We’re in countdown mode again in VegasVille. I’ve spent every New Year’s Eve since 1996 in town. But I’ve never counted down my personal favorites.
Now is the time. As we lumber into another calendar flip, here are my top seven New Year’s Eves in Las Vegas:
Park it with Lady Gaga
Master musician and bravura bandleader Brian Newman kicked into a rowdy version of “Auld Lang Syne” at the count of midnight, on New Year’s Eve 2019 at the NoMad Library. But I trained my phone on his friend in bedazzled frippery, singing on stage left.
A gentleman arrived at her side. A random interloper? Hardly. This was her soon-to-be announced boyfriend, tech entrepreneur Michael Polansky. The NYE party marked their first public kiss.
Gaga had already crushed it during “Jazz + Piano” at the Park Theater (later renamed Dolby Live) and stayed for the ensuing revelry. We had two countdowns that night, the formal in-time celebration at midnight, just as Newman and his band hit the stage, and again, at 2:22 a.m., the party was still percolating. Gaga had just unleashed “Fly Me to the Moon.” This New Year’s crowd was already there.
Newton’s wild ride
I’m often asked of my favorite interview subjects, favorite events or favorite stories over the years. The answer vacillates. Too many to consider to give the same answer each time.
But my single favorite line, ever, in a story or column is easy: “Wayne Newton, it should be noted, is a bad driver.”
We still laugh over this contention, which is as true today as it was on New Year’s Eve 1999. This was the infamous “Y2K” crisis that never happened. But we were almost Y2KO’d by our legendary chauffeur.
Mr. Las Vegas led what seemed like a chase scene from “Vega$” through the Stardust parking lot (he was headlining his eponymous theater at the time), against one-way traffic on Industrial Road, making a right on the Strip at Spring Mountain and cutting off a limo in front of the Bellagio fountains.
I once had a micro-cassette of that interview, in which Wayne alternately talked of his contemporaries Siegfried & Roy and Danny Gans while calling out to the limo driver, “Can you let me in!? I have an interview!” And Wayne’s wife, Kathleen, calling from the back, “Wayne! Wayne! Watch out!”
All of this to make a live interview with Connie Chung at Lake Bellagio, where Wayne parked the Rolls on the curb and hustled up a scaffold staircase to make his time.
As we returned to the Stardust, we nearly slammed into a giant potted plant at the stage door. But Wayne was totally composed. As he said, “This is a party,” and it was.
Goodman rock festival
That’s what it felt like on NYE 2008, as then-Mayor Oscar Goodman wasn’t just the Happiest Mayor in the Universe, he was also the most in demand. With his wife and mayoral successor, Carolyn Goodman, Hizzoner cut through an estimated 30,000 partiers on Fremont Street. The Goodmans navigated the throng behind a quartet of Las Vegas marshals and alongside a pair of ever-present showgirls. The entirely appropriate Queen anthem “We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions” played on the sound system.
Nonplussed Vegas broadcaster Kevin Janison, then with News 3, managed a live interview on stage. The Goodmans joined Janison’s weather forecast, which was “cold, with a 100 percent chance of loud.”
At midnight, the mayoral couple managed a kiss amid the bedlam. Outstanding.
Squalls at Circa Swim
The 2020 NYE amid the COVID pandemic was a masked, blustery affair hosted by the new downtown resort’s co-owner Derek Stevens and headlined by Zowie Bowie. The night featured an epic rendition of “Dream On” by ZB vocalist Jaime Lynch, the wind nearly blowing her off the performance platform.
KLAS-TV, Channel 8, picked up the national CBS telecast. Christina Amato, Skye Dee Miles and Zowie Bowie’s band held it together for a once-ever experience. Jonathan Jossel activated a wild fireworks show off the Plaza rooftop, a game-time decision because of the high winds.
Zowie Bowie’s Chris Phillips said afterward he’d done 6,500 shows in 30 years, “but I’ve never been through anything quite like this.”
Killers shake up The Cosmo
This was a bouncy celebration on NYE 2022 for the Las Vegas rockers at The Chelsea, with its spring-activated general admission floor. The countdown was played to an instrumental cover of “Auld Lang Syne,” accompanied by a cannon burst of confetti. The band then tore through “Mr. Brightside.”
Before the spectacle, frontman Brandon Flowers recalled a gig long before The Killers. He performed at Josef’s Restaurant, the French brassiere operated by celebrity chef Joseph Keller, inside Aladdin’s Desert Passage (today’s Miracle Mile Shops at Planet Hollywood). Flowers was a food runner and host at the restaurant. As the band proved that night, and in every performance, we’re a long way from Desert Passage.
Bruno Mars twin bill
From last year’s NYE sweep. Mars performed a sold-out show at Dolby Live at Park MGM, hustled to Bellagio in a black SUV and then jumped on stage at The Pinky Ring at 11:47 p.m.
Backed by his band, The Hooligans, Mars announced, “We’re just going to vibe for a couple of minutes.” The band improvised a groove, then Mars counted in the new year from a tablet on stage. A funky spin through “Auld Lang Syne” is how we started this year.
Takin’ care of Fremont
This celebration in 1998 is somewhat of a blur. It was a rare NYE I wasn’t actually assigned to cover (it was also during the pre-FizzyWater days). But Bachman Turner Overdrive and Starship headlined Fremont Street, setting off another cold crush of humanity. A $10 ticket price, and comparatively scaled-back security, in those days.
A visiting friend cut into the Las Vegas Club — or was it the Golden Gate? — to play slots for the first time. Megabucks, actually. After dumping a few 20s into the machine and coming up empty, he said, “I was expecting a little more instant gratification.” Good luck.
We grooved to BTO’s “Taking Care of Business,” and a midnight flourish of Prince’s “1999” across the FSE canopy. The technology has since been upgraded, but the memories are held in time.