As 'Late Night' loses its band, we rank the best groups ever on late night TV

When producers at Late Night with Seth Meyers told keyboardist and associate musical director Eli Janney the show would eliminate its live backing group, The 8G Band, due to budget cuts, he wasn’t all that surprised.

“This was a moment, honestly, we all saw coming,” said Janney, who made his name as a bassist and keyboardist for the indie rock band Girls Against Boys – and as a producer with artists like James Blunt – before musical director Fred Armisen asked him to join Late Night’s backing group in 2014.

Janney says Armisen was looking to bring an indie rock band into the world of late night TV.

Along with Janney on keyboards and Armisen on guitar, they had Seth Jabour on guitar, Marnie Stern on guitar, Syd Butler on bass and Kimberly Thompson on drums. But when Armisen’s performing career took off, he wound up leaving Janney in charge – returning for short stints as a guest drummer several times a year.

“About six months into the show, [Armisen] was like, ‘Hey I have to go work on the next season of Portlandia, I should be back in about 30 days,” Janney said, laughing. “And then he just never came back [full time].”

Thompson and Stern eventually left the band, and 8G began playing with a succession of guest drummers, including Iron Maiden’s Nicko McBrain, Styx’s Todd Sucherman and Queens of the Stone Age’s Jon Theodore. Janney said they likely performed with over 300 drummers; Taylor Hawkins of the Foo Fighters was on their schedule to appear when he died in 2022.

The group’s last appearance in a new episode is Thursday, with Armisen back playing drums for their final week. Ironically, Janney and Armisen were just nominated for an Emmy this year for best musical direction.

“I think we knew broadcast TV was shrinking in general…[and] there’s just a limit to how many people are watching after 12:30 [a.m.] at night on broadcast,” he added. “Everybody’s moving to streaming. But I thought we had a couple more years, at least.”

When I caught up with Janney on a Zoom call last week, he was philosophical and relatively upbeat, stressing that producers and star Seth Meyers had fought to keep the band. Instead, they’ll pre-record music that the show can use in future episodes.

Looking back on more late-night bands worth remembering

As a musician and late night TV nerd, I have an accompanying obsession with the bands who back the shows, and I’ve seen lots of them live. Late night bands often embody and amplify the tone of a show – Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show had a rollicking, old school big band, while Jimmy Fallon’s version has the urbane cool of rap/soul/funk stars The Roots.

Now that 8G joins the ranks of bands of the past, I’m reflecting on more late night bands that have – or will one day – go down in history. Here’s a list of the best.

#1: The World’s Most Dangerous Band/CBS Orchestra

Late Night with David Letterman (NBC) and The Late Show with David Letterman (CBS)

This group was squarely in my generation – a band I was hooked on from their early days with Letterman on NBC in the mid 1980s, right up until his retirement on CBS in 2015. It began as a hip four piece packed with the best session musicians in New York, including drummer Steve Jordan (now with the Rolling Stones), bassist Will Lee and often-barefoot guitarist Hiram Bullock, led by keyboardist and Saturday Night Live alum Paul Shaffer. Their stripped-down, funky sound was a welcome change from Carson’s massive, more traditional jazz band. Over the years, the group evolved into a much larger unit with two guitar players and a horn section; P-Funk keyboard legend Bernie Worrell even played with them for a time. And the band was capable of everything from skin-tight backing of James Brown to including guest musicians like David Sanborn and trading quips with Letterman himself.

“I watched them all the time…and just felt like they were on another level from what I was doing,” Janney said. “Also, they seemed to be having the best f---ing time. It wasn’t uptight at all.”

#2: The NBC Orchestra

The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (NBC)

So many of the traditions we associate with late night TV and music started with Carson’s big band, from a flashy, signature theme song to a group packed with ace musicians – like jazz trumpeters Clark Terry and Snooky Young. Trumpeter Carl “Doc” Severinsen led the group, wearing flashy clothes and bantering with Carson while occasionally leading bits like “Stump the Band,” where audience members tried to name songs they couldn’t play.

#3: The Roots

Late Night with Jimmy Fallon and The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon (NBC)

It may have seemed odd to some for a rap band from Philadelphia to join Late Night when SNL alum Fallon took over the show from Conan O’Brien in 2009. But it made perfect sense to me – bringing a modern, genre-blending attitude to the show while featuring one of the best bands in any category. And their “Slow Jam the News” segments are still a classic. Still, NBC took a little while to agree: bandleader Questlove told me they were originally signed to a succession of 13-week contracts, in case the network decided to make a change quickly.

#4: Jon Batiste and Stay Human

The Late Show with Stephen Colbert (CBS)

No shade to current Colbert bandleader/guitarist Louis Cato – an amazing multi-instrumentalist who I first saw playing drums with David Sanborn, George Duke and Marcus Miller years ago – but the first version of Colbert’s band led by piano prodigy Batiste was a breath of fresh, innovative air. The band, which Batiste had put together with classmates from Julliard well before they landed on Colbert‘s show, effortlessly moved from jazz and R&B to pop and even classical – with a cool way of playing while walking through the audience that recalled the Second Line marching bands from Batiste’s native New Orleans.

#5: David Sanborn and friends

Sunday Night/Night Music (NBC)

Executive produced by SNL showrunner Lorne Michaels, this show was an offbeat experiment which aired for two seasons beginning in 1988, featuring the late jazz saxophonist Sanborn and co-host Jools Holland with a band of ace backing musicians, performing with a wide array of different artists in one show. Bassist Marcus Miller (Miles Davis/Luther Vandross) was the musical director, with guitarist Hiram Bullock, drummer Omar Hakim (Sting/David Bowie), keyboardist Philippe Saisse and many more. Sanborn loved to bring different types of musicians together, having jazzers Carla Bley and Steve Swallow perform with funk master Bootsy Collins. And the band’s rocking take on “See the Light” with Jeff Healey remains one of my favorite performances by the late guitar god.