Stray Cats played "Rock This Town" on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on Tuesday night, with Brian Setzer on guitar, Lee Rocker on upright bass and Slim Jim Phantom at his usual standing drum kit.
Consequence, which posted the performance on August 19, 2026, had Setzer back at full power on the rockabilly guitar and Rocker plucking his strings hard enough to hear it. JamBase said the trio arrived at the taping back at full strength.
The appearance came at the end of the band's summer 2026 tour, which marked Setzer's return to the road after an autoimmune disorder made playing the guitar a serious problem and forced the cancellation of their 2025 tour.
Setzer said in a statement that it is good to be healthy and strong again, and pointed to what the group is built on: "The Gretsch guitar, the acoustic bass, and the stand-up drums still sound pure and fresh today."
The fall leg starts on November 9 at the Texas Trust CU Theatre in Grand Prairie and runs to December 6 at the Premier Theater at Foxwoods in Mashantucket, Connecticut. In between sit the Majestic Theatre in San Antonio, the Orpheum in Memphis, the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, the Fox Theatre in Atlanta and the Count Basie Center for the Arts in Red Bank, New Jersey.
One wrinkle in the reporting: Consequence wrote that the run kicks off in San Antonio on November 10, while its own list of dates and JamBase both start it a night earlier in Grand Prairie.
The fall dates are on the tour guide with the rest of the rock calendar, which also holds Iron Maiden opening a North American run and a 50th anniversary Ramones tribute in Hollywood.
The band's last late night television performance had been in 1990, on Letterman, playing "Gene and Eddie", their song for Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran. They went back to Cochran again in 2025, recording his "Teenage Heaven" and releasing it alongside a new song called "Stampede", the first new music the band had put out since 2019.
The facts
- Stray Cats played Rock This Town on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.
- The lineup was Brian Setzer, Lee Rocker and Slim Jim Phantom.
- It was their first live late-night TV performance since 1990.
- Their 1990 appearance was on Letterman, playing Gene and Eddie.
- The fall tour runs November 9 to December 6, 2026.
- It opens at the Texas Trust CU Theatre in Grand Prairie, Texas.
- Setzer cancelled the 2025 tour because of an autoimmune disorder.
- Teenage Heaven and Stampede arrived in 2025.
How this checks out
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