Vegas lounge scene offers something for all tastes

By Bob Ecker
Special to The Advertiser

Ryan Walthier serves up a round on the deck at the Palm hotel's Ghost Bar, which offers spectacular views. Photos by Lori Cain • Special to The Advertiser

The VooDoo Lounge in the Rio Hotel offers live bands and rivals the Palms' Ghost Bar for awesome views of Las Vegas.

You can find every possible stage setting for your lounge act here: from neon-lighted techno bars to down-home pubs, watering holes for the beautiful only to places with peanut shells on the floor, pools where you swim up to the bar and bars where you play pool, saloons in the skies and those way below ground.

Of course, everybody has a different opinion of what constitutes a fun place. Just remember, talk is cheap but the cover charge usually is not. The standard entrance fee to many of the tonier clubs and lounges in Las Vegas is now $20 before you even hear the ice tinkling in the glass. So choose wisely.

Still relatively new and a must-visit is the Ghost Bar. Fifty-five floors above the brightly lit Nevada plain, this lounge sits atop the Palms hotel, which opened in late 2001.

Unlike its frenetic downstairs dance-club cousin downstairs, Rain, the Ghost Bar lives up to its billing as a place to see and be seen, with fashionably dressed people in their 20s and 30s mixing it up. The understated purple neon on the ceiling balances the modern grey and pale green couches scattered throughout. The bar itself is a gem, yet the view is what brings people back.

"This place is impressive," said Jennifer Hom, a first-time visitor from Chicago. "And it's not jam-packed like some other clubs."

The outdoor deck area provides an outstanding panorama of the city below, and the fresh air is a plus. "I love that you can sit outside," said Katie Coleman, a Las Vegas real estate agent out on the town with some friends. The deck also boasts a plastic glass floor panel where the bold can stand 55 floors up and look straight down at the street way, way below.

Right across Flamingo Boulevard from the Palms stands the Rio Hotel, with its own sky-top fun spot, the VooDoo Lounge. A well-mixed crowd in their 30s parties at the VooDoo Lounge, where there is just the right amount of energy and space to roam.

"This place is like old Vegas, with a twist," said Angela Blake of Minnesota, her husband, James, nodding in agreement. The Blakes have been to many newer places in Las Vegas, but keep returning to the VooDoo Lounge.

The club, on the 51st floor, rivals Ghost Bar for the view. "This place is awesome and has a really good vibe," said Holly Robbins, visiting from Washington, D.C. Live bands perform reggae, dance music, R&B and rock on different nights of the week.

Out across town, the Whiskey Bar inside the plush Green Valley Ranch Hotel/Casino celebrates its first anniversary this month, and is where George Clooney and Brad Pitt have been seen recently.

The Whiskey Bar is a combination ultra-cool lounge and neighborhood hangout where locals get in free. "I like lounges like this much better than clubs," said Lucy Jacobs, from nearby Henderson, as she sipped an apple martini with her friends. "It's not a meat market, just a fun place."

The stylized, black-and-silver interior hosts DJs and local bands. When the weather warms, couches are available for patrons to enjoy live jazz on Wednesday nights outside under the stars. Cabanas also can be rented for poolside frivolity.

BiKiNiS Beach and Dance Club is a new venue inside the Rio hotel. Billed as "a beach party at night," this recently opened club serves up sexy waitresses and dancers, all wearing bikinis. The club's new decor is clean and smart, the women friendly, and the club's specialty is sweet Montecristo rum. This is a great place for groups. The BiKiNiS Thursday night ladies' swimwear competition seems destined to become a Vegas tradition.

Coyote Ugly kicks up dust every day and night inside the New York New York Casino/Hotel. The club's patrons are primarily enthusiastic young men and women who are finally old enough to legally drink and are making the most of it.

The saloon came to Vegas thanks to the film of the same name and is owned by one of the film's producers, Jennifer Worthington.

"We think of it as the South meets Greenwich Village," Worthington said. The decor reflects the boozy style of an Alabama roadhouse, with billboards, signs and other paraphernalia hanging from the ceiling. "We spent a lot of money making it look this old and dusty," she owner.

This club features sexy young bartenders who not only serve drinks (often straight down men's throats) but get up on the bar and dance. There are no seats, and this spot is a roiling, rollicking tribute to youth, dance and sensuality. The energy inside Coyote Ugly is tremendous. Though many of the dancers are professionals, any woman can dance on the bar if she's got the courage.

"Sometimes the most conservative girl comes in and within 15 minutes she's dancing on stage," Worthington said. The music is contemporary, spiked with amped-up versions of southern rock standards such as Charlie Daniels and Lynyrd Skynyrd.

For true lounge lizards, a night isn't complete without a visit to Drai's. This chic subterranean spot in the basement of the Barbary Coast Hotel is a steakhouse by day and an after-hours club by night. It opens at 2 a.m. and doesn't get going until about 4, and it's a place to see the late-night Las Vegas underbelly. It's wild yet possesses a veneer of cool sophistication — like a visit to David Lynch's living room.

People of different stripes float on in, including strippers, tourists, locals, car dealers, celebrities, bartenders and many more. "I've been here many times," said Tyger, a dancer from Las Vegas. "Everybody likes Drai's. We come here to forget our problems." She then jumped up and began a sensuous dance, and indeed, a lot of other people soon forgot their problems.

The music, like the crowd, is a mixed bag. Hip-hop, eurobeat, old blues and rock each get a spin on the turntable.

Sevilla, a new, high-energy, multilevel Latin dance club/restaurant/bar/lounge, recently opened inside the Aladdin, turning into a hopping Latin-style discotheque after the dinner hour.

This huge, elegant nightclub appeals on various levels and strives to provide guests with a different experience. "It's great," said local Trisha Mendez. "It's the best place I know in Vegas." Unlike many other venues around town, clubbers put on their finest clothes to strut their stuff at Sevilla.

Another club, Tabu, just opened on the main floor of the MGM Grand. Model-worthy men and women serve the latest libations inside this new-age ultralounge. Celebrity sightings are common, and the polished crowd enjoys tasting specialty concoctions such as the KISS — Appleton rum, honey and nutmeg.

Tabu features projected images to interact with, custom-designed lighting and furniture, and a bar made entirely of ice. Definitely worth seeing.

In the interest of time and space, we can only mention the other options we checked out: Baby's at the Hard Rock; the ever-popular Rum Jungle in the Mandalay Bay; the tiki-styled Venus Lounge at the Venetian, which brings kitschy class to the late-night scene; The Bar at Times Square, with its nightly dueling pianos; and Studio 54, the classic big dance club still going strong at the MGM Grand.

Bob Ecker is a free-lance writer from Napa, Calif.

If you go ...

The term "open late" means the bar is open until the wee hours, generally 4 or 5 a.m.

• Ghost Bar: Inside the Palms hotel. Open late. $20 cover.
• Voodoo Lounge: Inside Rio All-Suite Hotel. Open late. Cover varies.
• Whiskey Bar: Inside Green Valley Ranch Hotel/Casino. Open late. Cover varies.
• BiKiNis: Inside Rio All-Suite Hotel. Open late. Cover varies.
• Coyote Ugly: Inside New York-New York Hotel/Casino. Open at 6 p.m. Cover varies.
• Drai's: Downstairs inside the Barbary Coast Hotel/Casino. Opens at 2 a.m. $20 cover.
• Sevilla: Inside the Aladdin Hotel. Opens in the evening. Open late. Cover varies.
• Tabu: Inside MGM Grand. Opens in evening. Open late. Cover varies.
• Baby's: Inside Hard Rock Hotel/Casino. Open late. Cover varies.
• Rum Jungle: Inside Mandalay Bay Resort. Open late. Cover varies.
• Venus Lounge: Inside Venetian Resort. Open late. Cover varies.
• The Bar at Times Square: Closes at 3 a.m. Cover varies.
• The Sand Dollar: 3355 W. Spring Mountain Road. Never closes. Minimal cover.
• Double Down: 4640 Paradise Road. Never closes. Minimal cover.
• Mist: Inside Treasure Island. Opens in the evening. No cover.