Few programmes on British television have maintained their routine as steadily as Later... With Jools Holland, which heads into its 69th series on Sunday, October 11. Broadcast on BBC Two, the show once again takes up residence in the Victorian auditorium at London's Alexandra Palace Theatre. The room itself dictates the pace. Arranged around the familiar circle of performance areas, the format still relies on the friction of placing completely different musicians in the same room, trading songs in rotation rather than isolating them behind individual production sets.
The opening night illustrates that contrast immediately. Paul Heaton is booked to perform, arriving shortly after securing his first UK Number One solo album with Jenius. Alongside the seasoned pop writer, the premiere turns over airtime to four acts making their television debuts. These newcomers include Mary In The Junkyard, Skye Newman, Wiltshire singer-songwriter Dermot Henry, and DC3, a Northampton rapper whose work incorporates gospel arrangements. Handing unproven artists their earliest television appearance has been a central fixture of the programme since its start, and the series premiere leans into that balance between household names and untested talent.
The first episode also steps away from the stage floor for a conversation between Holland and Johnny Marr. The guitarist will discuss The Age Of Everything, his latest solo effort scheduled to arrive on Friday, October 2. In putting the record together, Marr committed to an older method of working, playing eight of the ten songs live while on tour before committing anything to tape in a studio. As Marr pointed out, plenty of guitar bands talk about road-testing new material before recording, but very few follow through on the idea. Comparing his stubborn focus to the habits of Brian Eno and Damon Albarn, he observed that once an idea takes hold of him, he sees it through to the end unless something forces him off course.
The wider series roster leans into several autumn album campaigns. Jamie T is scheduled to appear across the run, bringing material from his upcoming record Ghosts (100 Days Of Morning), which arrives in October and was recently previewed by the single Tallahassee. Royal Blood are also set to perform tracks from their forthcoming fifth LP, Dead Company, due in November following the release of their single Swallow The Bomb. They are joined on the schedule by Bloc Party, who issued their seventh full-length album, Anatomy Of A Brief Romance, earlier in September, and Violet Grohl, following up on her debut release, Be Sweet To Me, which arrived in May.
Beyond traditional guitar outfits, the booking policy stretches into a wide spread of disciplines. Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi is slated to appear, as are Dexys Midnight Runners and Australian songwriter Courtney Barnett. The episodes also make room for jazz drummer Moses Boyd, cellist and vocalist Ayanna Witter-Johnson, Afrobeat collective Ibibio Sound Machine, and pianist Emily Bear, alongside appearances from Elkie Brooks, Shygirl, Kingfishr, Corto.Alto, Madra Salach, and Mulaa Joans.
The new run follows directly from series 68, which wrapped in June with appearances from Mitski, Florence + The Machine, James Blake, Jessie Ware, Niall Horan, Holly Humberstone, Lola Young, and Ellie Goulding. More than thirty years on from its debut, Holland's setup continues to rely on simple proximity, placing metal veterans, jazz players, pop chart-toppers, and television first-timers inside the same Victorian hall.
