Conan O’Brien Talks New Band the Vigodas

When Conan O’Brien takes the stage at the Teragram Ballroom in downtown Los Angeles on Friday night, he’s wearing tight black jeans, a custom black jacket sporting the band’s name, and a wide smile. He greets the crowd by asking how many people had seen his cover band, the Vigodas. A few shout that they had, but the vast majority were there to see him for the first time. And despite his fame, that makes sense. Though he’s probably one of the most recognizable and beloved people in Hollywood, at this point, the band has only done about 10 shows around Southern California since premiering last May. 

They draw a wide range of fans. Some know him from his days hosting Late Night, while others seem to be dedicated listeners to his long-running interview podcast, Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend —a smattering appear young enough to have only seen clips of him during his network heyday. The band run through more than a dozen covers — from Elvis Presley and Elvis Costello to Bo Diddley and John Lennon — an eclectic mix of rock & roll spanning the 1950s through the 1980s that is probably best described as the music that won’t get out of O’Brien’s head. 

“When I was in college, when everyone else was starting to listen to U2 and Oingo Boingo, I was into hardcore rockabilly,” O’Brien, 63, tells Rolling Stone backstage before the show, running his fingers through the front of his ginger mane, which leaves it in a four-inch wave above his head. “I had the hair for it.” He loved the raucous sounds of Jerry Lee Lewis and early Elvis Presley. “Over the years, I would pick up these songs that were like adrenaline,” he says. “One of them is Ronnie Hawkins’ version of ‘40 Days,’” which they play later during their set.

Though the crowd never seems to break a sweat, they’re engaged through the hour-plus set, occasionally singing along and doing little solo swing dances in place. (There are also a surprising number of couples making out.) But the best part of the night is the overwhelming joy on O’Brien’s face as he jams onstage with four other guys 20 years his junior, whom he only met a few months ago but became fast friends. 

O’Brien is probably still best known for his decades as a talk-show host, but it was the podcast that launched the band, he says, when he had singer Norah Jones on in May 2023. “I’ve known Norah over the years, and she always remembered me having a guitar whenever she would come do the late-night show,” O’Brien says. “She said, ‘How’s the guitar going?’ And I said, ‘You know, it’s kind of sad because I don’t really have anyone to play with, and I need someone to kind of kick my ass and help my game.’ She said, ‘I know a guy.’”

The guy was guitarist Jason Roberts, who’d played in Jones’ band for more than a decade. He started giving O’Brien lessons, and they would nerd out about their shared love of the Beatles. “We text about the Beatles a lot,” Roberts says later. “We just both love the Beatles so much.”

About six months ago, O’Brien asked Roberts if he’d be down to take their lessons to the next level. “He was just like, ‘Can you help me put a band together?’” Roberts remembers. “And I said, “I know the exact guys for this.” O’Brien tells the same story. “A week later, we’re in Hollywood, and we’re playing,” he says. “I’m just floating, so happy.”

They named themselves after the late actor Abe Vigoda — another towering figure with an expressive face, best known for his roles in The Godfather and Barney Miller. “Abe was a fixture on my old late show, he did hundreds of bits for us, and he was a sweet and hilarious man. I always knew his iconic mug was the face of our band,” says O’Brien. He had never played in a band as a teenager, but always wanted to. “For years and years and years, you could argue that the only reason I wanted a late-night show was so I could have a band,” he says. Back when he was working with the Max Weinberg 7, and later Jimmy Vivino and the Basic Cable Band, he would join them to jam every time they had rehearsal. “I’d put on a guitar and I would play with them and sing songs,” he says. “We had a good repertoire. And then when I went through my Tonight Show madness” — referring to the six months he spent behind the desk of the NBC institution from 2009 to 2010 — “we went out on the road and we did a comedy show, but also it had a lot of music in it too, and that was my happy place.” 

O’Brien seems comfortable as a cover man, satisfied to reinterpret the music he loves — often by speeding them up. A few years ago, he ran into Beverly D’Angelo at a party, and she commented to him at just how fast his version of “40 Days” was when she heard it on tour. Earlier this year, when the Rolling Stones asked him to introduce them and their new album at a concert in Brooklyn, he ran into Keith Richards backstage. “Keith said to me, he said, ‘I heard your ‘Monkey Business,’” O’Brien says, referring to the Chuck Berry cover he recorded with Jack White for 2010’s Live at Third Man. O’Brien was surprised he knew who he was, much less had heard his 16-year-old record. “You’re kidding,” he replied. “[Keith] went, ‘You sound like a fucking auctioneer.’” O’Brien laughs. “He’s not wrong.”

Part of the joy of the band is the excuse to tour different venues in Los Angeles. Their first show was at Permanent Records Roadhouse, a tiny club in East L.A. where they played as a surprise guest after Fred Armison’s regularly scheduled set. Since then, they’ve had a tour of Los Angeles’ finest small stages, from the Troubadour to the Lodge Room to the Moroccan Lounge. “I’m a connoisseur of kooky backstages,” he says, remembering a time he hung out with his friend and idol Bob Newhart backstage at the Chicago Theatre. “I had a goofy dressing room, and Bob Newhart said, ‘Conan, no matter what you achieve in show business, whenever you get to the theater and they show you your dressing room, there’s always a piece of dead brown lettuce on the floor. That’s just the way it is.” He smiles at the thought. “It’s very humbling.”

Aside from getting to see the bowels of these Art Deco monuments, the other point of the band, O’Brien says, is to be able to share the stage with other musicians whose work he loves. There are the folks in his outfit, sure — Roberts the guitarist, Erik Kertes on bass, Ben Alleman on keys, and Josh Adams on drums (Rob Jensen filled in on Friday for Adams, who is on tour with the Fruit Bats). But there are all the openers, too, like Malena Cadiz tonight — an Americana singer-songwriter with a lush voice — or Sam Evans, who opened for them at Pappy and Harriet’s out in Joshua Tree a few weeks ago. Each night, he asks those openers to join them for a song or two. “I want it to be a hootenanny,” O’Brien says. “I want it to be something where we roll along and other people jump in. Because I have no future in the music business, but I can be like a small part of it.”

The Vigodas’ Teragram Ballroom Set List
“7 Nights to Rock” – Nick Lowe
“No Action/Radio Radio” –  Elvis Costello
“Baby Let’s Play House” – Elvis Presley
“You Can Have the Crown” – Sturgill Simpson
“Werewolves of London” – Warren Zevon 
“Jump into the Fire” – Harry Nilsson 
“Hello Mary Lou” – Ricky Nelson (with Malena Cadiz)
“Twenty Flight Rock” – Eddie Cochran
“Forty Days” – Ronnie Hawkins
“I’m So Tired” – John Lennon
“Victoria” – The Kinks (with Gaby Moreno)
“Proud Mary” – Ike and Tina Turner (with Gaby Moreno) 
“Who Do You Love” – Bo Diddley 
“Not Fade Away” – Buddy Holly (partial song) 
“Polk Salad Annie” – Elvis Presley 
“Up on Cripple Creek” – The Band