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Kick off the big games every Monday Night at The Strip’s most action-packed football viewing party with host Chet Buchanan and 98.5 KLUC!
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THE LATEST
count as “cash income” while food stamps don’t—and those numbers affect how poverty rates are determined. Another factor: “The demographic composition of the state might have changed,” Carson says. “Has the state seen a lot of inor out-migration? Tracing the root causes of increasing poverty in a particular state is a real challenge.” Amid predictions that Nevada won’t regain its old job numbers until 2018, movement into the state seems unlikely to reach its previous phantasmagorical levels. But migration out of and within the state remains a problem: large numbers of people not only coming and going, but also moving around Southern Nevada, possibly refecting their changing economic status and forcing children to constantly adapt to new schools. More than half a century ago, a reformer called our home “the sorry state of Nevada,” and attitudes have changed less than we might imagine. Nevadans continue to accept their way of life, which has produced any number of other indicators that a society based almost entirely on tourism, mining and federal projects never has created a proper social-safety net and never will. The rate of child poverty is a reminder of even greater poverty—economic, political, social and intellectual.
To load, or not to load: That is the question. And it’s a big one for many video poker players who sometimes play with less than max coins inserted. Everyone knows that it’s a sucker move to play less than full-coin, right? Not so fast. From a strict mathematical point of view, full-coin isn’t necessarily optimal. In fact, if the goal is to play at the lowest loss-rate per hand, it almost never is. To see this, you have to determine the expected loss per hand, which is done by multiplying the casino advantage times the coin denomination times the number of coins played. For playing five coins on a machine with a 97 percent return (about what you face on the typical schedule you’ll encounter in a bar), it works out to a loss of 3.75 cents per hand. When you play less than full-coin, you lose the bonus for the royal flush, which decreases the return by about 1.5 percent. But even with the lower return percentage, betting one, two or three coins is less expensive than betting five. Don’t play four coins, though—at that point the reduced-royal penalty catches up, and you’re better off loading it up. Does this mean that you should always play short-coin? For many the answer is probably no. One of the reasons for playing in a bar is to get free drinks, and most bars don’t comp for less than max-coin play. Add in the price of drinks and the extra loss per hand is easily made up for. Plus, betting less than the max leaves the door open for the dreaded short-coin royal. I’ve seen this happen many times, but one stands out in my memory: A woman was playing a quarter machine at the Golden Nugget, and she hit a royal. Her machine was across the aisle from a huge line for the buffet, so there were lots of bystanders. People love to see royals, and all of the usual congratulations and backslapping commenced. That is, until someone realized that the woman had played only one coin. Instead of $1,000, she’d won “only” $62.50. Not only did the celebration cease, it turned to laughter and ridicule. The poor woman, having gone from hero to goat in seconds, scooped up her coins and skulked off. Interestingly the situation changes drastically as a machine’s return percentage goes up. For example, if you happen to be in a casino playing 9/6 Jacks or Better with a 99.54 percent payback, playing five coins is better than playing two, three or four, though it’s still not better than playing only one. Since you usually won’t be playing a game this good, you don’t have to worry about it (except for hitting that royal). Go ahead and play one, two or three coins if you want to slow things down. Just don’t play four.
Michael Green is a professor of history at the College of Southern Nevada.
Anthony Curtis is the publisher of the Las Vegas Advisor and LasVegasAdvisor.com.
Battle Born, Poverty Bred
November 7–13, 2013
Nevada’s childhood poverty rate leads the nation in growth. What does that say about our state?
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NEVADA TENDS TO BE at the top of the bad lists and at the bottom of the good lists. With Britney Spears soon to be performing here, it’s now appropriate to say, “Oops, we did it again.” “National Child Poverty Rate Stagnates at 22.6 Percent,” says a new report from the University of New Hampshire’s Carsey Institute. That’s almost unchanged from the year before but an increase of 25.3 percent nationally from 2007, before the Great Recession. Guess which state led the pack? Since 2007, the rate of children under age 18 in poverty in Nevada has risen by about one-third, slightly more than the runner-up, Florida. When the study divides poverty rates into rural, urban and suburban areas, Nevada’s biggest leap in poverty rates was in suburban areas—refecting growth patterns in heavily suburban Southern Nevada. “The cause for an increase in child poverty can be diffcult to explain,” says Jessica Carson, a sociologist and researcher for the Carsey Institute who co-authored the study. “Rising poverty tends to result not necessarily from a single policy change”—as might be true with, say, an increase in welfare participation—“but rather is borne of a broader economic and social climate.” Nationally, that may seem easily explained by the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. But some states fared
far better than others. Carson suggested places where “there is plenty of well-paying work to go around” contrast markedly with those where “unemployment may have peaked above national averages, and may remain high, driving down median incomes.” She also pointed to possible “changes in the quality of jobs available” (instead of the number of jobs), which includes factors such as working for less pay or fewer hours or weeks. That may sound familiar. Ten years ago this month, Nevada’s unemployment rate was 5 percent. It peaked at 14 percent in September 2010 and is still close to double digits. But underemployment also is a problem. Remember when the joke was that Nevada’s state bird was the crane? Those wellpaying construction jobs on the Strip and in the housing market disappeared. So did the housing market. Fewer tourists—and, recently, more tourists spending less money and putting less emphasis on gambling—have reduced the need for already lowpaying casino jobs. The effect of state policies is tricky to follow, Carson says. For all of the statistics kept out there, some programs such as welfare
ILLUSTRATION BY JESSE J SUTHERLAND
DON’T PLAY FOUR
Give us a brief history of Beacher’s Madhouse. We started back in 2002 on Broadway, the Broadway Theater, and lasted until the end of 2003 when we started at the Hard Rock. Our frst show ever we sold out 1,400 seats and turned away about 4,000 people. We booked a residency there for the next fve years—20 shows on, 20 weeks off. It was a very successful formula for many years, and then Peter Morton sold the hotel. We stayed on for another year, and then I was just kind of bored and wanted to change, so we went on tour. We toured in 81 cities and sold more than 2 million tickets in 5,000to 10,000-person arenas. And then you came L.A. How’s it going at the Roosevelt? We have been open for three years. Most nightclubs in Los Angeles open and close within a year—we’re open going on three years. We just extended our lease another fve. It’s the most successful nightclub of this decade in Hollywood.
November 7–13, 2013
The Maddest House
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Jef Beacher talks about his eponymous adult cabaret, little people and making it big in Las Vegas all over again By Sam Glaser
ON NEW YEAR’S EVE, Jeff Beacher will make his triumphant return to Las Vegas following a fve-year hiatus. Part adult variety show, part nightclub, Beacher’s Madhouse—the former Broadway Theater-turned-Hard Rock Hotel fxture—has become one of Los Angeles’ most enduring hot spots (see unpaid celeb guests Johnny Depp, Kevin Spacey, Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, Justin Bieber, Zac Efron). Now Beacher’s back, taking over the former Crazy Horse Paris space in MGM Grand and preparing to raise the curtains on “the largest and most exciting Beacher’s Madhouse of all time.” In other words, let the debauchery begin.
What’s been the key to your success? It’s me being there and having a really cool, different product. Everyone just keeps opening the same garbage with the same promoters and the same everything. We just sell on our own, because we’re a popular place that has amazing and fun content. What role does your celebrity clientele play? Celebrities are always really important and set the trends around the world. Vegas has become a DJ-driven city, but for me it’s about crowd and audience and having fun, having hot girls and cool people, which doesn’t necessarily mean celebrities, just a cool crowd of people. We’ll always keep coming and paying for that experience, and we’ll pay top dollar for it.
What’s the overall goal of this new show? Like at Beacher’s Madhouse Los Angeles, it will be the hottest room in Las Vegas, the most sought-after, the most expensive ticket. VIP tickets are $150 and $200. General admission is $75. Tables start at $500 and go up to $2,000, just for the table fee before bottle minimums. [Beacher’s Madhouse] Las Vegas will be open six days a week, with an early show six nights a week, and Wednesday through Sunday we will be open late night. What might we learn if Harvard did a Jeff Beacher case study? If you take a look at Harvard case studies, Cirque du Soleil for example, they took the circus and made it this high-end circus, and for them that was a [wide] blue ocean, and that’s why they took off and they never turned back. For us, this is high-end cabaret theater—there’s nothing like it in the world. Will they do a Harvard case study? Yes, 100 percent. And when they do it on me, they’ll say how we started with one small theater and how we [grew to] own 50 theaters around the world, a touring show, television show and movies franchise. What’s it going to take to succeed again in Las Vegas? It’s not like we’re opening a [new] nightclub. It’s an 11-yearold brand where people are trained and love having fun. We’ve done altogether 5 million tickets in 10 years. That’s a lot of people. It’s all been live and people experiencing it live and bragging and sharing their live moments with the world. Everything we’ve done with the company the past 10 years and up until today has been for this theater. You seem to have one foot in nightlife and one in theater. What do you think of the showclub hybrid? The nightclub business is at an all-time high. There are more nightclubs now than there have ever been, with bigger numbers now than there have ever been. But it’s not my business. We are more in the theater business. What we have nobody else has: It’s a theater/nightclub hybrid. Luckily for me, it’s a total wideopen playing feld. What’s with Beacher and little people? Find out at VegasSeven.com/ BeachersMadhouse.
PHOTO BY BRYAN STEFFY
NIGHTLIFE
I’m seeing words like “crazy,” “insane,” “outrageous” and “sensory overload” used to describe the new show. What’s the craziest aspect of Beacher’s Madhouse Las Vegas? We have four fying midget bartenders. They’ll fy around the room and deliver drinks. One comes out of a telephone booth and shoots out of the top like Superman. One comes out of a cannon and shoots across the room, and one comes out of an elephant—the tail shoots up and he shoots out of the ass. The rest of them dance and shoot up together from the bar. It’s pretty intense.
NIGHTLIFE
PARTIES
HAZE Aria
[ UPCOMING ]
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See more photos from this gallery at SPYONVegas.com
PHOTOS BY TEDDY FUJIMOTO AND TOBY ACUNA
November 7–13, 2013
Nov. 8 Wale performs Nov. 21 Foxes performs
NIGHTLIFE
PARTIES
HYDE Bellagio
[ UPCOMING ]
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See more photos from this gallery at SPYONVegas.com
PHOTOS BY TONY TRAN
November 7–13, 2013
Nov. 8 Warren Peace and DJ Shadow ReD spin Nov. 9 Konflikt and D-Miles spin Nov. 10 XIV Superheroes
NIGHTLIFE
PARTIES
TAO
The Venetian [ UPCOMING ]
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See more photos from this gallery at SPYONVegas.com
PHOTOS BY POWERS IMAGERY
November 7–13, 2013
Nov. 7 Sage the Gemini performs Nov. 8 Eric D-Lux spins Nov. 9 DJ Five spins
NIGHTLIFE
PARTIES
BODY ENGLISH Hard Rock Hotel [ UPCOMING ]
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See more photos from this gallery at SPYONVegas.com
PHOTOS BY JOE TORRANCE AND SEAN AKARI
November 7–13, 2013
Nov. 8 Craze and Mark Stylz spin Nov. 9 DJ Ikon spins Nov. 10 DJ Shift spins
The Beer NuT
November 7–13, 2013
Pale Ale beat out 121 other Americanstyle Pale Ales to take the bronze in that category. It’s the creation of brewer Kyle Weniger, who started his career as a homebrewer and went pro in 2012. By Xania Woodman “It was surreal going up there and getting a fst-bump from [homebrewing forefather] Charlie Papazian himself,” exciTemeNT aND curiosiTy about beer Weniger says. “It was so cool to share has reached a fever pitch in the U.S. I the stage with so many of my heroes.” saw this frsthand at the recent Great When the brewery received a longAmerican Beer Festival, October awaited shipment of citra hops, there 10-12 in Denver, where 49,000 people was a friendly competition to see who descended on the Colorado Convencould create the best beer capitaltion Center to get their izing on the precious, fll of beer and beer exotically fruity buds knowledge from 624 along with Cascade and For Northern Nevada’s brewers pouring 3,142 centennial hops. Citra award-winning beers, beers. The event is put Rye also took gold in the visit VegasSeven.com/ on by the Brewers Asso2013 Denver InternaTheBeerNut. ciation, which says there tional Beer Competition. are 2,538 breweries in Joseph James has just the country as of June, tripled its citra-hop 2,483 of them small, independent order for next year. Find it on draft and traditional—the association’s Downtown at Atomic Liquors ($6) and guidelines for being called “craft.” all eight Southern Nevada SmashAnd many more are in the works: burger locations ($3.50). FoxBrews.com. Right now, the Nevada Craft Brewers’ Association lists six new Nevada Quad Damn It! by Chicago breweries in planning. Brewing Co. The big trends at the festival There’s tough competition in this year included herbal saisons the Belgian-Style Strong Specialty (Belgian-style farmhouse ales), feld Ale category, with 80-plus entries, beers (made with vegetables), and which makes Chicago Brewing Co.’s so much chai, spice and chocolate. I silver medal for its Quad Damn It! even saw an increase in the number all the sweeter. A quadrupel, this of gluten-free cider/sorghum blends dark, strong, malty, medium-bodied and low-gluten beers. Belgian-style beer has a nose of winAt the awards last year, Las Vegas’ ter spices and a palate of dark fruits. Chicago Brewing Co. and Big Dog’s “You get banana, plum, brown sugar, Brewing Co. took the gold and silver raisin,” says head brewer David Pasfor their Cocoa for Coconuts and Red cual. “It fnishes actually rather dry; Hydrant Ale, respectively. This year, it doesn’t give you that cloying sweetthe accolades increased twofold as ness.” But at 10.2 percent alcohol by four Nevada beers medaled out of volume, it packs a mean punch. the 4,809 entries. Catch them when Despite it being Pascual’s frst time and where you can, and save the date, brewing this style, entering it into October 2-4, 2014, for the next Great the competition paid off for this American Beer Festival in Denver. brewery-only, draft-only beer. “I GreatAmericanBeerFestival.com. don’t think of it as a competition with the brewers here, but I want to make Citra Rye Pale Ale by Joseph James sure I’m doing my part to bring atBrewing Co. tention to Las Vegas.” $5 per pint, 2201 Joseph James Brewing Co.’s Citra Rye S. Fort Apache Rd., 254-3333.
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Photo Courtesy of the Brewers AssoCiAtion
DriNk These Beers righT Now!
That’s how I feel about weight loss! Me, too. You can lose the weight, right? But you have to make it part of your lifestyle. Luxor, Then you see the 7 p.m. cookie, and think, “Oh, Tue-Sat and 9:30 this won’t kill me,” but p.m. Tue, then that cookie turns Fri and Sat, into brownies. It’s all $59-$130, about keeping a rigid 262-4000, schedule and not getCirqueDuting off course. Let’s Soleil.com. face it, when the show opened up, I learned a lot. I learned a lot about myself, about this town, and I’m a different person.
CRISS ANGEL BELIEVE
How have you changed? In so many ways. I just get it. One thing I learned is never believe your own hype. Don’t listen to it, just bury yourself. Whether it’s positive, negative— just stay focused. You can’t get caught up in the other garbage.
November 7–13, 2013
How are your “Loyals” treating you these days? Magic is a hokey novelty in the scheme of things. To have this type of success is really amazing. It’s amazing to have 6 million followers on Facebook and Twitter, for a magician. That’s unbelievable, so I owe those people everything.
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Lance Burton said that with TV magic, you only have to get the illusion right once, and from one angle. Stage magic is the opposite. That’s a very poignant point, and I would concur. Lance told me back in the late ’90s—I was driving in his van with him to have dinner, and I was no one—“Criss, you’re gonna be huge. You’re gonna make tons of money.” Lance predicted it before I could even predict it, and to this day, Lance is a dear friend. He is really a testament of hard work, talent and perseverance. He’s been a great role model. He’s so nice! He let me come to his house, and I wasn’t even writing an article
about him specifcally. Come to my house any time you want; you don’t even have to write an article. He showed me his retired show doves. Where do you keep the doves in your show? I keep the birds at the Luxor, but at home I have four dogs. I love animals. What are the challenges of returning to television? I did not want to go back on television doing what I already did. For the frst time, I’m taking people behind the curtain into my secret society, and they’re going to understand the process: how I come up with something, how it evolves and how it’s brought to life. They’re going to meet my incredible team [and] see my 60,000-square-foot facility. People are going to see a different Criss Angel—a more evolved, a more sophisticated Criss Angel. What I mean by “sophisticated” are the illusions, demonstrations, escapes and the mind-body things I do are things I couldn’t even contemplate in my previous season. What was it like to reanimate a corpse for your TV show? A lot of people were questioning why I was doing that. The thing is, I was around 81 dead
Angel attempts to raise the dead for his TV show on Spike.
and psychics were frauds. Then you have Criss Angel offering $2 million to the Long Island Medium to do something that [I] can’t explain, and she denied taking the challenge for obvious reasons—because she’s full of shit. Now, I’m raising the dead. I would just say you have to look at the parameters. But you do believe in God? I do believe in God. I believe that for every painting, there’s a creator. The world is a big painting.
things, but they will never bring peace or happiness. Any specifc examples? Just in general, materialistic things don’t fulfll you. Love fulflls you. My mom’s here, that’s the greatest gift. My mom getting on a plane and surprising me is worth more money than you could offer me. It was a surprise? I never knew. [It’s] just amazing to have my family here, to
“ONE THING I LEARNED IS NEVER BELIEVE YOUR OWN HYPE. DON’T LISTEN TO IT, JUST BURY YOURSELF. WHETHER IT’S POSITIVE, NEGATIVE—JUST STAY FOCUSED.” – Criss Angel bodies. I saw bodies being cremated. I saw teeth and metal parts that would be hips and screws and elbows and shoulders, ashes, bodies. It just gave me so much more of an appreciation of life and how fragile it is, and how we should really appreciate every breath that we have. It’s so important to give love and to be a positive force in this world. In Houdini’s day, spiritualism was huge. Did you bring any spiritual philosophy into attempting a resurrection? It’s a dichotomy, right? Houdini spent more than 50 percent of his life proving that mediums
Or trash heap, whatever. It’s a painting nonetheless— good, bad or whatever. But that’s my personal belief, and I don’t put it on anybody. We should all respect each other and live in harmony because life is a gift. We should be helping one another and doing good for our fellow human. What is more important, money? That’s what I discovered. You asked before what the difference between me now and then is. I can buy whatever I want, and I have done that. That stuff never fulflls you. It’s a rat race out there, and everybody’s working to buy these
have my friends here, to have the people who were with me in my darkest days. And you being here. I don’t even know you, but I get a good energy from you. I get a good sense of spirit, and I appreciate your time, and I really mean that. All we have in life is time, and we choose to spend that time how we wish. The fact that you wanted to spend a little bit of your time and your life with me, I’m grateful for it. Thank you. Can you talk about these new DJs or musicians that you’re into? I’m a big fan of Skrillex. I’m also a fan of great songs [that]
are timeless—from The Beatles to Billy Joel to Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath. I love what’s going on in the clubs, I love what’s going on just in general. It’s a very exciting time, with the Internet and technology. I wish I could live another 100 years to see what the world will be like. My greatest concern is the generations that are growing up with the Internet that are living in their own little world, spewing so much negativity. Kids need to get out in the world and discover the real magic, the magic of nature. How does a plane fy? You ask people how a plane fies, I guarantee eight out of 10 people wouldn’t be able to explain it. That’s because we take it for granted. There’s magic around us. A birth, a baby—I think computers are amazing, the Internet is amazing. It’s all wonderful stuff. But you have to use things in moderation. You have two tears in your rotator cuff and a tear in your bicep for which you’re about to have surgery. How do you feel? My concern is that I still haven’t fnished shooting my television series. I’ve got some crazy things coming up that require me to put my shoulder in compromising situations. The surgeon is telling me not to do it, and I also have to do this show through the holidays, so it’s a fne line. If it pulls another millimeter and a half, my bicep will collapse [and] I might never recover fully. I’ll be out for a couple of weeks in January, but I’ll be back the frst week of February. I’m going to put
ANGEL PHOTO COURTESY OF SPIKE TELEVISION
A&E
Electric Daisy Carnival? I did not. I do 10 shows a week typically, and then I’m doing a television series. So my day consists of about 18-21 hours, seven days a week. People look at success, and they don’t see the other side of it, which is a tremendous demand on time. You have to have a high work ethic to keep having success over such a long run. Even though it was diffcult to get to the destination, it’s more diffcult remaining at the destination.
Anything else you want readers to know? If you haven’t seen my live show, defnitely come out, because you can experience a show that will give you the opportunity to believe in your dream. You’ll see me accomplish the impossible, and I’m no different than anybody. I’m not special. If you have a dream, you can live your dream. I’m a living testament to that. When people leave my show, they leave with a positive, uplifting feeling that they can try to conquer the world, like I try to do. … You’re shaking your head. What’s running through your mind? Or do I need to tell you what it is? If you know, you can certainly tell me. I think you’re surprised. It just seems very New Age-y. I don’t think it’s New Age-y, I think it’s me. I don’t know what the defnition of “New Age” is, but I can only be me. I can only speak from my heart. Sometimes it gets me in trouble, but sometimes it’s the truth. For me, it’s always about being straightforward, you know? I think you probably came into this interview expecting something different.
Here’s the schedule for the fourth-annual celebration of all things Cirque, including one magical Angel. Nov. 9: Zumanity rehearsal at New York-New York; Q&A with performers and costumers, 3:30-4 p.m. Nov. 10: Demonstration of O fire acts at Bellagio; Q&A, 3-4 p.m. Nov. 11: “Zarkana University” at Aria with classes on rigging, clowning, wardrobe, music and juggling. Presentations begin at 2, 2:45 and 3:30 p.m. Nov. 12: Footage of One Night for ONE DROP that promoted Cirque’s waterconservation initiative, plus a sneak peek of next year’s show, at Treasure Island, 3-4 p.m.; “Mystère Revealed,” featuring the show’s characters and their stories, 4:30-5:30 p.m. Nov. 13: Cast of Michael
I don’t know what I was expecting. I think if you think about it, you were probably expecting a different type of interview. I’m not saying it would be better or worse, but it was probably different. Maybe not. … Did you enjoy yourself tonight? Did you enjoy the show? Was it different than you anticipated?
Jackson ONE teaches
I’m still hoping that girl got put back together. Would you like to be in the show tomorrow? I can cut you in half.
Grand, 3:30-4:30 p.m.
I don’t know. You never put her back together. But think of the advantages of being in two places at once. Do you have any gossip about Las Vegas? I’m so not gossip; I live a boring life. I’m always working. I don’t go out anymore, I just work. It keeps me out of trouble. [Laughs.] What did you think of Burt Wonderstone, in which Jim Carrey parodied you? When you have one of the biggest Hollywood celebrities doing a parody of you, I’m honored and fattered. Those guys came to meet me at my show, and after the show we talked. Fortunately they had great actors. Unfortunately they just missed the mark with the story. It would’ve been great if it was hugely successful, because the tide rises all ships.
“Thriller” choreography at Mandalay Bay, 2-3 p.m. Nov. 14: Manipulation of the puppets in KÀ at MGM
Nov. 15: Viewing of Criss Angel’s TV series Criss Angel Believe at Luxor; Q&A with live show’s production team, 3-4 p.m. Nov. 16: Dance workshop to learn routines from The Beatles LOVE at The Mirage, 2 and 3 p.m. Ticket packages range from $100 to $585. Call 1-866-998-4831 or visit CirqueDuSoleil.com.
November 7–13, 2013
For a few months, though, you’re risking it? I guess so, but we’re in Vegas, aren’t we? It’s all about gambling, calculated risks. I can’t close the show. We are doing astronomical business right now. We are killing it. We have been the No. 1 best-selling magic show since we opened, but now it’s unbelievable. I’m not going to cancel the shows because I was in that situation: In the ’90s, I came to Vegas, went to go see a show, and it was canceled. I was devastated, and I made a vow that I would never do that if I was ever blessed enough to have a show.
CIRQUE WEEK
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together a limited-engagement show, which will feature the world’s greatest magicians. I’m going to perform in it with a sling on, and I’ll do 20 or 30 minutes in the show. Then in April, I’ll go back—provided that I’m OK—to the full show of Believe.
Music
Andrew Jackson Jihad brings folk-punk to Triple B.
portuguese ballads, pirate Metal, canadian punk
November 7–13, 2013
Hopefully you didn’t blow your concertgoing wad at the Life Is Beautiful festival, because there are so many intriguing live-music possibilities this week: Andrew Jackson Jihad wages sonic holy war at 9 p.m. November 7 at Triple B. The Phoenix folk-punk effort is comprised of singer-guitarist Sean Bonnette and bassist Ben Gallaty, and they sound like a caffeinated Decemberists or a manic Neutral Milk Hotel. By turns genuinely heartfelt and sneeringly anticapitalist, Andrew Jackson Jihad’s most recent disc is the politically charged 2011’s Knife Man, among the rowdiest acoustic-based song collections I’ve heard in a long while. And when the band plugs in and goes electric on “Skate Park,” you’ll want to, as Bonnette sings, break my bones and feel the pain of self-improvement, too. Chicago folk-punk band The Gunshy opens. Heard of fado music? Sometimes called the Portuguese blues, it’s a smoldering, passionate style of balladeering powered by 12-string Lisbon guitars and a haunting voice. Fado dates back to the early 19th century, and among its most popular
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practitioners today is Mozambiqueborn Mariza. The gorgeous 39-year-old chanteuse will sing mournfully and beautifully about love’s feeting spell at 7:30 p.m. November 11 in Cabaret Jazz at The Smith Center. Reviews of her live performances are raves, so this should be a remarkable evening of breezy, samba-kissed, gypsy-favored music. Self-professed “bacon-powered pirate metal” ensemble Alestorm bellies up to the stage at 10 p.m. November 13 at LVCS. These hardcoredrinking Scots make no qualms about their buccaneerthemed novelty, brewing boisterous, parrot-in-cheek sing-alongs with titles such as “Death Throes of the Terrorsquid” and “Captain Morgan’s Revenge.” If you want to feel as if you’re trapped aboard the Jolly Roger, this’ll certainly stiffen your wooden plank. Also on the bill: Norwegian folkmetal juggernaut Trollfest, California boogie-metal quartet Gypsyhawk, San Francisco black-metal group Leviathan, plus local nu-metal acts Sicocis, Vile Child and Sinnfull Servent. Your Vegas band releasing a CD soon? Email Jarret_Keene@Yahoo.com.
Videography
Panic! at the Disco goes topless for “Girls/Girls/Boys” I’ve never been in the naked presence of Panic! at the Disco frontman Brendon Urie. But thanks to his band’s video for their latest single, I feel I can cross this item from my bucket list. Toned and glistening in oil, Urie stands unclothed all the way down to his shaved inguinal canal for the full three-minute electronica tune. Presumably, this is all an homage to D’Angelo’s infamous nude-to-his–hips video for 2000 single “Untitled (How Does it Feel).” Whereas that song was a sexy R&B slow-jam, Urie’s is skittering dance-pop that would’ve made a nice B-side to Pat Benatar’s “Love Is a Battlefield.” Is the 26-year-old Summerlin-spawned Mormon gunning for an upcoming cover of QVegas? He could easily, um, pull it off. Since he married his girlfriend in April, I’m curious to know why he waited to show everyone most of the goods. Maybe to rub the fact that’s he now off limits in the faces of fans? ★★✩✩✩ – J.K.
A&E
MOVIES
Better than flowers: Tim (Gleeson) bends the time-space continuum to woo his lady (McAdams).
First Date, Second Try This time-travel rom-com almost gets it right
November 7–13, 2013
By Michael Phillips Tribune Media Services
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AND NOW FOR a completely improbable romantic comedy recommendation. Already a hit in its native England, About Time presents all sorts of small and mediumsize problems threatening to upset writer-director Richard Curtis’ flm from within. Those range from the premise (Only men in this family can time-travel? Are the women at least allowed to vote?) to the clanking interpolation of near-death experiences designed to make us care. The charm of the script comes in three fabrics: genuine, artifcial and what you might call a cotton/poly blend.
But the cast of About Time is effortlessly skillful, and the movie ends up working, as it happens, despite its fantasy element, not because of it. On his 21st birthday, ordinary young Tim, played by Domhnall Gleeson, learns from his blithely eccentric father (Bill Nighy, a delight—his comic timing is so distinctly his own, he’s like his own time zone) the family secret: The men in this particular clan are able to time-travel into their pasts, reliving and then restaging key embarrassing moments, thereby avoiding pesky relational humiliations. In other words they live (and this is the
weirdly unexamined part of the screenplay) lives of perpetual dodginess and stealth manipulation of loved ones. It’s Groundhog Day crossed with Love Actually, the latter being a big Curtis hit. The twin poles of Dream Womanhood in About Time are represented by Tim’s longtime crush, a family friend played by Margot Robbie, and by Tim’s more approachable but equally gorgeous destiny, an American in London played by Rachel McAdams. As an actress and as a movie star—she’s certifiably both—McAdams has traveled this way before: In The Time
Traveler’s Wife, she was (spoiler alert) the wife of a timetraveler, while in Midnight in Paris she was (spoiler alert) a time-traveler’s fiancée. Strong material, weak material and in-between, McAdams has an uncanny ability to establish a rapport with a scene partner, so that the on-screen relationship acquires something like real feeling, no matter her co-star. About Time gives her a worthy one in Gleeson. The mode of time-traveling transport here is straight out of C.S. Lewis; if, for example, he bungles a New Year’s Eve kiss, Tim simply finds the nearest wardrobe or closet, clenches his fists, thinks of the moment he’d like to revise, and poof, there he is, Take 2. The surprises in About Time, such as they are, relate to the expanse of the storyline; Tim and Mary, made for each other, glide along life’s highway, become parents, suffer setbacks they can cope with, and the existential advantages
and/or drawbacks of Tim’s secret weapon come and go with the breeze. I mentioned Love Actually earlier in the review. That’s a film I actively dislike (I love Curtis’ script for Four Weddings and a Funeral, though). Some will feel similarly disinclined toward the conceits and strategies of About Time. For me, the actors save it, and make the most of it, among them Tom Hollander as the world’s most hostile successful playwright; Richard Cordery, as the world’s dottiest addle-brained uncle; and Lydia Wilson as Tim’s sister, a magnet for bad relationships and for Curtis’ most ruthless sentimental pathos. Enjoy the love in your life, and don’t squander it: That’s all Curtis is selling here, really. With Gleeson and McAdams at the forefront, About Time has a beguiling pair of rom-com miracle workers helping him close the sale. About Time (R) ★★★✩✩
A&E
movies
a ‘Game’ adaptation Several generations afer the book was written, this worthy tween sci-f adventure fnds a changed audience By Michael Phillips Tribune Media Services
in step with its sensitive, tactically brilliant 12-year-old hero, Ender’s Game is a bit of a tweener, neither triumph nor disaster, a war-games fantasy with a use-by date of November 22, when the new Hunger Games movie comes out. Its central action scenes unfold in a vast zero-gravity battle-simulation arena, on a space station readying for an alien attack of enormous skittery bugs called Formics. The preteens and young teenagers being trained to save the world play dangerous rounds of laser tag and try to impress the authority fgures played by Harrison Ford (a long way from Han Solo), Viola Davis and Sir Ben Kingsley. Asa Butterfeld of Hugo is Ender Wiggins, the relentlessly bullied boy with the Hobbitty-sounding name who becomes “Earth’s ultimate military leader,” in the words of the flm’s promotional materials. Hailee Steinfeld of True Grit is Petra, his sympathetic best friend and training mentor. They’re sweet together, these
kids. Already, Butterfeld and Steinfeld are learning the virtue of behaving on camera, as opposed to acting each tense encounter into the ground. When a best-seller such as Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game takes a generation or more to fnd its way to the screen, the result can acquire an unwanted aura of retro-nostalgia, whatever the story’s setting or the director’s approach. The look of this project, refected by the flm’s poster, settles for futuristic industrialism made generic. Still, while writer and director Gavin Hood may not be Mr. Style or a science-fction visionary, he gets the story told, with appealing actors at the center. Across nearly three decades, many young readers have devoured Card’s books (the original, the four sequels, plus two spinoff adventures) as expressions of rebellious outsiders with a cause. Ender is a freak by defnition simply by being a “third,” the third-born child in a near-future world
In Orson Scott Card’s future, tweens must train to save Earth from aliens.
ruled by a strict two-child policy. The violence in Ender’s life is nearly always justifed since he’s dealing with dead-eyed sociopaths his own age who wish to do him harm. Then comes the not-so-twisty twist near the climax of the story, which asks the audience to grieve and question a different scale of violence. (Spoiler issues here, so we’ll keep mum.) Hood’s adaptation stream-
lines the novel and its concerns, only occasionally lapsing into trailer-speak, as when Ford’s commander speaks to his recruits in the language of movie-trailer-ese (“and in the middle of the battle, a legendary hero emerged”). At heart, Ender’s Game relays a simple story of a little guy caught in a web not of his own making, learning to stand up for his beliefs. The target audience
November 7–13, 2013
short reviews
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Last Vegas (PG-13) ★★★✩✩
A genial Hangover for the AARP set, Last Vegas is roughly what you’d expect, but a little better. The four stars are Michael Douglas, Robert De Niro, Morgan Freeman and Kevin Kline. The setup: Lifelong Flatbush-born pals reunite for the bachelor party of the Douglas character, a Malibu slicko marrying a much younger woman. Old grudges reignite; new high jinks ensue; a tax attorney turned Vegas lounge singer (Mary Steenburgen) excites the interest of the Douglas character, as well as the grieving widower portrayed by De Niro.
Diana (PG-13) ★★★✩✩
There’s a myopia to Diana, the new film about the divorce and last great romance of Princess Diana’s life, that fits its subject like one of Diana’s custom-tailored gowns. Isolated, focused on her image, her few contacts with the outside world and her work, when this lonely and lovelorn woman (Naomi Watts) zeros in on something or someone, it seems obsessive, smothering and all-consuming. Dismiss it as worthy of a Lifetime Original Movie if you want, but this film gives us insights into this poor little royal plaything that Americans, at least, will find eye-opening.
Angels Sing (PG) ★★✩✩✩
Featuring an all-star cast of singers, this is a wan little holiday film that manages to show a little heart once it finally gets going. Harry Connick Jr. stars as a history professor who’s always angling to dodge Christmas with his parents (Kris Kristofferson, Fionnula Flanagan) for reasons he’s reluctant to tell his son. But Michael’s house-hunting throws him in the path of an old man (Willie Nelson) with a McMansion for sale, and Michael finds himself living on one of those Christmascrazed streets where house decorations draw fans from far and wide.
could do worse. The old folk, meantime, can focus on the flm’s most intense stare-down contest: Though I don’t believe they ever share a scene, it’s astonishing nonetheless how Kingsley and the main Formic handle close-ups in exactly the same way, never, ever, ever, ever blinking. Ever. Ender’s Game (PG-13) ★★★✩✩
[ by tribune media services ]
Free Birds (PG) ★★✩✩✩
Here’s more proof that Hollywood has almost killed the animated goose that laid the golden egg. No matter that in this case the goose is a turkey. The voice cast includes Owen Wilson, Woody Harrelson, Amy Poehler and George Takei—funny folks, one and all. Yet there’s barely a laugh in it. Wilson voices Reggie, a scrawny turkey who figures out why his flock is being fattened up. The demented Jake (Harrelson) shows up to enlist Reggie in his mission: to steal a secret time machine, travel back to early America and change Thanksgiving history to get turkey off the menu.
7 QUESTIONS
What kinds of bar trends have reached the tipping point? The DJ thing. The pendulum swings back and forth. You’re starting to see it swing forth. We’re not going to see 30 percent of casino billboards with DJs’ pictures on them a year from now. People are starting to say, “Been there, done that. I can see these guys at festivals around the country.”
The Bar Rescue host on underestimating domestic beer consumers, overestimating the DJ culture and his plan to bring the ‘World’s Best Bar’ to Las Vegas
November 7–13, 2013
By Jason Scavone
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Other than adding more taps, what can a beer bar do to stand out? To give you a silly analogy frst: Roughly six out of seven people who walk into a restaurant for lunch are going to order a nonalcoholic beverage. And a majority of the people who order a soft drink will order a diet. What do most restaurants have? One diet and four non-diets. So they’re backward in the way they’re merchandising it. The same thing relates to beer. Fifty-two percent of all beer orders will be for light beer. Having a lot of taps doesn’t mean you have the right ones. Having a lot of taps, if you’re not good at marketing, is just causing con-
fusion for the guest—they just end up ordering the Coors Light. They’re brand sensitive, not ingredient sensitive. Sometimes we try to be too sophisticated about beer. On one hand, there’s a growing segment of beer drinkers that’s really into microbrews, but there are also people who deliberately drink down-market—PBR, Hamm’s, etc. Are beer tastes polarized right now? The trends show that those people [into microbrews] also consume products like Bud Light. The fact of the matter is, as many microbrews as we try, those premium light brands like Bud Light and Coors Light
Does the divide in Las Vegas between where tourists and locals go to drink exist as sharply in other communities? It does. Years ago I owned a restaurant in a tourist destination and I couldn’t get locals to go. What I did was I raised prices by 20 percent, and I gave out a locals card that gave a 20 percent discount. The tourists had no problem paying the 20 percent more. But providing that card sent a very powerful message to the local market. Your book, Raise the Bar, focuses on what you call “reaction management.” What is that? To me, management is the achieving of objectives through
the manipulation of others. It’s not the nicest way to say it, but it’s absolutely true. How do I manipulate you? I can manipulate you through pride. I can manipulate you through fear. I can actually motivate you through your family. I can manipulate you fnancially. I can manipulate you by embarrassing you. I do that on Bar Rescue all the time—if I can’t get a reaction, I’ll embarrass you in public to get it. Last but not least is confrontation. Confrontation is one of the greatest tools I have. I don’t fear it. I will scream, yell, rant, rave, be in their face relentlessly until I can create the smallest amount of doubt. If I can get them to doubt themselves for a second, that little crack, I can walk right in and change their lives. That’s where my intensity comes from, my desire to do that. I am never angry on television without it being somewhat intentional.
One place the pendulum hasn’t swung is Ibiza. Is that any kind of example for Las Vegas? They still use the word disco there. That doesn’t compare to Las Vegas at all, I’m sorry. It’s a European audience. I run the Nightclub & Bar convention. Eighty percent of the members of Nightclub & Bar are independent operators who don’t have dance foors. Las Vegas has the greatest nightclubs, but it doesn’t have the greatest bars. That, I believe, is the next step in Vegas, and I’m doing one. I want to do the World’s Best Bar—the name of it is actually World’s Best Bar. I’m working on it now.
Find out what Taffer thinks of the Las Vegas bar scene, and what his overall strategy is for most Bar Rescue projects, at VegasSeven.com/Taffer.
PHOTO BY EMILIO GONZALES
Jon Taffer
are still in that cycle of consumption. I gave a speech last week to 600 beer distributors in Las Vegas, and I had a slide I put up on the screen of Boot Hill. On each one of the tombstones was a beer that came and went in the past three years. Red Dog is a great example we all know. You know how many bars in America got stuck with 30 cases of Red Dog no one would order?
Nightlife is driving more and more casino revenue. If the DJ trend goes away, can nightclubs maintain that position? Gaming drop was better when they didn’t do it this way. I get that this is a trend, and it’s something that’s causing people to visit Las Vegas. But it hasn’t improved gaming drop compared with other trends we’ve been through. My guess is the casinos would be eager to eliminate that huge expense and improve gaming drop through a different demographic. The investments in Vegas are huge. The results are huge. Who else does $90 million a year for chrissakes? Marquee and XS. Tao is in its eighth year; it’s doing $70 million a year. The payback, the return, is unbelievable. But Vegas is a gamble. The guy across the street might spend $50 million building something. New clubs are emptying other clubs instead of bringing new people to the market.