John Katsilometes: 30 Years Covering Everyone in Las Vegas | The Stereo Image

He's covered the Strip for three decades... every show, every opening, every fighter and headliner worth writing about. John Katsilometes, the entertainment columnist behind "The Kats Report" at the Las Vegas Review-Journal, sits down with host Mike Jones for a story-rich conversation about how he built a journalism career with no degree, got sober, and became the institutional memory of a city that never stops changing. 00:00 Intro 01:30 From Idaho to the Las Vegas sports desk 02:34 Tyson, Holyfield, and the bite night 04:01 Mystère and the sports-to-entertainment leap 06:04 No degree, hired at eighteen 10:16 Reckless years, then sober in 2001 12:31 The Kats Report and coming back to the RJ 15:56 "I am but one man": covering all of Vegas 28:44 What Kats listens to, from Rush to Baby Keem 37:16 Penn & Teller and live music on the Strip 52:57 Becoming the institution In this episode How covering sports on deadline quietly trains you for everything else in journalism Why a single Mystère assignment rewired how he saw Las Vegas entertainment The lost world of "sightings" columns — and the Chris Evert one he had to kill How he gets educated on an artist fast, whether it's the Black Keys or a Grammy-winning rapper from Vegas Watching Penn turn into a real bass player during the pandemic 🎧 Listen everywhere: TheStereoImage.com Season 2 Episode 15 John Katsilometes, Kats Report, Las Vegas Review-Journal, Las Vegas entertainment, Mike Jones, The Stereo Image, jazz podcast, Penn and Teller, Las Vegas Strip, entertainment journalism