Christian Smith

The Vanderpump Hotel — Basement (formerly The Cromwell)

Dark, intimate underground energy with multiple rooms for different sounds — the original Drai's vibe restored. Hip-hop in one room, house in another, hookah lounge as the chill-out zone. More focused and immersive than the rooftop era, where the outdoor environment imposed a ceiling on the bass response and the show competed with the Strip skyline for attention. Underground, the sound system takes over completely and the crowd orientation shifts inward toward the DJ and the dance floor rather than outward toward a view. The multi-room format creates a constant sense of discovery — the energy in the hip-hop room at 1 AM is completely different from the electronic room at the same time, and moving between the two resets the experience without requiring a venue change. The hookah lounge functions as a decompression zone: lower volume, seated, a space to hold a conversation or plan the next move without stepping outside. The Wednesday industry night crowd knows the venue intimately — less performative than weekends, more socially fluid, and the kind of room where you are more likely to talk to strangers and less likely to be in a group that stays rigidly at one table all night.

MGM Grand

Hakkasan is where Vegas nightlife meets fine dining ambition — five floors that each feel like a different club. Start dinner downstairs at the Cantonese restaurant, move up to the Ling Ling Lounge hip-hop floor, then ascend to the thundering main room where the DJ stage rises above a sea of 3,000+ people. The production quality is closer to a stadium concert than a typical nightclub. Friday and Saturday headliners bring the biggest EDM names on the Strip. The venue's sheer scale means you can disappear for an hour on one floor and emerge somewhere completely different.