Sam Smith - Money On My Mind - Music Video

The music video for the Sam Smith song "Money On My Mind" takes place in Las Vegas.

Some landmarks I spotted in the video include:

Golden Gate
Paris
Cosmopolitan
Fremont Street
Stratosphere
Dino's Lounge
A Little White Wedding Chapel
Fun City Motel
Flamingo

Penske Wynn Ferrari Dealership Closing

The famous Penske Wynn Ferrari showroom at Wynn Las Vegas will be closing by the end of the year. The only Ferrari dealership in Nevada was a tourist attraction in itself, charging guests $10 to browse the high end cars.

The story first reported by TMZ relayed that Steve Wynn was "frustrated that he's not making the best use of the 10,000 square foot space inhabited by the high-end dealership."

Nothing has been announced as a replacement for the dealership yet. More retail would probably be the obvious choice. Some people think another nightclub would make sense. The poker room is also in that area, so something might be happening there.

While not free, the Ferrari showroom was one of those "only in Las Vegas" attractions that appealed to some people and it will be sad to see it go in that sense. Tourists looking to get a car show feel still will be able to check out The Auto Collections at The Linq.

The Player TV Show - Fake Las Vegas Hotels

The new Las Vegas TV series "The Player" premiered earlier tonight. The show stars Wesley Snipes, Philip Winchester and Charity Wakefield. The somewhat ridiculous premise of the show is that ultra wealthy gamblers bet on whether crimes will be committed, and whether "The Player" will be able to intervene to prevent those crimes.

As I had speculated in my earlier blog post about The Player, despite the Las Vegas setting and loose gambling premise it seems this will be more of a standard action-crime drama and probably won't have much to do with Vegas itself. I'm guessing as the series goes on we'll see less and less of Las Vegas stuff, like what happened with CSI over the years.

One of the things I was looking forward to was seeing what type of artistic license the show would take with Las Vegas hotels.

Right off the bat we were presented with a fake hotel called Charlemagne located near Treasure Island:


Another fake hotel that was also in the trailer is called Occam and located right accross from Wynn where the proposed Alon Resort will be:


They even gave us a nice close up of this one:


Except seconds later there was this establishing shot where Occam was nowhere to be found. Oops.

Jeff Victor hired by Derek Stevens

Jeff Victor, outgoing president of the Fremont Street Experience has been hired by Derek Stevens' company as Vice President of Operations.

It is widely thought that Victor will be brought on to help with the closed Las Vegas Club property, which was bought by Stevens last month and will likely be remodeled and re-opened.

Victor will also presumably be heavily involved with the other Stevens properties - The D and Golden Gate.

Jeff Victor oversaw the Fremont Street Experience for nine years, so he has a good idea of what's going on in downtown Las Vegas. He's reportedly an energetic and an aggressive marketer just like Derek, which should be a perfect fit as part of the growing Stevens empire.

Wayne Newton has turned Home into Museum

Five years ago today I wrote a blog post about how Wayne Newton was planning on turning his famous Casa de Shenandoah estate into a tourist attraction.

After half a decade that plan has finally came into fruition. Starting at $35 guests will be able to explore the manacured grounds, encounter horses and other wildlife, and tour a museum showcasing Wayne's cars and showbiz memorabilia.

As I speculated in my 2010 blog post, Wayne's private jet will also be on display - visitors will be able to step aboard to see how Mr. Las Vegas traveled back in the day.

The 52 acre Casa de Shenandoah certainly looks impressive, but I'm not exactly sure this is something I would take the time to visit on a Las Vegas vacation.

For all the info check out Casa de Shenandoah.

Big Rig Jig coming to Fremont East

Big Rig Jig, a modern art sculpture by Mike Ross is coming to downtown Las Vegas later this year according to Las Vegas Weekly.

The sculpture, which features two tanker trucks welded together will be located in the Downtown Project owned Fergusons Motel lot on Fremont East.

Big Rig Jig was created in 2007 for the Burning Man festival. It has also been featured at Coachella and most recently at the Banksy pop-up installation Dismaland.

Speaking of Banksy, Downtown Project founder Tony Hsieh has hinted there could be a Banksy installation during the upcoming Life Is Beautiful Festival.

Riviera used for Fire and Police Training

The Riviera hotel closed on May 4th, and it will likely be imploded sometime in late 2015. The vacant building has found a new purpose though - as a training ground for the Clark County Fire Department, along with police and other agencies.

Having a vacant resort hotel like this gives the police and firefighters a unique opportunity to train on a real life building, something that is rarely done. This video from the LVCVA gives a glimpse inside the Riviera and the training that's going on.