The Deuces Are Wild for Aerosmith in Las Vegas

Posted on by Original Rock

Aerosmith’s Deuces Are Wild residency at Park MGM has been one of the highlights of the year in Las Vegas.

Aerosmith’s headlining residency at the Park Theater at the new Park MGM resort surpassed $35 million in gross revenues last month. Since opening last April 6, the show has sold 163,820 tickets across their 25 shows.

The Billboard reports that the residency has averaged $1.045 million in grosses per show. The band’s run from September 21 to October 6 alone generated $6.5 million and sold over 29,000 tickets. Due to the “extraordinary demand”, Aerosmith recently announced they will be adding 15 more show dates until early 2020.

Over fifty years-worth of hits, covers, and fan favorites curated in a 90-minute special would hardly describe “Deuces Are Wild”. The opening show alone last April covered almost all their billboard hits from the 70s to the 90s.

The show primed the audience with a half-hour-long documentary featuring interviews with the group and their famous peers while Cirque de Soleil explored the venue. Then during the live shows singer Steven Tyler and the band opened with a blitz of classics “Mama Kin,” “Back in the Saddle” and “Sweet Emotion”, as well as covers of Fleetwood Mac’s “Stop Messin’ Around” and “Train Kept a-Rolling”. The show closed with their biggest hits including “I Don’t Wanna Miss A Thing”, “Dream On”, and “Walk This Way”.

The Deuces are Wild residency has been an astounding success, and is a much-needed win for land-based casinos in their effort to mitigate the domination of their online counterparts. In fact, casinos have bet big on these types of residencies with the world’s biggest music stars now being paid huge amounts to perform at the city’s top casinos. Even though these are costing the casinos a fortune to host, with MGM reportedly paying Lady Gaga $1 million a show (for 74 shows), the casinos will be counting on the increased visitor numbers as well as the boost to their restaurants and bars. In the past twenty years online casinos have evolved to offer more gaming services than those of a brick and mortar casino. Sandlot Games’ thorough review of LeoVegas online casino reveals that the app has around 1000 different games in its roster—an experience that no land-based casino can replicate. With online casinos able to compete on a gaming level, physical casinos have reacted by offering what their online counterparts can’t – an amplified entertainment experience. And the high payoff from investments like Aerosmith’s residency shows that this tactic is working.
The show’s overwhelming success was also epitomized by other big names coming to the On-Stage VIP section of the show. Actor Johnny Depp and director Tim Burton are just some of the band’s fans who were recently seen gracing the epic show. Guitarist Brad Whitford says the residency “is the one thing Aerosmith can say we did right in this life.” The band also hinted at a UK tour of the Deuces are Wild in a cryptic tweet from their official account—potentially following in the footsteps of the massive hit Raiding The Rock Vault tour which they were a part of. The good news for rock fans is that legendary band is not slowing down and with the extra shows in Vegas there will be a greater scope to see them live.