Embed and breakfast man: The New Pornographers

The New Pornographers did Letterman yesterday. Here, don't take my word for it - here they are...

Embed and Letterman: Sleater-Kinney

"Okay, okay, we get it, there's a lot of bands who've played Letterman. Make it stop now."

Fair enough, but one last dip into Dave's archives, for Sleater-Kinney, of course:



[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and Letterman: Vampire Weekend

There's a limit to the room to say anything interesting ahead of these video clips, giving they all come from the same programme:



[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and Letterman: The Bangles

This is from something like 1945. The Bangles doing Hero Takes A Fall:



[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and Letterman: Pulp

Late-night American television audiences getting introduced to the concept of rich students from St Martins slumming it:



[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and Letterman: Guided By Voices

GBV. 2012.



[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and Letterman: Pink

Something a little poppier now, although not that much poppier, as Pink turns up in her teen goth mode to do Family Portrait:



[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and breakfast man: Blur

It's easy to forget that Blur once did pop music instead of making cheese and running for council. Back in 1999, they did this version of Tender for Letterman:



[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and Letterman: Sonic Youth

1992 was something of a great year for Dave. Here he is, young looking and introducing Sonic Youth:



(There's a less wobbly, but unshareable version over on YouTube)

A couple of years later, they were back to do Bull In The Heather:



[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and Letterman: Alabama Shakes

From a couple of years back, Alabama Shakes:



[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and Letterman: David Bowie

Here's a poorly-dressed Bowie from the start of the century, pushing the Heathen album and talking about the internet:



Enough talking. Let's hear him do some music:


[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and Letterman: Pixies (2)

So, Letterman had the Pixies on when they reformed. Which is good, but he also had them on first time round.

Here they are in 1992:



[Part of Embed and Letterman]

Embed and breakfast man: Letterman

With David Letterman announcing his retirement, it's worth recalling that American TV isn't just losing a programme which mined a seam of inspired humour (albeit one which kept on mining after the seam was worked out), but also a show with a brilliant music booking policy.

Let's have a quick look, shall we?

Here's Pixies doing Monkey Gone To Heaven as a kick-off:


[More to come]
Earlier Pixies
David Bowie
Alabama Shakes
Sonic Youth
Blur
Guided By Voices
Pink
Pulp
Luscious Jackson
The Bangles
Vampire Weekend
Sleater-Kinney

Embed and breakfast man: Dum Dum Girls

Ah, let's cleanse our palette with a virtually brand-new video from the Dum Dum Girls, shall we?



As a bonus, here's the band on Letterman from last month:

Happy Birthday, Golden Gate

The Golden Gate bridge is 75 years old tomorrow (it opened to the public on May 27th, 1937). It went on to inspire, of course, one of the greatest pop songs of this or any age:

[Buy: The Woods]

Embed and breakfast man: The Joy Formidable

From last night's Letterman: The Joy Formidable:



[Buy: The Big Roar]

Embed and breakfast man: Thurston Moore

A morning delight from late-night: Thurston Moore on Letterman, doing Benediction: [Buy: Demolished Thoughts] [via The Audio Perv]