It'd been a while since I'd eaten at Tao; I have a tendency to think of it more as a club than a restaurant (I have a feeling the staff does too). The host made us wait and said "I'll see what I can do" when we said we didn't have a reservation, giving us the impression that they might be booked. Inside, there were enough tables to make my girlfriend and I roll our eyes.
The Good: The drinks were amazing. We had the Tiger Lilly and the Black Pearl. The desert was also amazing (molten chocolate cake with coconut ice cream). My girlfriend really liked the spicy smoked salmon roll. We thought the jalapeño yellowtail was decent. The decor is really pretty.
The bad: The bus staff rushed around us and passed things over our head unsteadily. It makes it hard to relax when you worry that your girlfriend is going to get trampled because she's near a service entrance. The waiter was nice, but paced the meal poorly, so we spent a lot of time just waiting after we finished our jalapeño yellowtail. The music was also very loud and made it hard for us to hear each other or the waiter.
The ugly: The sushi wasn't fresh. The wild yellowtail, the white tuna and the hawaiian snapper were all virtually indistinguishable because they shared a common tinge of whatever coolers they were in. The soft shell crab roll was pretty tasteless and the sauce didn't add anything other than moisture to a dry roll.
My tiny girlfriend was hungry again after a couple of hours in the casino and we ended up going for another meal, so was that $130+tip we spent at Tao worth it?