Add Grateful Dead and Simon&Garfunkel to the list (I am sure about the Dead and 99% on Simon and Garfunkel)
Sting was the guest host & musical performer for at least one episode (which aired the same week that the first Gulf War began.) He got the usual two musical breaks, but also performed a song in lieu of an opening monologue - the only time that (AFAIK) that’s happened.
U2 performed two songs at the tail end of the show, while the credits rolled. Another one-time-only (again AFAIK.)
I thought Garrett Morris’ greatest moment on “SNL” was when he got to sing a Mozart aria during the show hosted by Walter Matthau.
I never watched much SNL growing up, so I missed a lot of good performances.
However, this past season, Ray LaMontagne performed. It was the first time in a LONG time (like, since Pearl Jam played in the mid-'90’s) that I was awe-stricken by the musical guest. I rewatched his songs a few times on the DVR, and rushed up to iTunes to buy some of his stuff.
Phoenix got three songs last season. And I’ll add them to the list of best performances too, because they blew me away.
Devo was mentioned, but my favorite was their rendition of Satisfaction. It was a real WTF moment for me…in a good way.
I saw a re-run once with Paul Simon doing “Graceland” (with an African band) and Willie Nelson dueting on it. You wouldn’t think Texas Cowboy, New York Jew and South African band could make something together, but it was fantastic. (But then again, I think Willie Nelson could sing a duet with a jackhammer and make it work)
I liked Stone Temple Pilots’ performance of “Naked Sunday”; in fact, it struck me so that years later I asked for help on identifying the song here in one of those “help me find…” threads, and someone whose Google skills were better than mine figured it out. Scott Weiland sung the choruses through a small handheld, powered megaphone/bullhorn, and I loved the change in the sound of the vocals that this produced. I think I like that even better than the CD version, but I’m glad to have found out what song it was.
(This was the episode with Nicole Kidman as the host; one memorable sketch was her playing a little girl, meeting Michael Myers’ hyperactive kid character.)
Hey, the Blues Brothers were legit, hitting #1 on the Billboard 200.
Times have so changed, but back in the 70’s I was nonplussed to see some guy come out, sing in a regular workers outfit and then strip to bra and panites and wig.
Anyone who can figure out that one!
The performer’s name was Al Alen Petersen. That’s about all I can tell you about him. I’m not familiar with anything else he’s ever done
However, I recall him doing that same “I Gotta Be Me” drag number on a handful of other shows (including Richard Pryor’s short-lived variety show).
Who was the guy from the seventies, played a guitat, had a moustache and glasses, looked a little like Groucho Marx, but in a white suit or something like that. He kind of sang a mumbly, blues thing?
You mean Leon Redbone?
Leon was on several times. I had one performance up on Youtube until the jerks from NBC took it down. Which would be fine if it was available anywhere else.
I would soooooo love a link to this.
SNL was my first exposure to Kinky Friedman. I fell in love right away.
Pearl Jam tops the list for me…specifically Porch.
Sadly for Laura, Gloria still stands out in my memory as the SNL performance that went horribly, horribly wrong. IIRC it put a serious ding in her career.
I just finishing watching Kate Bush’s incredible performances on the Season 4 DVD. And then I watched them again. And then again. Absolutely stunning.
The other that stands out is Patti Smith’s “Gloria”. I remember seeing it way back and it instantly made me a Patti Smith fan. Seeing it again on the Season 1 DVD it was still as strong as it was then.
BTW on the same SNL episode with Eric Idle/Kate Bush, Gilda Radner does a wild drunken/stoned sendup of Patti Smith in a recording studio sketch.
Oh yeah, as Candy Slice. That was a great character. I remember her singing “Gimme Mick.”