✦Weekender✦ Jammy brunch | Bourbon contest | Meta improv | Dragon parties | Mine adventure | Cactus yoga 🌵
FROM PAJAMA-CLAD breakfast clubs to bootleg bluegrass to fire-breathing street festivals, here's what made The List this weekend. Cheers! – Andrew Kiraly 🤍
💐 Friday Jan 31
- I've usually only had the luck to see Las Vegas artist Lolita Develay's work in single astounding doses as part of larger shows. Here's a rare chance to gorge your eyes on an exclusive buffet of her talent all on its own. "High Roller Blooms" turns Nuwu Art Gallery + Community Center into a garden of earthly temptations, where watercolor wealth meets floral decay in massive paintings that bring Develay's signature style – sleek, slick, supra-realism that reads like dreams dipped in rainbow gasoline – to a new level of scale. 5p, Nuwu Art Gallery
- If, like me, you've nursed a confusing lifelong ambivalence toward the banjo, Ramsey's Bootleggers just might decisively win you over once and for all with a juggy earful of moonshine twang in this plucky free fam-friendly concert. 6p, Winchester Theater
- Been practicing your cry-on-command skills? The Audition Table turns yr standard improv workshop into a live-taped YouTube show where you're both performer and audience in a meta-theatrical experiment that might either be wrenchingly awkward or stomach-knottingly funny (hopefully both). 630p, SPCKRFT
- Yeah, I think we can all use a little health, healing, and hula right about now. Tonight kicks off three days of Hawaiian cultural workshops in which three cultural teachers – musician Mailani Maka`īna`i, wellness expert Kumu Kaui Auwae, and hula expert Candace Kananiokamokihana Marticio-Melendez bring island wisdom to the desert for a weekend of learning and connection. 7p, Super Summer Theatre Studios
- Here's an aural treat: pair Austin's Dream 2 Dream's soaring, sleepy vaporwave cocktail of indie psych with the intimate Griffin backroom, and you've just entered a new dimension via the dance floor. Three Rounds and Elevated Undergrounds keep the retro vibes flowing. 8p, The Griffin
- Okay, I'm down for some nakedly earnest positivity: Earl Turner's "New Day" promises fresh twists on classics and surprise songs you never saw coming. Like January resolutions, but actually entertaining. Note that due to completely understandable sudden high demand for nakedly earnest positivity, tix are going fast. 7p, Myron's
- Get a dose of murderlicious melodies at Vegas City Opera's 7 Sins So Deadly. No horn-hatted Viking ladies here – just goth-streaked goodness that includes the West Coast premiere of David Del Tredici's "Dracula," Jake Heggie's haunting cycle "Songs for Murdered Sisters," and George Crumb's deathly ditties "3 Early Songs." Better yet, student tickets are to die for: They're free 20 minutes before curtain, no soul-selling required. Note there's a Saturday show, too. 7p, Charleston Heights Arts Center
- When iconic music label Deutsche Grammophon signs a guitar specialist, you know we've got a legit six-string savant on our hands. That's the case with Raphaël Feuillâtre – born in East Africa, trained in France – whose glittering guitar work brings an almost innocent freshness to biggies such as Bach to lesser-known names such as organist Jean-Phillipe Rameau. 730p, UNLV
🐀 Hella more weekend here, which may contain vintage-clad farmers and desert rats with luxurious stoner locks
🌝 Lunar fest | Spooky burlesque | Tiki jazzotica | Cosmic concert | Alt-farm market | Desert stoners | Sinful songs
The coolest things to do in Las Vegas this week, ever.
Andrew Kiraly
⛏️ Saturday Feb 1
- The story of modern Nevada is mostly a story about greedy, extractive digging – and long before it was about mining tourists' wallets, it was about mining Da Earf for gold, silver, and, lol believe it or not, the main ingredient in cat litter. Open only the first Saturday of every month, today The Mine Experience is offering free admission to its simulated underground exhibit. Tread carefully; this is holey ground🙄. 9a, The Mine Experience
- If you've been feeling prickly lately, Cactus Joe's has the cure, with a desert zen sesh where crystal bowls vibrate your stress away among the spiky succulents. BYO yoga mat and prepare to get cosmically aligned. 930a, Cactus Joe's
- Here's a welcome wake-up call: DW Bistro invites you to brunch in your jammies this Groundhog Day weekend. Like Bill Murray said: If you gotta repeat a day, might as well do it with bottomless mimosas. 10a, DW Bistro
- Get your soul lifted with music that'll literally move you at the 23rd Annual Gospel Fest, where Ashling Cole, Brent Jones, and Lena Byrd Miles raise the Water Street roof with heaven-sent harmonies. Free spirit-charging included. 10a, Water Street Plaza
- Smuggle some art education into yr larval children's brains under the guise of crafty kiddie funtime. Rita Deanin Abbey Museum turns this First Saturday into a kid-friendly treasure hunt through art and nature, complete with garden exploring and stained glass coloring. 10a, Rita Deanin Abbey Art Museum
🐍
Slither art thou: Okay, so "Year of the Wood Snake" doesn't exactly roll off the (forked) tongue with the same mystical panache as "Year of the Dragon," but you can't dis the solid traits of growth-mindedness, flexibility and tolerance that characterize the snake-year-people coiled among us. Celebrate at proper scale with these other Lunar New Year happenings: You'll be over the moon at Las Vegas Lunar New Year Festival Feb. 1 in Chinatown Plaza with 11 hours of performances, food, and festivities ✦ Get a natural high at Taverna Costera's "Year of the Snake" rooftop party and fundraiser Feb. 1 ✦ Fresh energy is in the air at Desert Breeze's 4th Annual Spring Festival Feb. 2 with pop-up vendors and Asian-inspired music and dance.
- Here's your wallet's chance to be a hometown hero. Market in the Alley packs kinda-sorta-modern-urbanism node UnCommons with 40+ local makers, movers, and small biz shakers. 11a, UnCommons
- Nevada Ballet Theatre's Don Bellamy and crew honor dance legends and cultural game-changers in this Black History Month celebration where every pirouette tells a moving story. 3p, Summerlin Library
- Sure, you can watch wrestling at home solo, crushing beer cans in performative outrage all by your lonesome in your Doritos-dusted recliner, or you can scream with the tribe at The Nerd. The funky li'l otaku bar transforms into Suplex City for this Royal Rumble Watch Party. 4p, The Nerd
▼ Saturday cont'd
- Achieve reputational liftoff with your family at this celestial show. Stardust turns the Fifth Street School into mission control for a cosmic concert where live ambient music scores your journey through 4K space vistas. Like Pink Floyd's laser show without the highly redolent 72-year-old unfrozen caveman hippies. 7p, Historic Fifth Street School
- Longtime Las Vegas chanteuse Laura Shaffer has been bringing classic jazz stylings to local stages for ages, and now you can hear her golden voice supplemented with rainbow rolls and sake bombs (and a boppin' backup band). 7p, Maxan Jazz
- Not just another hypnotic dark synthwave band, Cold Cave deserves its hardcore following for stately dancefloor anthems that have the perfect balance of irresistible hooks and ethereal neon verve, a sehnsucht-rich recipe rife with chrome, drizzle, and dramatically long trenchcoats. 8p, Fremont Country Club
- Whazzat? You're back at The Griffin for another night, this time for the 2,500cc chainsaw anthems of Arizona's horror-punk heroes Calabrese bringing big fang energy with Zombeast, Dark Ride, and local ghouls Damned By The Night raising hell in support? Respect! 8p, The Griffin
- As I'm writing this, headphoned into sticker-plastered laptop at dining room table, my wife keeps hand-flapping into my peripheral vision. "Whaaaat!?" I say, tugging out my earbuds, ripped from the zone. She asks, "Is something wrong with your legs? They're jiggling like crazy!" It's 'cause I'm listening to the relentless jittery smoove ska of Warsaw Poland Bros. 9p, Red Dwarf
💙 Sunday Feb 2
- Free is good! Free is rad! Free is punk! Start the pit for Free Locals Day! 10a, The Punk Rock Museum
- Las Vegas' lively blues scene – popping everywhere from charming dives such as Champagne's to beloved stalwarts such as The Sand Dollar – owes a lot of thanks to The Las Vegas Blues Society, a hub of hot talent and major organizational mojo. The LVBS throws its annual Membership Appreciation Party with free food, fresh faces, and live riffs – plus prez Jimmy Carpenter's state-of-the-scene address. Join at the door if you're feeling blue (in a good way) – it's a great opportunity to network with awesome cultural connectors. Of course, local blues acts will be storming the stage. 1p, The Composers Room
- Get a sweeping musical education with every strum: The Las Vegas Classical Guitar Ensemble strings together six centuries of finger-picking history, from Renaissance courtly vibes to modern six-string wizardry. 3p, West Charleston Library
- This event sounds berry informative: Green thumb guru Mark Ruben of Gilcrease Orchards dishes on gardening tomatoes and berries in the desert. Whatever you're growing – romas, beefsteaks, blueberries, strawberries – this should be a fruitful talk. 3p, Summerlin Library
- Think pink for this wine + dessert duo. Ada's crew takes over Double Zero Pie & Pub with this party where Chef Stephani's seductive sweets meet Kat's blush-worthy wine pours. Romance optional, indulgence mandatory. 5p, Double Zero Pie & Pub
- The double-bill El-Rod tribute show could only cooler if it culminated in a Voltron-like merging of performers Harry Shahoian and John Anthony into a singular entertainment superbeing named ELROD. 7p, Italian American Club
- If you've yet to sample the artful, molecularly refined cocktails at Petite Bohème, here's a chance to do so with an extra shot of competitive spirit: at DTLV'S Ultimate Bourbon Competition. Pro tip: soak up all that boozy goodness with their umami-bomb chicharrones. 9p, Petite Bohème
🙏 Hope you have the raddest weekend. Thanks for your support! – Andrew Kiraly 🤍
