Your Daily Guide

☀️ The Heat Takes a Toll on the Homeless

So far this year, at least 260 deaths have been heat-related in Clark County — and 74 of those were listed by the coroner as homeless. This comes as the county clears out roughly 1,200 encampments each year. The sudden upheavals can lead to the loss of medications and other unintended consequences. [KTNV]

• City Cast Las Vegas met with volunteers helping those who camp in underground tunnels. [City Cast Las Vegas 🎧]

✡️ Circa Sued Over Religious Headscarf

Circa is facing a religious discrimination lawsuit that claims a Messianic Jewish cage cashier was sent home without pay for refusing to remove a headscarf. The suit also says the employee was asked to bring in a letter from clergy to validate the religious practice, but did not supply one. [Casino.org]

🥳 Resorts World Made It 5 Years

When people say “Resorts World is dead,” I say … “Have you seen Virgin Hotels?” Despite some rough patches and growing pains, things are looking up for Resorts World, which celebrated five years on the Strip over the summer. The two latest fiscal quarters have been strong with hotel occupancy, room rates, and high-end casino play moving in the right direction. The property is also shaping up to have its best year for convention activity in 2026 — and it wants an NBA-ready arena too 🏀 [Las Vegas Review-Journal]

• City Cast Las Vegas looks at the advantages of a new NBA arena at Resorts World or another North Strip location in today’s news roundup. The episode also discusses some good news for the school district’s budget battles and our latest Vegas obsessions. [City Cast Las Vegas 🎧]

🏈 Are You Not Entertained?

Let’s enjoy saying “the undefeated Las Vegas Raiders” while we still can. The team is off to a great start this season with a 3-0 record. For perspective that’s the same number of victories the Raiders saw over the entire previous season. [Sports Illustrated]

• More sports stuff: The new Las Vegas team for the Professional Women’s Hockey League still doesn’t have a name, but it has a date for its inaugural home opener: Dec. 6 at the T-Mobile Arena. [KVVU]

The combination of power chords, beer, and devil horns 🤘 never gets old (even if the audience does). The Sphere will experience heavy metal for the first time with the debut of a new Metallica residency Thursday night. Can the band live up to the Sphere’s best moments so far?

🌵 U2 Goes Outdoors

U2 had one chance to get it right when opening the Sphere exactly three years ago today. The band showcased their best album (“Achtung Baby”) and fully maximized the Sphere’s shape-shifting superpowers. But there was something about “Where the Streets Have No Name” that added emotional resonance to the night (and finally got the VIPs and old, rich ticketbuyers out of their seats), bringing the audience outdoors, “high on a desert plain,” in a crystal-clear Nevada landscape.

✨ Dead & Company Takes Flight

Between John Mayer’s guitar licks and Bob Weir’s final shows before passing in January, there’s a lot to appreciate about Dead & Company’s run at the Sphere. The setlists changed frequently with one constant: In a special effect produced by Industrial Light & Magic, the Sphere took the audience to San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury neighborhood before rising up over the city and into the cosmos for a “long, strange trip” that plays out before landing back in the Bay Area hours later.

• John Mayer is returning to the Sphere — this time as a solo act — in 2027. [KSNV]

🌪️ ‘The Wizard of Oz’ Goes for a Spin

Personally, I preferred "Postcard from Earth” (filmed with the Sphere’s own patented camera system) as a movie showcase, but “The Wizard of Oz” proved the venue could adapt older, established media for new cinematic experiences. When the tornado hits Kansas — with wind, fog, and a rumble felt in the seats — it not only delivers on wow factor, but sets the audience up for a hard landing (apologies to the Wicked Witch of the East) as the screen shifts from sepia to Technicolor.

• Read more about our first impressions in Munchkinland. [City Cast Las Vegas ✍️]

🚀 The Backstreet Boys Travel to Space

The Sphere seemed ripe for a NSYNC reunion — no dice — but the Backstreet Boys seized the opportunity to show what a boyband could do with all those special effects, putting together a show with an intergalactic sci-fi setting. It’s definitely the most “digital” of the Sphere’s concerts without a backing band or even a real instrument anywhere in sight. So when the act took flight with the help of a practical effect — a levitating stage — for “I Want It That Way,” it gave the audience a genuine, climatic surprise.

🛎️ The Eagles Check In to the Hotel California

The Eagles chose to give away their best moment early, opening with “Hotel California” while the screen transforms from sunny Los Angeles to a “dark desert highway” and spooky hotel corridors with a gathering of ghouls joining in on the chorus. It’s a testament to the band’s deep catalog that the show never lulls from there — and an on-screen sequence during “In the City,” in which the audience rises above an urban dystopia is another moment that perfectly blends music with special effects.