Brandon Flowers: Other Vegas Bands Are Jealous

The Brandon Flowers interview is up (along with the rest of the episode including a really great Top Secret Tourist Tip of the Week). Click on that link above or right-click here to download it to your computer and listen at your leisure.

Here's the part that's bound to get some attention (Tramps is the gay bar the band first started out playing in):

"We want people to be proud of us, y'know? There's so much jealousy that goes on in Las Vegas about what we've done. And it's kind of a shame. We'll sell out the show but a lot of the people are going to be from L.A. It's pretty pathetic. It's a common thing for people in your hometown to kind of shy away. The people who filled Tramps up, those people aren't going to be in the front as they were before we sold any records. They're going to be bitching about it on blogs."

Flowers also talks about playing with U2, those gay rumors and what's next after they wrap up their second tour on Friday at the Hard Rock Hotel.

Also up is a BONUS edition featuring an animated interview with drummer Ronnie Vannucci Jr., who tells of playing a Caesars Palace lounge at age 6 and responds to critics of the second album, "Sam's Town." Right-click here to download that.

This week's Strip is LIVE on WEDNESDAY

Miles and I have to go to a three-hour orientation that kicks off our process of adopting our first child, so we had to move the live recording of "The Strip" to Wednesday this week.

Our guest this week is Brandon Flowers of "The Killers" -- finally! Join us Wednesday from 7-8 pm PT at LVRocks.com.

Busy Tuesday

I'm off to the MGM Mirage shareholders' meeting at MGM Grand shortly to see what's what with the $12 billion offer by Kirk Kerkorian to, essentially, buy Bellagio and CityCenter from himself and out from under MGM Mirage. I'll be writing for Reuters on that. And then, later, I have a chat with Las Vegas Sands President Bill Weidner for tonight's episode of "The Strip."

Yes, that's right. We're postponing airing our Killers interviews until next Tuesday in light of the huge news coming out of Vegas this week about the fate of MGM Mirage.

Gotta get in the shower. Join us from 7-8 pm PT tonight at LVRocks.Com for the live show and chat.

Doing it for money

As most freelancers do, I take and pitch all sorts of odd assignments to pay the mortgage. It's one of the neat parts of the lifestyle, that I can ask to write about anything that interests me and sometimes they even let me. And often they come at me with stories I wouldn't ever have gotten to do and they turn out to be really interesting.

To wit, here's two random bits to check out if you care:

* Some University of Chicago business profs did a really intense study of the costs of the U.S. having not invaded Iraq versus the various outcomes of the fact that we did. It's really fascinating -- they seem to think that financially, it's something of a draw, if not a bargain, that we did, even in the worst-case scenario.

* The folks at Brigham Young University, of all places, have loosened up their policy on gays on campus. I wrote about it for Newsweek. They're now allowed to say they're gay so long as they don't ever do anything and as long as they never suggest that it's morally acceptable. And that's progress.

Otherwise, just another busy day writing the plan for tonight's "The Strip," posting the latest episode of "The Petcast" on which Emily and I had quite a fun squabble, writing up my Vegas mag piece on The Killers and putting some finishing touches on the forthcoming gay guidebook.

Frank Fahrenkopf, Craig Ferguson on The Strip Tonight

Join us live at 7 pm at LVROCKS.Com for the chat and live show.

It'll be a busy night on "The Strip" -- Comic Craig Ferguson and American Gaming Assn executive director Frank Fahrenkopf. Plus, a crew from RawVegas.TV will be in the house to interview us while we're playing the pre-recorded Fahrenkopf interview.

Had a terrific interview today with Brandon Flowers of The Killers which will be used on a future show as well as for a Vegas mag story I'm writing. And I've locked in PAUL ANKA for next week's ep of "The Strip."

See you tonight!