proper."
Joe Leone, vice president of entertainment at the Golden Nugget, questions why more casino executives don't recognize the drawing power of quality live acts. "At the end of the day, as much as the business landscape has changed across Las Vegas, one underlying thing that has not changed is ‘butts in the building,'" he says. "The more ways you can find to get bodies into the building affordably, the better off you will be. I think part of it is just the corporatization of Las Vegas, where there's a lot of bottom-line thinkers right now."
In part, Bronson blames the casinos' ongoing nightclub boom—an "overplayed hand," he calls it—and the availability of cheaper forms of lounge entertainment such as hypnotists and track-backed singers. "You know what the sign in front of the Stardust says? It says, ‘It's Hypno-larious.' Come on. I take exception with replacing a live group of professional musicians with one guy."
Most of all, Bronson chalks the progression away from two-drink-minimum lounge acts up to departmental rivalries, which make traditional loss leaders all but impossible to write off these days. "You've got food and beverage in direct competition with table gaming in direct competition with entertainment, and nobody wants to foot the bill," he explains. "If entertainment foots the bill, then it looks like they're running at a loss because they're not showing the gains made at food and beverage and gaming. They know lounge entertainment is gonna generate, but they want a tangible set of numbers they can point their fingers at. In the old days, if you came into a lounge and saw the Count Basie Orchestra for free and came out of that lounge raring to go, the pit bosses knew it. But how do you put that down on paper? ‘This guy mentioned that he saw Count Basie?' It's not gonna fit on a ledger line."
Steve Schirripa began to feel that financial pinch toward the end of his run as entertainment director at the Riviera, which lasted from 1995 to 2000. "At one time we had an afternoon act, from 4 to 8 during happy hour, then come 8:30 or 9 we had another band, and then we had a third band play until 2 or 3 in the morning. It was continuous music. But by the end we were down to one band a night," Schirripa recalls via telephone from New York City, during a break from filming the final season of The Sopranos (Schirripa plays mobster Bobby "Bacala" Baccalieri). "Now, hotels want every single space to make money, and the lounge isn't necessarily a [direct] money maker. But you have to look at it and say, are they gonna bring in people that wouldn't normally be here? If a good band is bringing in 300 people from outside and those people are drinking and gambling and eating, the value can't always be measured in what they spent in the bar in the lounge. If you put the revenue all together, I believe you make money."
Schirripa has an even more direct message for casino operators unsure whether bringing the All-Stars aboard makes sense financially. "Why someone hasn't snatched up the Lon Bronson Band, I do not know. If you want 300 or 400 people in your lounge at 4 in the morning, hire the band. It's very simple." Agrees Leone, "In today's day and age of tracks and lip-synching, when they were here this was one of the few spots in Las Vegas where there was a creative vibe on a nightly basis. There's some wonderful entertainment options in Las Vegas, with incredible production, but as far as having that confidence and having some fun, just basically jamming, Lon's band stands out."
Bronson's occasionally pained tone notwithstanding, he insists he isn't bitter about what has happened to his beloved Vegas lounge culture. "It's a trend, that's all. Just business, and we're adapting." He also sees a glimmer of hope on the horizon, in the form of Red Rock Station, which sprawls out around the high-profile Rock's Lounge near its core. "I think little by little you'll see some of the casinos coming around," he predicts. "Rock's is a great room, in the center of the casino, with a comfortable setup. You can go and see a killer band, like the Steve Lee Group on Monday night, for two drinks, and then maybe you go out and gamble, which was the concept from day one."
For now, he and his band have plenty of work—both full-time and freelance—to keep them busy, not to mention secure financially. "It's never been about the money for this band. Music is our profession, but we look at this particular ensemble as a fun hobby, and we do it because we enjoy it," he maintains. But that doesn't mean the man who once ruled Vegas' lounge bandstand plans to turn his back on musicians like his Starlight visitor, soldiering on in an industry that's seen the average lounge band's hiring price drop from $5,000 to $7,000 a week to below $3,000, when work is even available.
"I gotta hand it to these guys. They're probably playing something like four one-hour sets a night, six nights a week," he says as he exits the Stardust's darkened lounge, possibly for the last time. "These days in this town, you've really gotta want to work to do that."
They used to play at the Fontana lounge at the Bellagio every nite to a full house.
A Man Without a Lounge
Lon Bronson and the decline of a great Vegas tradition
By Spencer Patterson
Photo by Benjamen Purvis
"You're Lon Bronson, aren't you?"
The excited inquiry finds a mellow, middle-aged man in a "Let's Do Funk" T-shirt with deliberately ruffled, sandy-brown hair, who's relaxing near the back of a throwback Vegas lounge in an old-school Vegas casino scheduled to be a pile of dust this time next year. Once, not long ago, this same man—who is indeed Lon Bronson—reigned supreme in a room not dissimilar to this one, commanding a reputation as leader of the best lounge band on the Strip and far beyond. But those days have passed, and today the trumpeter sits in the Stardust's Starlight Lounge solely as a spectator, and a source of considerable interest to the stranger who has noticed his presence.
"You guys are great, man. I used to see you all the time."
As it turns out, Bronson's admirer also plays music, manning the drum seat for local five-piece Rated TG, which has just finished a three-song soundcheck before a two-week run beginning later that Tuesday. Following a handshake and a brief, friendly exchange, Bronson returns to his seat, in time to observe the elevated stage's velvet curtain close behind the curved center bar. "I've gotta take my hat off to these guys, 'cause they're really in the trenches," he says. "A band like this might get booked for two weeks, and then they might be off for two or three months before they get another gig. You used to have 30 or 40 lounge bands doing day shifts, night shifts, making a living doing the lounge circuit full-time. Now there's just no lounges like this left."
Bronson spent 13 years holding down first Monday nights, and then Fridays and Saturdays, at the Riviera's Le Bistro Theatre with his All-Star Band, so named because its dozen or so members earn their primary paychecks performing in the pits at such ongoing shows as Mamma Mia!, Legends in Concert and Phantom of the Opera. Then the Riviera succumbed to the lounge scene's increasingly popular "pay to play" entertainment scheme—the casino leases space to acts, who then recoup via covers and ticket sales, rather than hiring acts directly and allowing patrons in for the traditional two-drink minimum—and Bronson's group packed up its horns and saxes and trekked to the Golden Nugget in 2004.
"I wouldn't entertain the notion of selling tickets because inevitably you can't compete in that market," Bronson explains. "Plus, I don't think it would be fair to the people who have been seeing us all these years to start charging a cover. We've always prided ourselves on being a throwback to that Louis Prima-type, mid-'60s Vegas lounge band, and once you start charging a ticket price you're a headliner."
The All-Stars found a lustrous showroom waiting for them at the Nugget, with first-rate lighting and the most impressive sound system the 47-year-oldBronson has experienced in a career that stretches back to his days as a young performer in New Hampshire and Boston. The Theatre Ballroom's third-floor location drew fewer walk-ups, but hordes of locals and tourists in the know made the journey upstairs in search of hot, late-night music, as did the celebrities the band has long been famous for attracting, from Penn Jillette and Drew Carey to the Barenaked Ladies and Tower of Power.
New ownership brought cost-cutting changes at the Nugget last year, however, and Bronson & Co. didn't receive an extension when their final six-month contract expired in October. "They came in with axes, slashing every department, including entertainment," says Bronson, who immediately began entertaining offers to remain Downtown or return to a Strip hotel. But nine months later, save for a few corporate gigs and other private functions, the All-Star Band—an ensemble so good other bands routinely spent their off nights watching them—has been conspicuously absent from the lounges and showrooms of its past.
Recently emerging from public hibernation, Bronson and his group have popped up in an unexpected new home along the Strip but outside the casinos: Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville. "I swore after the Golden Nugget next time it would be location, location, location, and Margaritaville isn't on the Strip, it's in the Strip," says Bronson, who has played a handful of shows at the locale and hopes to land a regular Sunday slot there soon. "In a typical lounge setting, in the course of an evening we might have been reaching 100 or 200 people at a time. At Margaritaville they pipe your music out onto the street, so in addition to up to 1,500 people inside, you're reaching thousands walking by outside."
Squeeze into Margaritaville while the All-Stars are onstage and you'll hear the band envelop not just the ground-level bar, restaurant and dance floor, but also second- and third-floor seating areas with dramatic views of Caesars Palace. Images of Bronson, his male and female vocalists, guitarist, sax and horn players and rhythm section hover on screens throughout the tavern, while tourists snap photos of what must be the best bar band they've ever stumbled upon on a trip to Las Vegas.
Here, Bronson's lineup has slimmed from 13 to 11 in accordance with a slightly smaller stage. Gone now are the sleek, black getups of the Nugget years, replaced by T-shirts, shorts and, in some cases, flip-flops. And though the versatile ensemble still works funk and jazz into its sets, the band plays to its rock side slightly more now, diving into material by Frank Zappa, Jethro Tull, Sly & the Family Stone and the Motown legends, to the obvious delight of the crowd.
"It's our ultimate clientele—middle-aged people there to hang out in Jimmy Buffet's house. They're drinking a lot, and they're ready to rock with us," Bronson says, becoming markedly more animated as he speaks about the new location. "And we don't have to compete with casino noise or deal with pit bosses pointing decibel meters at us."
Satisfied as Bronson might be, he often doubles back to the topic of lounge decline, saying he's not so much saddened by it as embarrassed. "The two-drink-minimum lounge entertainment was something that set Las Vegas apart from almost everywhere else," he says. "And now it's the reverse. You can go to Mohegan Sun in Connecticut and see a name headliner in the lounge for two drinks on the weekend. It's embarrassing that something that we pioneered and something that we're famous for has really gone the way of the dinosaur here."
By way of example he refers to Vegas veteran Freddie Bell, a performer Bronson has respected since they shared a stage during the All-Stars' formative years. "He was a star in his own right in the late '50s, and I learned a lot about Vegas history and Vegas culture from him," Bronson says. "But the punch line of the story is that there are no lounges in town for Freddie to play anymore. Now he plays at that Italian restaurant on the outskirts of town, where they do karaoke on Mondays, the Bootlegger. It's gotten to the point where even Freddie Bell, one of the pillars of the lounge scene in Las Vegas, is playing at a freestanding Italian restaurant instead of being the centerpiece at a casino lounge in Las Vegas proper."
Joe Leone, vice president of entertainment at the Golden Nugget, questions why more casino executives don't recognize the drawing power of quality live acts. "At the end of the day, as much as the business landscape has changed across Las Vegas, one underlying thing that has not changed is ‘butts in the building,'" he says. "The more ways you can find to get bodies into the building affordably, the better off you will be. I think part of it is just the corporatization of Las Vegas, where there's a lot of bottom-line thinkers right now."
In part, Bronson blames the casinos' ongoing nightclub boom—an "overplayed hand," he calls it—and the availability of cheaper forms of lounge entertainment such as hypnotists and track-backed singers. "You know what the sign in front of the Stardust says? It says, ‘It's Hypno-larious.' Come on. I take exception with replacing a live group of professional musicians with one guy."
Most of all, Bronson chalks the progression away from two-drink-minimum lounge acts up to departmental rivalries, which make traditional loss leaders all but impossible to write off these days. "You've got food and beverage in direct competition with table gaming in direct competition with entertainment, and nobody wants to foot the bill," he explains. "If entertainment foots the bill, then it looks like they're running at a loss because they're not showing the gains made at food and beverage and gaming. They know lounge entertainment is gonna generate, but they want a tangible set of numbers they can point their fingers at. In the old days, if you came into a lounge and saw the Count Basie Orchestra for free and came out of that lounge raring to go, the pit bosses knew it. But how do you put that down on paper? ‘This guy mentioned that he saw Count Basie?' It's not gonna fit on a ledger line."
Steve Schirripa began to feel that financial pinch toward the end of his run as entertainment director at the Riviera, which lasted from 1995 to 2000. "At one time we had an afternoon act, from 4 to 8 during happy hour, then come 8:30 or 9 we had another band, and then we had a third band play until 2 or 3 in the morning. It was continuous music. But by the end we were down to one band a night," Schirripa recalls via telephone from New York City, during a break from filming the final season of The Sopranos (Schirripa plays mobster Bobby "Bacala" Baccalieri). "Now, hotels want every single space to make money, and the lounge isn't necessarily a [direct] money maker. But you have to look at it and say, are they gonna bring in people that wouldn't normally be here? If a good band is bringing in 300 people from outside and those people are drinking and gambling and eating, the value can't always be measured in what they spent in the bar in the lounge. If you put the revenue all together, I believe you make money."
Schirripa has an even more direct message for casino operators unsure whether bringing the All-Stars aboard makes sense financially. "Why someone hasn't snatched up the Lon Bronson Band, I do not know. If you want 300 or 400 people in your lounge at 4 in the morning, hire the band. It's very simple." Agrees Leone, "In today's day and age of tracks and lip-synching, when they were here this was one of the few spots in Las Vegas where there was a creative vibe on a nightly basis. There's some wonderful entertainment options in Las Vegas, with incredible production, but as far as having that confidence and having some fun, just basically jamming, Lon's band stands out."
Bronson's occasionally pained tone notwithstanding, he insists he isn't bitter about what has happened to his beloved Vegas lounge culture. "It's a trend, that's all. Just business, and we're adapting." He also sees a glimmer of hope on the horizon, in the form of Red Rock Station, which sprawls out around the high-profile Rock's Lounge near its core. "I think little by little you'll see some of the casinos coming around," he predicts. "Rock's is a great room, in the center of the casino, with a comfortable setup. You can go and see a killer band, like the Steve Lee Group on Monday night, for two drinks, and then maybe you go out and gamble, which was the concept from day one."
For now, he and his band have plenty of work—both full-time and freelance—to keep them busy, not to mention secure financially. "It's never been about the money for this band. Music is our profession, but we look at this particular ensemble as a fun hobby, and we do it because we enjoy it," he maintains. But that doesn't mean the man who once ruled Vegas' lounge bandstand plans to turn his back on musicians like his Starlight visitor, soldiering on in an industry that's seen the average lounge band's hiring price drop from $5,000 to $7,000 a week to below $3,000, when work is even available.
"I gotta hand it to these guys. They're probably playing something like four one-hour sets a night, six nights a week," he says as he exits the Stardust's darkened lounge, possibly for the last time. "These days in this town, you've really gotta want to work to do that."
They used to play at the Fontana lounge at the Bellagio every nite to a full house.
Hugos at 4Q Downtown is as good as it gets. If you want a helluva deal on Prime Rib for a small price, same as would cost 8x in the steakhouse, check the specials at the coffee shop overlooking the casino.
I have had numerous employees at 4Q tell me that the Prime Rib is exactly the same from both Hugos and the coffee shop. Also, the coffee shop has a nice view overlooking the casino floor.
Lots of fun, very tasty and very inexpensive.
VVV
I have had numerous employees at 4Q tell me that the Prime Rib is exactly the same from both Hugos and the coffee shop. Also, the coffee shop has a nice view overlooking the casino floor.
Lots of fun, very tasty and very inexpensive.
VVV
