The Bunkhouse Saloon closed in March 2020, just as the pandemic began, and there are no signs it will reopen anytime soon, if ever. Beauty Bar shuttered permanently a year before that. And though Backstage Bar & Billiards (and the adjacent Fremont Country Club), the Dive Bar and the Double Down Saloon remain open, a music scene this size needs additional off-Strip, non-casino rooms to truly thrive.
Fortunately, Las Vegas can draw on experience gained through its long history battling through venue closures with fortitude and creativity. When one space ends, others usually begin, and when permanent spots don’t cut it, makeshift ones pop up, from generator shows in the desert and cave shows in the mountains to gigs in homes, storage units, warehouses and beyond.
Also keeping the concert calendar from drying up are independent promoters, like Patrick “Pulsar” Trout, the 36-year-old behind Pulsar Presents; Ruben Rodriguez; and the folks who run Bad Moon Booking, Blackpath Booking, Nevermore Productions and Vegas Rock Revolution—locals who frequently take financial risks bringing acts to town. We caught up with Trout, who has been booking bands in Las Vegas for more than 15 years, to discuss the pandemic’s effects on showgoing, the new wave of venues and more.
Post-pandemic shutdown, you’ve been doing shows at some places that are pretty new to the music game. What has that been like? The first several months back, a lot of it was just figuring out the lay of the land, as far as what venues were open and what they wanted. The main thing for me was trying to get a better understanding of what the audience’s needs and expectations are now. Because trying to get someone to come to a show now is not anywhere close to trying to get someone to come to a show in 2019. It’s an entirely different ask.
How so? Last summer, when things started to reopen, there was a demand to go out, regardless of what it was. And once that honeymoon period wore off, people really need a reason to go out. I don’t think it’s enough to just put a few bands onstage anymore, even if it’s good bands. There has to be some sort of a draw or some sort of, I don’t like using the term gimmick, but themed events seem to do well now. Making things more of an overall party than just a show.
I also think a big part of it is that people are limited in terms of what they can spend, and people are really having to make much tougher decisions about how to spend their free time. People got used to just doing things at home.
I think these last couple years exposed that a lot of the things that we’ve been told as a society that we have to go out to do, we really don’t have to if we don’t want to. If someone doesn’t want to leave their home ever, they really don’t have to. And for a lot of people, it’s like, do I really want to spend the money that it costs to drive to a place and buy drinks and buy a ticket when I can sit at home for free and watch something online?
There’s always going to be people who really want the live experience, though, and I think what I and a lot of other promoters are trying to do is give people added incentive to go out.
What can you do to get more people out? Most production and entertainment companies have been living and dying by social media for the last decade … and I’ve noticed that digital marketing does not have anywhere close to the reach it used to. I’ve been trying to do a lot more in the way of physical promo—posters, flyers, things like that—to get back to that hands-on approach, because I think that goes further with people now.
I think people tend to look at social media now as something they’re obligated to do as opposed to something they actually want to do. If they’re doing something fun, like going to a record store or a shop they like, and they happen to see your poster, I think it carries more weight now than being stuck on their social feed because they have to be on it for work and then they happen to see an ad scroll by.
Are you seeing mostly familiar faces, or is it largely a different audience out there these days? I’m seeing a lot of familiar faces, but I’m also seeing a lot of new ones, which is really encouraging. Over the course of the pandemic, a lot of people left Vegas, but a lot of people came to Vegas, too. New people who, for the first several months or year they were here, couldn’t go out even if they wanted to, can finally see what there is to offer here.
Take us on a tour of the newer spots where you’ve been booking lately. SoulBelly BBQ. The owner, Bruce [Kalman], has a great vision for the place, and the food’s fantastic. The sound is excellent, so dialed-in. In the past, a small venue having great sound was kind of a rarity in this market, and that’s a big factor when I’m dealing with booking agents for national acts.
A lot of times you walk into a bar with a stage and you can tell that it was a bar first and then they decided to incorporate live music. A lot of places make that work, but with SoulBelly you walk in and you immediately can tell that they designed the place with music in mind.
It’s been a lot of fun, the bands have been really receptive to it and I think having more venues in that Arts District area is great.
Taverna Costera is another cool, new spot. It’s really intimate—it only holds maybe 100, 125. The stage is on the roof, so it’s a very interesting setup. And it’s nice to have a room where, if you’re a band that’s new to the market or you’re a local band coming up, you can play in front of 50 people and not have it feel like it’s a cave.
I’ve done a few things at the Usual Place, which is a great room. It’s got a big dressing-room area with a shower, which is something a lot of smaller venues don’t have. From a promoter perspective, that can be a difference-maker when you’re negotiating. Carlos [Sanchez], the owner, is putting the time and effort into making it everything that it can be, bringing in a bigger stage, a bigger sound system. And the room is scalable—you can do a 400-person show in there, but you can also scale it down to half-capacity and not have it look awkward.
When talking to booking agents about the newer venues in Las Vegas, how much explaining, or even convincing, do you have to do? There’s always a certain amount of explaining and showing that you have to do with that sort of thing, but I don’t mind doing it. I have the relationships with some of these agents where they’ll trust me outright if I say, “This is the spot,” but to me, that’s not really enough. I need to be able to show them that this place is what I’m saying it will be. And with these venues, I’m able to do that. I’m able to say, “Here’s exactly what this place has to offer; here’s what makes this place special.” And I think being able to come back to agents with that goes a long way in getting bands to come back and not skip the market.
When the Bunkhouse, which has been such an anchor venue Downtown for years, didn’t reopen after the shutdown, it worried a lot of people. As someone who has witnessed the scene’s resiliency through the years, how confident were you that things would work out? Somewhat confident. Obviously with the pandemic, my No. 1 priority was safety, making sure my family was safe and then, as things started to open up, making sure guests were safe. I figured that with the pandemic, realistically some places were going to close, but also there would be people that had the opportunity to get something going, and it would really just be a matter of seeing who had the best ideas and the best plans for that.
It’s a cyclical thing. Venues in this market come and go, and that is challenging when I’m dealing with agents. There are agents where I’ve worked with a band for over a decade but every time I’ve booked them it’s had to be in a different room, not because they didn’t like the room, but because the rooms kept changing.
How do you think the Swan Dive, which is being constructed in the Arts District, will add to that mix once it opens? The No. 1 gripe I get from agents is, “I’ve got this act that’ll sell out any 500-600-cap room I put them in, but I don’t wanna put them in House of Blues because the room will be half-empty and I don’t want to stick them in a 300-cap room where they’re gonna be unhappy with the production and they’ll have 300 people mad they couldn’t get into the show.” And for years I’ve kinda had to throw my hands up.
Having a place like Swan Dive, especially Downtown in the Arts District, that can take on those kinds of shows, is gonna make a huge difference in terms of the viability of the market. Those acts that draw 500 to 700 are the acts that will draw 2,000 to 3,000 in a few years, but we end up not getting them at all a lot of time, because they don’t see Vegas as a market where they can build themselves up. They see at as a market that you come to after you’ve already won.
And it takes a while to develop acts. The first time I booked Code Orange, maybe 50 people came, and then a year later the show sold out at 200 paid, and now they’re one of the biggest metal acts in the world. But that was over the course of nine years in the market.
I think, in a lot of cases, it really comes down to the independent promoters being willing to build those relationships and take that time. If you’re a publicly traded corporation you’re not really in a position to do that.
Is Vegas in a different place in the eyes of booking agents now than it once was, or is there still some wariness? I think it depends a lot on the genre. The more mainstream it is, the more accepting they are of Vegas. If it’s something they can stick on the Strip they’re not too worried. If it’s anything in the alternative world, I think there’s still some apprehension. It’s a lot better than it used to be, and I do think with the crop of new venues and the ones that are being planned and opened up, I think we’re gonna see less of that initial resistance from agents and they’re gonna start seeing Vegas as another obvious spot to put on the route.
How has it been dealing with all the postponements and cancellations the past couple years? My response has always been the same: I’m not gonna ask any artist, any patron or any place to do something they’re not comfortable with. At this point it’s the new normal. Realistically, this is something we’re going to be dealing with for years, and it has to be factored in. Any time you book an event now, you have to have it in the back of your mind that something could happen. There’s no point in anyone getting upset with an artist or a venue or a promoter because that artist is trying to keep themselves safe.
I have acts that had to cancel in 2020 because of the pandemic who I might get back, and I might not; it depends on their routing. But it’s not worth getting angry or upset over; it’s just a reality of the situation.
How much do you think all of this has changed the local scene in terms of dwindling opportunities for bands here to get out and play like they used to? What I’ve seen and heard from local bands in the last several months is that they’re excited to play shows again, but they don’t really know where to play or who to talk to.
Also, a lot of the newer venues are still figuring out their identity. It’s not that they’re hesitant to book things, but they’re trying to establish their brand first and go from there. I’ve had some venues that have been resistant to doing heavier shows, and I’ve said I’ll bring in extra security and here’s footage of their live shows so you can see what it’s like. I’m comfortable sitting down with someone and explaining why I think something’s worth bringing to their venue, and if they still don’t feel it’s the right fit, I’ll find somewhere else. Being independent, I feel I’m in a position to give people what they want on a case-by-case basis, as opposed to trying to fill dates on a calendar or be all things to all people all the time.
Lastly, is Vegas any closer to solving its longstanding all-ages venue issue? It’s still a tough sell. I think there needs to be more clarity on what is and isn’t OK. And I think with the amount of growth the city has shown and with the amount of new businesses opening up, at a certain point they’ll have to look at the rules to see if they make sense or need to be changed.
But at the end of the day, it’s still very much a 21-plus market. I completely understand why we don’t have an all-ages venue in Fremont East, because they don’t want people under 21 down there; there’s nothing else for them there, so it doesn’t make sense.
To me, it would make more sense to do an all-ages venue in Summerlin or Henderson, but then you run into the not-in-my-backyard crowd worried about a bunch of scary teenagers hanging out. It’s something I think will happen, but I think it will take more time and a more collective voice.
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