A&E
Cocktail Culture
How to Make Daylight's Clooney Cocktail
May 22nd, 2013
How do you capture sunlight in a glass? Tequila’s a great place to start. The spiky leaves of the blue agave have been soaking up Mexican rays for more than a decade, feeding the piña that, when roasted, mashed, fermented and distilled (to condense a centuries-old process down to a sentence), is tequila, ready for aging or not. In Las Vegas, the Light Group favors Casamigos as the company’s official tequila brand. Read more »
Showstopper
Retitled '80s Show' Improves but Should Adjust Mockery Quotient
May 21st, 2013
Hand me my dictionary … Let’s see … “Determined.” Adjective. See “Sirc Michaels.” Read more »
Movies
Third Time’s the Charm
The Hangover’s hilarious Ken Jeong opens up about the Tao of Chow
May 21st, 2013
Not many people can say that jumping naked out of the trunk of a car changed their life forever. Even fewer people can claim that they jumped naked out of the trunk of a car onto Bradley Cooper’s face. And yet for Ken Jeong, whose breakout role in The Hangover series (the anticipated third and final installment of which hits theaters May 24) as the flamboyant, drug-addled gangster Leslie Chow has earned him a not-so-cult following as the funniest character actor in Hollywood—both of these things are true. Read more »
Reading
SPF 50 Shades of Good Writing
Put your e-reader in your beach bag—the summer book season is full of hot, familiar hits and free of cheesy S&M romances
May 21st, 2013
Summer is right around the corner, which means bookstore shelves will be crowded with the usual mix of serious fiction and lightweight entertainment. The next few months will bring readers some hotly anticipated sequels, a number of auspicious literary debuts, three new James Patterson novels with a combined print run of more than 2 million copies, and a showdown between Dan Brown and Khaled Hosseini that will make the 2013 best-seller list look a whole lot like 2003. Read more »
Pop Culture
Liberace and His Rhinestone Rappers
On the eve of a Soderbergh biopic, looking back to the OG of ghetto glitter
May 21st, 2013
When Macklemore raps, Yo, that’s $50 for a T-shirt, of his Gucci-sporting contemporaries in newfound cultural touchstone “Thrift Shop,” he just sounds so damn sad. Read more »
Soundscraper
Bowling for Bands
May 21st, 2013
Punk Rock Bowling is back again, and the musical lineup looks superb. There’s plenty of classic testosterone-fueled punk on hand (Agnostic Front, The Damned, D.R.I.), sure. But there’s also more diverse, quirkier fare this time around. Case in point: new-wave pop radicals Devo, and a group comprising former members of hardcore icons Black Flag called, well, Flag. (They play the music of Black Flag, but shouldn’t be confused with the “official” Black Flag, see?) Sadly, unless you already bought tickets, you can’t see these groups. But here are two smaller, even more varied club shows to which you can still buy admission via PunkRockBowling.com. Read more »
Music
Your Rock ’n’ Roll Poolside Concert Primer
May 21st, 2013
I love the smell of chlorine in the evening, along with the sound of amplified guitars and pounding drums. Which means it must be summer in Las Vegas, where the best concerts occur near bodies of water. Here’s a cool list of musical options in the coming months. Boulevard Pool at the Cosmopolitan corners the indie-rock market by pouring the sonic equivalent of a bottomless, punked-up piña colada. Mandalay Bay Beach and Paradise Beach at the Hard Rock offer rad events, too. Other oases to keep an eye on for live music as the season grows hotter: the pool at South Point, M Resort’s DayDream Day Pool (with DJs spinning on weekends), and the pool at Red Rock Resort: Read more »
The Silenced Stage
Anthony Del Valle was the dean of Las Vegas theater criticism—and the best friend local theater had
May 21st, 2013
Anthony Del Valle was the dean of Las Vegas theater criticism—and the best friend local theater had Read more »
Movies
Apocalypse Soon
According to seven movies this summer, we’re on borrowed time. But don’t fret—'Linda Lovelace' and the 'Smurfs' are here to distract you.
May 21st, 2013
Since “summer” is swiftly ceasing to mean anything as a time of year, what with the soaring temperatures from April through October and the ever-increasing chance of giant ice-ball rain (also known as hail) in July, it is all the more crucial that we take our cues from popular culture, letting the most anticipated movies act as our seasonal barometer. Three-hour historical biopic starring Philip Seymour Hoffman? Wear a sweater; it’s getting nippy. Really horrible-looking thriller starring a Wahlberg? Happy President’s Day! The Hangover Part III followed by a reboot of the Superman franchise? Slap on some sunscreen, because it’s time to stick an upside-down Corona in your frozen margarita. Read more »
Tour Buzz
Tour Buzz: Billy Idol, Fleetwood Mac, Pitbull and Ke$ha
May 20th, 2013
I heard once that Billy Idol, who’s playing the Pearl on May 25 ($49-$89), actually lived in Las Vegas for a time during the 1980s. I can’t find substantiation of this anywhere, save for the cut-up KOMP sticker that’s stuck to his guitar in the video for “White Wedding” (ROCKS LAS VEGAS), a name-check in “Eyes Without a Face” (Steal a car and go to Las Vegas/oh, the gigolo pool), and an album whose name might have been inspired by UNLV’s student newspaper (Rebel Yell). Read more »
