Listen Best Late Night/Variety Show Band

[member 603]

So after discussing horn sections with different friends, the larger consensus is that the best modern horn sections are in late night bands. Then the discussion turned into who had/is the best Late Night/Variety Show band. Here were some nominees....

David Letterman's Band

The Roots (Fallon Show)

Max Weinberg Seven (Conan O'Brien)

Jimmy Vivano and the Basic Cable Band (Conan O'Brien)

Stephen Colbert's band

SNL- G.E. Smith Era

Those were the picks... My personal choice was a tie between Letterman's Band, and SNL- G.E. Smith Era.... If you know of any other bands that should be included, please include them.

 

[Hauler]

Didn't The Roots have a large amount of commercial success before taking the steady talk show gig?

 

[Robbie Hart]

I have no idea

 

[member 603]

Didn't The Roots have a large amount of commercial success before taking the steady talk show gig?

They did ok, I think their biggest hit was The Seed 2.0 featuring Cody Chestnutt.... They've appeared as the backing band behind a lot of people too

 

[Nemo?]

The roots win IMO.

 

[Gay For Longo]

Roots and it's not close imo

 

[BeardOfKnowledge]

The Roots were awesome before they moved onto being a band for Fallon.

 

[BeardOfKnowledge]

Didn't The Roots have a large amount of commercial success before taking the steady talk show gig?

They were a little more of an underground act, but yes they had won at least one Grammy.

 

[Gay For Longo]

Didn't The Roots have a large amount of commercial success before taking the steady talk show gig?

Not so much mainstream although they did have a couple bigger songs and worked with a ton of artists
Black thought is legit as fuck and who id say is the King of Philly rap scene (sorry gullie)
They have been hot on the street for 20 - 25 years

 

[Grateful Dude]

G.E. Smith era was something else. He’s a talented dude, and was a good band leader.

 

[member 603]

Lots of love for the Roots, and they are phenomenal... But I think you guys are sleeping on that Late Show band, Paul Shaffer had some MONSTERS in that band... Bernie Worrell, Anton Fig, Felicia Collins, Will Lee..... These guys played every award show at the time, they accompanied a TON of solo artists and bands... They were great.

That G.E. Smith Era SNL band too played with a bunch of artists on the show, and they were such amazing players for like 10 years.

The Roots are amazing, but like you mentioned, they were pretty established before the gig... These other bands got established on these shows

 

[Gay For Longo]

Lots of love for the Roots, and they are phenomenal... But I think you guys are sleeping on that Late Show band, Paul Shaffer had some MONSTERS in that band... Bernie Worrell, Anton Fig, Felicia Collins, Will Lee..... These guys played every award show at the time, they accompanied a TON of solo artists and bands... They were great.

That G.E. Smith Era SNL band too played with a bunch of artists on the show, and they were such amazing players for like 10 years.

The Roots are amazing, but like you mentioned, they were pretty established before the gig... These other bands got established on these shows

No denying their talent, it more comes down to musical taste for me
Paul has done some great shit and even worked with artists that I really like but off the top or my head, I couldn't tell you another person in the band and probably couldn't name more than 3 songs

 

[member 603]

No denying their talent, it more comes down to musical taste for me
Paul has done some great shit and even worked with artists that I really like but off the top or my head, I couldn't tell you another person in the band and probably couldn't name more than 3 songs

Bernie Worrell was a keyboardist... Famous for playing with Funkadelic, also was in Black Jack Johnson (With Doug Wimbash and Will Calhoun from Living Colour, Dr Know from Bad Brains, and Mos Def), Bucket of Bernie Brains (with Les Claypool and sometimes Buckethead). Anton Fig was the drummer, and has played with a whose who of projects, heavily endorsed, and runs awesome seminars on drumming (I sat through one, and I felt like a better drummer... And I don't play drums). Will Lee is a icon on Bass, tons of seminars at NAMM, heavily endorsed, has played on a ton of albums for artists, as well as his own stuff. Felicia Collins played guitar with Madonna, Thompson Twins, Vonda Shepard, P-Funk, I saw her in NYC with her own blues band and was AMAZING... Individually and collectively this was an AMAZING band.

 

[member 603]

G.E. Smith era was something else. He’s a talented dude, and was a good band leader.

He was so incredible on SNL, and other gigs that band was doing at the time, that at one point I had forgotten that he was in Hall & Oates.

 

[BeardOfKnowledge]

The Roots are amazing, but like you mentioned, they were pretty established before the gig... These other bands got established on these shows

It's funny. I remember when someone told me they had taken the gig my initial reaction was "No way, they're already an established touring act."

 

[Gay For Longo]

Bernie Worrell was a keyboardist... Famous for playing with Funkadelic, also was in Black Jack Johnson (With Doug Wimbash and Will Calhoun from Living Colour, Dr Know from Bad Brains, and Mos Def), Bucket of Bernie Brains (with Les Claypool and sometimes Buckethead). Anton Fig was the drummer, and has played with a whose who of projects, heavily endorsed, and runs awesome seminars on drumming (I sat through one, and I felt like a better drummer... And I don't play drums). Will Lee is a icon on Bass, tons of seminars at NAMM, heavily endorsed, has played on a ton of albums for artists, as well as his own stuff. Felicia Collins played guitar with Madonna, Thompson Twins, Vonda Shepard, P-Funk, I saw her in NYC with her own blues band and was AMAZING... Individually and collectively this was an AMAZING band.

@Rhino up in here dropping knowledge
I honestly had no idea they were that accredited
I really should have known Dr Know, was a big bad brains fan when I was younger and still a big mos def fan

 

[member 603]

@Rhino up in here dropping knowledge
I honestly had no idea they were that accredited
I really should have known Dr Know, was a big bad brains fan when I was younger and still a big mos def fan

I got legit lucky and was invited to a club in Brooklyn they were playing once.... No idea who they were, the entry fee was $25, I was like "For WHO???". The door guy was like "I think it's a guy from Living Colour, but I saw Mos Def in there earlier".... I paid the fee and still get somewhat mad that I was about to walk away from that show.