I was watching this clip of the Pixies on Letterman in '92 and was just flabbergasted to see half of the band sitting on stools on the side of the stage, replaced by Letterman’s house band stooges! Then, as if to add flavor to taste, Paul Schaffer plays a huge, embarrassing wanky keyboard solo in the middle of the song. There really aren’t enough wtf’s on my keyboard to process this.
Why was this insulting, bizarre practice done? When did it stop?
Always bugged me too, especially when I thought Dave was so cool but he was hanging out with the huge dork Paul Schaffer. Seemed like they made the musicians play with them if they wanted to be on the show.
I’d bet real money that this traces back to some obscure union rule or contract provision that’s since been repealed.
It may, but keep in mind that Schaffer and the rest of the band were and are accomplished and prolific studio musicians, who may well have performed with the guests on albums in the past.
For the most part, Schaffer and his band are considered highly-respected music insiders. Most bassists would kill to play next to Will Lee - same with drummers and Anton Fig (I’ve seen Anton take over a drum set from a lesser player - he was very nice and diplomatic about it, but the guy was totally schooled)…
…okay, watching the video: hmmm - I got nuthin’ - no clue why the other Pixies didn’t play in any meaningful way…that doesn’t look like a respect issue - more like either a weird union issue (doubtful) or a lack of trust in the other musicians’ ability to carry it off on live TV??? Even then - doubtful; Kim Deal never professed much technique on bass, but she coulda pull that off…
That’s also true, but it’s hard to believe that bands would use these guys in a high-profile television appearance over their own band members unless they didn’t have any choice.
I’d like an answer too, because this was absolutely standard for virtually every band, no matter how big, that came on the show in the old days. Either the band replaced some of the members or played with them, if only to lend a big band sound. No other late night band ever did it, to my knowledge, so the union regulation is doubtful.
How much effort is it to set up a band and their musical equipment? Maybe it’s just a logistic issue - there’s no sense in spending a couple of hours setting up a second band when you’ve already got one band ready to play.
Wow, that was … odd. What a mess, although, I must say, it actually was kind of interesting hearing what a decent drummer would sound like behind the Pixies. It’s certainly missing Lovering’s quirk and is a little too studio-perfect for the Pixies, but interesting nonetheless. And Paul Schaeffer’s solo? Wow, what a bad idea.
As far as I know, it’s always happened and still is. I’m sure the bands are just obliging Dave and Paul in their own “house”. When you go on the road and tour with a band (not that I have) I’m sure you must whore yourself out in every way possible to get some publicity for your group, so whatever happened there on the show was I’m sure worth all the viewer awareness going on at the same time.
With this topic fresh in mind, I found Sonic Youth’s first appearance on the show, which is alternately tragic and heeeeeelarious. Two drummers? Square session musician-type dudes trying to “play along” to SY’s atonal squall? The freakout at the end! Priceless!
That actually wasn’t bad at all – I don’t think I was able to hear any of Letterman’s band behind that one. It was funny to try to see the house band fit in (check out Paul with his keyboard towards the end.)
Actually, I’ve always kind of liked the Letterman approach of having the house band play with the showcase band. I figure, most of these bands I’ve already seen do their thing in concert, on TV, or wherever, why not mix it up a bit and give us something unique?
I agree. I always assumed that they wanted to do something a bit different for the musical guests on the show. Musicians seem to love mixing it up and it seems likely that most musical guests would really enjoy a chance to play with some great session guys.
That still doesn’t explain why some of the Pixies were sitting out though.
It used to be a big deal when Paul let a musical guest sit with him behind the keyboards. I remember back in the day there were only a few that had been allowed (Billy Joel and Eddie Van Halen I remember). Is that still the case?
That was all kinds of awesome. I’ve recently re-discovered Sonic Youth, I had cassettes of their music but I forgot about them in the CD and then MP3 era.
There’s a documentary called “The Year Punk Broke” that follows Sonic Youth on a European tour along with Dinosaur Jr, Babes in Toyland, and Nirvana. Pretty neat documentary, well worth watching for the interviews and general craziness. Thurston is a weird dude, I think we should hang out. There’s one scene where Kurt Cobain comes into what looks like a backstage room with a bottle of champagne, says something silly, pops the cork and sprays the champagne everywhere, and then throws the bottle across the room.
I checked with a buddy of mine - a NYC session drummer. Not much:
I think my buddy is correct about “follow the money” - but it is unclear what money factors led to that behavior…
I’ll lake you up on that. How about $100?
That would make sense if the additional musicians didn’t perform on camera, but in David Letterman’s case, all the musicians perform – the guest band and the house band (well, with Lovering in that Pixies clip excepted.) My guess is it’s just some kind of tradition. Who knows how it started, but if I were in the house band, I’d think it’d be fun to perform along with all these great bands coming through. Sure would make the gig much more interesting than just providing incidental music.
I’ve seen the same phenomenon also, albeit less frequently, on Jay Leno, most frequently with “indie” newer acts.
My guess was that it was a budgetary issue. Either the show, or the indie label with limited funds, wasn’t willing to foot the bill to fly out the whole band and their gear for a quick promo, so instead the house band would take up the slack.
I used to watch Letterman almost every night. It was not every band. Some bands only wanted to play their music one way. It is something they do for fun. It never seemed forced to me. I’m sure it was something Paul pushed for when the guest got there just because he wanted to do it. Some of the artists would play with the band all night, not just the parts that were aired.
I’m not a Letterman fan, so I don’t watch it often. But I do think that their band is really good. I remember that Clapton used to like to sit in fairly often. Paul’s sense of humor and banter is weak, but the band is damn good.