A decade ago, electronic duo Two Friends played a three-show mini residency at a Linq Hotel pool deck that did not even have a name. On Nov. 19, 2026, Matt Halper and Eli Sones will headline the T-Mobile Stage in the T-Mobile Zone at Sphere during the F1 Las Vegas Grand Prix, playing in the shadow of the giant sphere itself.
The gig marks a striking arc for a duo that met in seventh grade and formed their musical partnership in high school, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Sones recalled that the old Linq pool venue was not like a typical day club, a memory that stands in sharp contrast to Sphere's high-tech backdrop. The Strip venue in question opened in May 2015 as a 21-and-over pool space before later being branded Influence, The Pool at The LINQ, according to the Los Angeles Times.
A Stacked Lineup at the Base of Sphere
Two Friends will share the T-Mobile Stage bill during the Nov. 19-21, 2026 race weekend with a genre-spanning roster that includes Disclosure, Natasha Bedingfield, Gorgon City, Ja Rule, Sean Paul, Collect 200 and DJ Mandy, per the Review-Journal's reporting. Disclosure, the British duo of Guy and Howard Lawrence known for the album Settle, will headline the same stage on Nov. 20, 2026, while Sean Paul, known for hits including Get Busy and Temperature, closes things out on Nov. 21.
The stage sits at the base of Sphere with a giant emoji orb visible in the background, and the surrounding T-Mobile Zone offers ticketed fans Club Magenta activations, premium views, and exclusive perks for T-Mobile members. Grandstand ticket holders get assigned seats, while general admission holders get standing-room views and access to viewing platforms on a first-come, first-served basis, with food and beverage available for purchase throughout the zone.
Why Two Friends' Nightlife Home Base Is Shifting
Two Friends' current Las Vegas residency runs through the Wynn nightlife stable, but their fall shows are landing at Encore Beach Club at Night rather than their more familiar XS Nightclub. That is because XS closed in August 2026 for a top-to-bottom renovation lasting 90 to 120 days, with a planned reopening on New Year's Eve, as the Review-Journal reported. The club opened on New Year's Eve 2008 and is undergoing its first complete remodel in more than a decade.
The duo is booked at Encore Beach Club at Night on Sept. 13 and again on Oct. 10, both nights featuring Charly Jordan as a special guest. Their sound has been described as mixing Halper's rock leanings with electronic-driven mashups, a style built over nearly a decade as a live draw that has carried them from Madison Square Garden and Red Rocks to The Forum, Coachella, Lollapalooza and Bonnaroo.
Big Bootie Mix and a Growing Global Footprint
Two Friends built much of their audience through the Big Bootie Mix series, a project launched in 2012 that reached its 27th volume in May 2026, alongside the release of their EP Big Boots. Over the years the series has racked up hundreds of millions of streams across YouTube and SoundCloud, according to LIV Nightclub. The duo also built a following through viral remixes of The Killers' Mr. Brightside and Blink-182's I Miss You, and released new singles including Under the Table featuring Chris Lane and I Need Tomorrow featuring Jake Banfield.
In 2022, Two Friends launched Big Bootie Land, an annual single-day festival built to premiere new mix volumes in different cities, drawing tens of thousands of fans in markets like Boston, Chicago and Los Angeles, per EDM.com's reporting. The festival blends live sets with custom theatrical storylines, a format that has helped the duo scale from nightclub bookings to arena and amphitheater headline slots.
Vegas Is Their Last Remaining F1 Race in the U.S.
Halper said Two Friends are coming off Neon City Festival to perform at F1 Las Vegas, according to the Review-Journal, while Sones called the Las Vegas race the duo's last remaining Formula 1 event in the United States. The duo closed Neon City Festival at the Downtown Las Vegas Events Center in November 2025 with a 10:30 p.m. set, a festival that organizers built to draw both F1 visitors and locals looking to escape the race weekend crowds. Two Friends have also performed at F1 Miami and F1 Austin in recent years and are currently developing a dance project slated for release in the second half of 2026.
The Bigger Picture: F1's Long-Term Bet on Las Vegas
The Two Friends booking arrives amid a broader consolidation of F1's presence in Las Vegas. Formula 1, Clark County and the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority signed a 10-year contract extension in June 2026, locking the Las Vegas Grand Prix onto the global calendar through 2037 following three consecutive sold-out races since the event debuted in 2023, according to Formula 1. The race has generated $3.2 billion in cumulative economic impact for Southern Nevada across its 2023, 2024 and 2025 events, including $43 million in state and local tax revenues in 2025 alone, $15 million of which went to local K-12 public education.
That growth has not erased the event's rocky start. Liberty Media and the Las Vegas Grand Prix agreed in July 2026 to a $3 million class-action settlement compensating spectators who were ejected from grandstands during the disrupted opening-night practice session of the inaugural 2023 race, which was halted after eight minutes when a car struck a loose water valve cover, as Hoodline previously reported. Race organizers have also lined up additional star power for the weekend, with the Backstreet Boys announced in July 2026 to headline the official F1 Afterparty inside Sphere on Saturday, Nov. 21, with bundled ticket packages starting at $925, a booking Hoodline covered in its report on the Sphere afterparty lineup.
Elsewhere on the Strip during race weekend, Justin Carder & the Southern Language are booked at Caspian's at Caesars Palace on Friday, with Indie Florentino playing the same room on Saturday. Caspian's offers no-cover entry with paid table reservations, giving race weekend visitors another option beyond the Sphere stage and the Wynn nightlife circuit.
