I went to see the show last night at the Stratosphere and really loved it. I don't know how many of the songs were originals. I didn't know many of them (Mack the Knife, Eleanor Rigby, and a couple of others), but figure that I know all the songs in the Rat Pack shows, that tells you how up I am on current popular music.
The band was excellent - trumpet, sax, trombone, 2 violins (or maybe violin and viola), cello, guitar, bass, and drums, plus Frankie played piano. An odd instrumentation, but it worked well - the arrangements were really well-written. There were no background vocals, so whoever wrote the charts used the horns and strings to add what would normally be background vocals. I'm biased since I am a freelance trombone player, but that added so much more depth and punch than your typical background vocals.
Even when they did familiar tunes, they didn't just try to be a cover band. They'd play with an entirely different groove than what you're familiar with. They are really original - something in fairly short supply in Strip entertainment.
The show was a shade under 2 hours, with no intermission, but you really didn't notice. When I got out of the show, I turned my phone back on and noticed that it was just a couple minutes shy of 10:00 (it started at 8:00).
The only bad part was that the showroom was only half full, and on a Saturday night. Of course, this was UFC 148 weekend and I guess a lot of people in town were there for UFC stuff.
One thing I thought odd - you have to be 21 to go to the show. You can go see the topless vampire show at the same casino when you're 18. Guess that's because they dropped quite a few f-bombs, but it's nothing worse than you'd hear in any mall, often from a bunch of under 21s. Maybe it's because they drank on stage during the show (I'm guessing it was real Crown Royal, but it might have been a prop.)
If you like shows that center around music rather than acrobats or people wearing blue skin and playing bizarre percussion instruments, check it out.
The band was excellent - trumpet, sax, trombone, 2 violins (or maybe violin and viola), cello, guitar, bass, and drums, plus Frankie played piano. An odd instrumentation, but it worked well - the arrangements were really well-written. There were no background vocals, so whoever wrote the charts used the horns and strings to add what would normally be background vocals. I'm biased since I am a freelance trombone player, but that added so much more depth and punch than your typical background vocals.
Even when they did familiar tunes, they didn't just try to be a cover band. They'd play with an entirely different groove than what you're familiar with. They are really original - something in fairly short supply in Strip entertainment.
The show was a shade under 2 hours, with no intermission, but you really didn't notice. When I got out of the show, I turned my phone back on and noticed that it was just a couple minutes shy of 10:00 (it started at 8:00).
The only bad part was that the showroom was only half full, and on a Saturday night. Of course, this was UFC 148 weekend and I guess a lot of people in town were there for UFC stuff.
One thing I thought odd - you have to be 21 to go to the show. You can go see the topless vampire show at the same casino when you're 18. Guess that's because they dropped quite a few f-bombs, but it's nothing worse than you'd hear in any mall, often from a bunch of under 21s. Maybe it's because they drank on stage during the show (I'm guessing it was real Crown Royal, but it might have been a prop.)
If you like shows that center around music rather than acrobats or people wearing blue skin and playing bizarre percussion instruments, check it out.
