Flying from New York to Las Vegas takes about nine hours with a connecting flight. For a weekend of drinking, gambling and punk rock with the Punknews.org team, it was well worth it. Arriving to the Sunset Station hotel and casino in the afternoon, you could immediately notice an abundance of tattoos, piercings and band shirts.

After grabbing dinner, we were able to catch the Youth Brigade set. Not knowing any of their material, I wasn't particularly struck by the performance, but it seemed like the people who knew them were enjoying the relatively short set. It being Mother's Day weekend, they did dedicate one song to moms. They also introduced another song saying "This is a fucked up world right now, so I wish our president the best. This one goes out to him."

Fucked Up was next and even though I didn't know any of their material either, I was anticipating a good hardcore set after hearing good things from a friend. I was also forewarned that the lead singer would be getting half-naked and smashing his forehead with the mic until he drew blood. Despite not seeing blood, I wasn't disappointed in the least. The band jumped into the set sounding tight with the lead singer smashing cans of beer on his forehead, bottom end first. The guy was really bringing some awesome energy to the stage and the crowd was pumped within the first song. From watching him on stage, you can tell he's truly stoked to be playing music. By a few songs into the set, his shirt was off and he had smashed a beer bottle over his head. The crowd also helped to spread the energy, with a pit holding up the entire set. One huge guy in particular was parading in a circle with a scepter of taped-together beer cans. The singer kept joining the crowd and the pit, later thanking security for being cool, not kicking them off and even holding up the mic cord through the crowd. Back on stage, the pit king and several others began motioning unsuccessfully for the singer to join the crowd once again. Overall, the set was abundant in energy and enjoyable even for someone who had never heard Fucked Up before. The one song title I was able to catch was "Police." I'll definitely be looking forward to seeing them next time.

Hot Water Music was next. Fuck. Yes. With Punknews sponsoring, I'll call their 15-song set the Orgcore portion of the night. Chuck Ragan and company took the stage a little before 9:00, introducing their new drummer Dave, who was playing his first show with the band. Funny enough, Against Me! was playing the festival with former HWM drummer George Rebelo the very next night. After the introduction, the band went right into opener "A Flight and a Crash." The lineup of the show was one of those where the crowd gets more intense with every next band. HWM was no exception. There was more dancing, more singing, the pit was bigger and people were drunker. There may have been one fight and a few drunken fools during the set, but for the most part, people rushed to pick up any fallen comrades and the crowd was trying to be respectful, appreciating the atmosphere and seemingly the fact that fucking HWM was playing. There was an overall sense of "if you're here singing and dancing with me, you're good people."

Set list:

1. A Flight and a Crash
2. Remedy
3. Trusty Chords
4. Kill the Night (?)
5. Wayfarer
6. Paper Thin
7. Free Radio Gainesville
8. The Sense
9. Alachua
10. It's Hard to Know

NOFX closed out the night, taking the stage around 10:00. Fat Mike introduced the band, exclaiming "I've been doing cocaine for three weeks...and now I don't even feel like playing!" He then singled out some fans who had brought young (under 10 years old) children with them, describing sex acts out of spite and calling them bad parents. Seriously, though, who would think bringing their kids to a NOFX show would be a good parenting idea? After going through "Seeing Double at the Triple Rock" and "Leave It Alone," Fat Mike warned the crowd "whatever happens in Henderson...ends up on Punknews." Yes, Mike. Yes it does. After dedicating a short version of "Fuck the Kids" to the kids in the crowd, they ripped into a blazing-fast performance of "Linoleum," just like it should be. With the one and only in attendance that weekend, they played "She's Nubs," ending it with "she sure does know how to suck a cock." They played a joke song in the middle of their set in which they literally told jokes back and forth across the stage while they played. "What do you get when you cross a Mexican with an octopus? I don't know, but you should see that fucker pick up strawberries!" "What do you get when you cross a Jew with an octopus? I don't know, but you should see that fucker pick up pennies!" After trading a few more jokes at the risk of sounding racist, they cautioned "Racism is not normally funny."

After announcing a two-minute "encore" break, they took the stage once more, playing "Bob" and an extended version of "Theme from a NOFX Album" to close out the night of punk rock.

1. Double at the Triple Rock
2. Leave It Alone
3. Mattersville
4. Fuck the Kids
5. Linoleum
6. She's Nubs
7. Eat the Meek
8. Franco Un-American
9. joke song
10. Murder the Government
11. Don't Call Me White
12. Reeko
    --
13. Liza and Louise
14. The Man I Killed
    Encore:
15. Bob
16. extended "Theme from a NOFX Album"