The Queen of Vegas Beats DJ Lisa Pittman on the new lesbian hotspot

How did you come up with the name?

I probably spent a year wracking my brain between this and that. And it just kind of came to me as I was driving one day.

My whole theme behind it was Sin City, selling Vegas along with the event. I thought [about] the Seven Deadly Sins and hedonism. And then name Shedonism came to me. So we’ve built everything around a Sin party in Las Vegas. We’ve even created our own definition for the word.

Shedonism: The feminine art of being sinful. Excess, indulgence and debauchery. Devotion to pleasure as a way of life. Pleasure and happiness serve as the ultimate goal. Un-lady like behavior encouraged.

And Shedonism was born.

Once I had that all together and I had the hotel on board, everything started moving really fast. And got really big, really fast. So that’s when I brought Alison and Amy on board because I realized I needed bigger promoters, national promoters that could really make this big.

This is your partners Pandora Events out of South Beach¸ right? How did you meet them?

A few years back they hired me to work on their events. So when I had my stuff together for Shedonism, I called Alison and asked if she would negotiate the hotel contract for me. She said no I will not, but I will come on board if you want to take us on board. So, I thought about it a few days and decided it would be good to have them on board.

Pandora Events provides women with some of the best lesbian events in the country. Creators of Aqua Girl in Miami Beach as well as all of the women’s events for Atlanta Pride, they believe in partying with a purpose. With the National Center for Lesbian Rights and National Gay and Lesbian Taskforce as two of the many charities that benefit from the parties of Pandora Events.

Do you think this is something you want to take to other cities?

I was raised in Las Vegas. I watched it go from being this little town to this gigantic mega city, with this “if you build it, they will come” kind of mentality. I just want to make this bigger and bigger. Not necessarily to take to other cities, but make it one of the biggest gay events in the world. And then we can takeover huge hotels in Las Vegas. That’s my vision, that we just take it to the top, ya know?

It sounds like you’re living your dreams.

I am doing exactly what I want to be doing right now. This can be a tough business and it’s a lot different than it was when I started 10 years ago. The rewards are better because what I’m doing is on a much larger scale. I work in the newly crowned best nightclub in the world, the Marquee Club. I have a radio show. I do live gigs. I’d love to perform with like Rhianna or Lady Gaga.

So, right now you’re concentrating on bringing everyone to Vegas for a sinfully good time?

You know there’s tons of stuff to do in Vegas. So, you have to give people a really hot party to get them to come and spend their time with you. Our Pride is still relatively small. You know, we did our first Dyke March last year because of Shedonism. As a gay market, we still have a lot of space to grow. Vegas is a liberal city. There’s me and couple of other gay guys here trying to make Vegas a destination city for gays. Ironically enough Vegas is the number one or number two destination city for gays and lesbians. But they come to go to the shows and gamble not necessarily to go to the gay bars. It’s good to come and have a Vegas experience and we also want you to have a gay Vegas experience.

Spoken just like a mayor. Sign me up – Vegas here I come!