Vegas, Barely
I'm a loser even before arriving in Las Vegas. It originally seemed like a great idea to arrive in the city on New Year's Day. The place would likely be abandoned as the various woo! woo! people woke up right before checkout time and headed back home. I'd forgotten to consider the 3-7 odds that New Year's Day would fall on a long weekend. This means that I'm arriving into a miserable town just as it goes into overtime for moronic antics.
Mercifully, the flight to Vegas is largely vacant. I'm properly refreshed when I step off the airplane and stroll directly into a scene straight out of an Italian zombie epic. To be fair, though, it would take George Romero to create a blond couple strolling along in matching shades of Hard Rock Café and House of Blues jackets.
My original plan is to lock myself inside a hotel room and spend the next 24 hours catching up on all the DVD releases that I didn't get around to watching last year. This would be a smarter idea if nearly all of those films weren't Italian zombie epics. Still, a necessary short stroll on the Vegas Strip has gotten me securely locking my door. I was going through a press kit for a young actress named Jena Malone while on the plane, and came across this stellar quote about her favorite albums: "My favorite road-trip album? Nina Simone. She's got a collection of blues songs." This has already left me feeling like a cranky old man.
I only feel older to find that the Strip is overrun by punk kids-by which I mean the MTV punks who aren't given enough credit for liking fine bands such as Simple Act and Good Charlotte. This is my first trip to Vegas in two years, and I'd heard the kids had taken over. This wouldn't necessarily be so bad. I'm certainly happy to hear the speakers along the Strip playing Bowling for Soup instead of the usual goodtime tunes typically heard in the office parties of H&R Block.
But the old-timers saw this decline coming back in 2002, and it's further discussed when I finally emerge from my film festival and enter the MGM Grand a few hours before the Sunday sunrise. It seems that the disastrous family-friendly Vegas of the mid 90s has continued to have dire consequences. There's now an entire generation of young people whose idea of a wild time in Vegas is going without their parents and staying up past 10 p.m.
These kids are less interested in gambling than they are in paying $88 for the cheap seats at the Velvet Revolver show at the Hard Rock. As a result, Vegas vets who once planned their retirement on tip money from high rollers now pursue spare change from a flurry of fauxhawks. "You know the worst thing about these assholes?" asks one MGM employee. "They're allowed to stay here."
He says this as two fine examples of the new breed are heading for the elevators to the hotel rooms. He's not kidding.
But let's be realistic. The old men of Vegas shouldn't have been relying on rich cretins to keep them in comfort. The town has already had way too many funeral orations, anyway. I might as well kill a column bitching about how we can no longer go back and vacation in Macedonia.
That said, indulge me in a sad farewell to the Golden Nugget. This is my first time there since the new owners came in with the cameras for that horrible reality series, and the place is a pathetic mess. When the city finally empties out on Sunday, I'm initially impressed at how the Golden Nugget is staying full with an older crowd. The false hope is dashed within hours. I'm soon commiserating with a bunch of gorgeous older gals about how the place has fallen apart. I recently stayed at a Motel 6 that was better suited for comfort.
The Golden Nugget has also joined the Vegas trend in making gamblers second-class citizens, while lowering standards and cutting costs all around. The downtown dive-formerly a "don't miss" recommendation in Ian Fleming's Thrilling Cities (Signet, 1964)-used to be one of the few Vegas locales where the buffet was an edible value. Now it's even worse than the Sahara's. I say that with sad recent authority, too, since I got drunk at the Sahara and had to grab something to eat at what was formerly known as the worst buffet in Vegas.
As it turns out, my nightlife is a further pu-pu platter of mediocrity. The management will let you get pretty far on a business card when things aren't too busy and you know the layout of the old Copa Room and speak fondly of the Stardust marquee proudly boasting of an upcoming show from Steve & Eydie. I won't abuse those gracious hosts by bothering to pan, say, a rock 'n' roll topless vampire revue that's really no less predictably awful than Dance of the Vampires on Broadway.
My worst idea is touring the rock 'n' roll nightclubs on the Strip. I give up on that obvious target as I'm heading past the New York-New York resort and hear a barker shout, "Free entrance to Coyote Ugly!" The only interesting news from that aborted crawl is that Alanis Morissette is an official oldies act, having relied on Jagged Little Pill for over half her set on New Year's Eve. Local musicians are impressed that Penn Jillette bothers to open for himself on bass at the big new Penn & Teller Show at the Rio-which some staffers say is overpriced, but there's bound to be some empty seats when a show opens in early January.
Oh, and I hear a lot about how Vegas natives the Killers are way better than Coldplay. Which is true, but that simply means the Killers are only as good as, say, the Bolshoi.
My sole hot tip is to check out the Teatro Euro Bar at the MGM Grand, because the 60s spy vibe is a lot more Diabolik than Austin Powers. I spend most of my time on Boulder Highway, where the casinos have trailer parks and the in-house ads boast, "I cashed my paycheck here and won $10,000!" These spots will also spare you the curse of Vegas' one new breed of hot gambler. The gaming tables of the Strip are flooded with momentary hiphop tycoons putting down insanely large bets, totally unaware that they're mocking the gods of gambling and taking the whole damn table down with them.
And don't forget to take the bus lines off the Strip for a guided tour of the true Vegas. Specifically, the chance to congregate with the large population of head-trauma cases who end up in Vegas to work at the various minimal jobs. They're generally hidden away as they go to work at the hotels, but you can hit the strip malls and marvel at the incredible diversity of damaged types. I'm particularly impressed since the only American production I catch up with on DVD is Stuart Gordon's King of the Ants. The film's basically a long, loving tribute to traumatic head injuries in the Southwest. Best one since Vegas, at least.