Saturday night in Las Vegas, and I got an offer for comped tickets to Trent Carlini as Elvis … playing at the Sahara Hotel and Casino.

I really wasn’t sure what to do regarding this. As a resident, I have seen probably 100 Elvis Impersonators at one point or another, but this guy has a reputation for being one of the best. And I like Elvis music. At least half of it. Mostly the latter part of his career, and luckily, those were the Vegas years.

So I headed on over to the Sahara at about 8pm to hang out a bit before the 9pm showtime.

The line was actually very long, and I was worried about where I would be seated. Turns out my seats were in the back, but I snuck up to the 4th row, and nobody bothered me … so I got great seats.

The lights went down, the show started, and within 15 seconds I realize that I had underestimated what I was about to see. I thought something like this would go down: a guy dressed like Elvis comes out, and sings over some recorded music.

That is exactly what I expected.

Boy was I wrong.

The curtain went up, and there was a full 10 member, 8 instrument band! There was a guitarists (fender telecaster), bass player (fender bass), drummer, 2 trumpet players, a saxophone player, 2 keyboardists, and 2 attractive female backup singers. When Carlini came out, he played an additional guitar (acoustic and electric alternating) … making for a full 11 person band spread out on a very large stage.

As if that wasn’t enough, there was a full professional light/sound system, complete with drop down video screens showing occasional actual Elvis concert footage.

This wasn’t an Elvis impersonator, this was a full-blown Elvis show!

As a matter of fact, if you look at some of the old video of Elvis’s setup at the Hilton, this show was an almost identical setup of the King’s actual show configuration, right down to the placement of the individual musicians.

It was pretty fucking incredible.

Trent did a great job at belting out vocals that sounded pretty spot-on for Elvis, but that really was just a part of what I think made this show great. Between songs there were several (very good) instrumental jam sessions, costume changes by Trent to reflect different eras of Elvis’s life, and there was even a very realistic “handing out sweaty scarfs to women” part of the show.

I never got to see Elvis Presley’s show live, I was too young, but having seen tapes of said performances, I would have to imagine that this comes fairly close.

Now of course I am not saying that it had the same energy and excitement of a real Elvis show. That would be impossible. But within the realm of 2007 possibilities, this is likely the closest one will get.

And let me ask you something. When was the last time you saw an “impersonator show” get a standing ovation?

Well, this one did. Pretty much the whole audience (the theater was about 3/4 full).

As a matter of fact, there were two standing ovations. “I Can’t Help Falling in Love With You” earlier in the show got it’s very own ovation, as well as the final song.

There was some crowd interaction, particularly with the females, and Carlini was witty and ad-libbed fairly often.

Between Trent, the tight band, and the audio-visual guys, I had a blast. Totally unexpected. I had no idea that this was an actual replica-concert, and the scale of the production caught me completely off-guard.

One thing also that was interesting is that one of the old-guy ushers at the Sahara Theater (his name is “Rudy”), was an usher for the Elvis concerts when he performed at the International Hotel (now the Las Vegas Hilton).

There is authenticity even with the show staff.

If you like Elvis, or just want to see a good “Vegas Show”, then I would highly recommend seeing this show. The price is very reasonable.

The theater is also very large and comfortable with good seat spacing. It is not a cramped lounge … it is a large theater.

The Sahara did a great job landing this show, and it’s a quick monorail ride to the theater. Check it out.

After the show, I looked at the back of the ticket stub, and it said “Bring this stub to the cashier’s cage with your Sahara Player’s Card, and get $25 in chips for $20″.

So I took them up on it. The chips were novelty chips that could only be used at the tables and not just cashed back out (obviously), so I went over to the $5 Blackjack tables.

I lost the first 4 hands, and was down to my final novelty chip.

30 minutes later I left the table with $120. Playing $5 at a time. I shit you not. I went on one of the longest Blackjack winning streaks I have ever had. I hit 14, and got a 7, I hit 12 and got a 9, I hit 15 and got a 5 … you get the picture. I also got 4 natural blackjacks. And I never bet more than $5, unless I doubled on 11 or split 8’s (each of which I did one time).

So instead of losing $20, I won $100 … after being down to my last $5 chip.

Not high-roller tourist exciting … but $100 is one hundred freakin dollars. I’ll take it.

And if I hadn’t over-tipped like an idiot, it would have been about $17 more.

As if that wasn’t enough, it turns out that I had $15 in free slot play on my Sahara Club Card. So I just played the free money, hit one decent pull, and walked away from the slot machine with $12.50 … free and clear.

So, not only did I see a very fine show, 100% comped, but I walked out of the Sahara with $112.50 more in my pocket than I walked in with.

I love this town.