Las Vegas Blog

According to their website, the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas will be introducing a pair of new venues this August to what is already one of our favorite Off-Strip hotels in Sin City.

Staying true to their music-themed identity, the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino will debut Vinyl, a small music venue crossed with what they're describing as a "speakeasy"-inspired atmosphere. Vinyl tickets are available online for as early as Friday, August 24 when Julien-K is set to perform at 9:30pm. From there, heavy metal rockers Static-X headline a hardcore bill that includes Prong and David Suicide.

By the way, if these names don't sound totally familiar to you, well, that's kind of the point. The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino's idea for Vinyl is to set a stage for some of the smaller, less-well-known bands passing through the Vegas desert. Not only that, the mission behind Vinyl is to draw in a whole host of genres - from hardcore punk to jazz, country and everything in between. (Seriously.) So on any given night, you can see something you're completely comfortable with, or a genre that's totally out of your element. Hey, music's music, right?

Tickets at Vinyl usually fall somewhere in the $15- $20 range depending on the act - a far cry from pricier shows at The Joint, their much-bigger music venue on-site. Since we've already established ourselves as big fans of the Off-Strip Las Vegas music scene, we're excited to see what kind of acts Vinyl brings to their new, smaller stage.

Vinyl isn't the only "next small thing" (as they call it) brewing at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino; the hotel is also set to open "Culinary Dropout" in August, which they're describing as an "Amped Up Gastropub" on their website. Again, we can get on board with this.

Gastropubs have been all the rage over the last few years, albeit in cities considered (unfairly) as "trendier" than Las Vegas. Like Vinyl, Culinary Dropout will host all kinds of different live music on the weekends, though the real star will be their food and beverage menus. 

A creation of the Fox Restaurant Concepts' restaurateur Sam Fox, Culinary Dropout will bring together comfort food with a pub-style flare, and their description of "creative libations" makes us believe there should be some pretty good drinks to enjoy, too. (The Master Mixologist, Mat Snapp, is said to be particularly experimental according to the Culinary Dropout preview site.) Plus, since they're already considering themselves as a self-proclaimed "Perfect Destination for Day-Drinking" then, well, we're seriously going to need to check this place out.

No word on the exact date for when we can expect to taste Executive Chef Erin Suniga's gastro menu, but the anticipation is building and the expectation is that the doors will be open soon.

Check out Early Vegas on Facebook, Twitter and Google+ for updates on the openings of these two new venues at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino.