The always-supercharged Las Vegas Strip musical residency landscape has changed quite a bit over the last five years, with superstar artists coming and going and new venues opening to accommodate even more high-tech concert spectaculars. But there’s one incredibly popular and successful production that has remained a constant over that period of evolution, and that’s the headlining residency from Bruno Mars at Park MGM.
He played his first shows in the venue then known as Park Theater for New Year’s Eve in 2016, and Mars is back at the recently upgraded and renamed Dolby Live theater at Park MGM to ring in 2022 with performances on Dec. 30-31.
Mars’ ongoing chart-topping success and overall prominence in the global music industry is built on a double-sided, impressively sturdy foundation: He crafts songs that make people feel good, and he performs them with loads of passion and endless energy. When Mars first landed at Park MGM, he had just released his third album, 24K Magic, an absolute smash that paid tribute to the R&B, soul, funk and pop sounds of the 1990s that still holds tremendous influence on his songwriting and creativity. Even while he toured the world on the strength of those songs—“That’s What I Like,” “Versace on the Floor,” “Finesse” and the inescapable title track—Mars continued to pop up in Vegas regularly for his big, welcoming musical party on the Strip.
The nostalgia his fans also feel for the sounds of that era keeps Mars and his audience connected on a deep, dance-inducing level, and this year he’s strengthened that bond with his new music. Teaming with another versatile talent in rapper, singer and musician Anderson .Paak to form a new project dubbed Silk Sonic, Mars has shifted his focus to re-creating the R&B and soul of the 1970s. The duo collaborated with legendary Parliament Funkadelic bassist Bootsy Collins and took inspiration from generations of Motown artists, James Brown, Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder and Prince. Time will tell if Mars incorporates Silk Sonic singles “Leave the Door Open” and “Skate” into his Vegas shows, his only live performances currently scheduled.
But the Vegas experience, which was the first big-room residency show to return to the Strip after the shutdown of 2020, is more than just a musical trip back in time. Mars and his band hit the stage hot and never cool down, not even when he belts out hit ballads like “Just the Way You Are” and “When I Was Your Man.” He keeps everyone dancing to the bouncy “Locked Out of Heaven” and the retro “Uptown Funk.” And when he does reach back for a quick cover or acknowledgment of the music that set him on his path, it feels like you’re out at a bar with your best friends, picking a song from the jukebox or singing karaoke together. That’s the power music holds over all of us, and Mars has a refined understanding of that phenomenon.
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