The 8G Band will be playing its last tunes on Late Night With Seth Meyers this summer.
NBC-imposed budget cuts to the show mean that the house band — keyboard player Eli Janney, guitarist Seth Jabour and bassist Syd Butler — will be going away when Late Night begins its new season in the fall. The trio have been part of the show since its debut in 2014; Fred Armisen was the bandleader for much of that time but has been more of a guest performer in the past few years.
“Seth Meyers and Mike Shoemaker, the showrunner, brought us in in person to talk about it. They expressed their regret and frustration about it,” Janney said in an interview with Vulture. “They had been trying to work it out for months, but in the end NBC was adamant about where they wanted the budget to go. It’s not just the band; there’s a whole crew that works with the band, so there’s a lot of people employed.”
Sources confirm that the band won’t be a regular part of the show beginning next season.
Janney told Vulture that while the band members won’t be in the Late Night studio starting in the fall, viewers will still be able to hear them: He said the 8G Band will record “a whole bunch” of music for the show to use for guest introductions and returns from commercial breaks.
Among current network late-night shows, only CBS’ After Midnight — which is structured more like a game show — operates without a house band. Conan O’Brien’s TBS show didn’t have a band for its final years, after going from an hour-long show to a half-hour in 2019.
Meyers recently renewed his deal at NBC, which will keep him in place as the host of Late Night through 2028. The show celebrated its 10th anniversary in February.
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