Gavin Rossdale Plays Meditative Version of Bush’s ‘Glycerine’ With String Quartet on ‘Tonight Show’

Gavin Rossdale paid homage to the 30th anniversary of his band Bush on The Tonight Show on Tuesday night (Jan. 16) by throwing it back to (near) the beginning. Taking the stage alone in front of a stack of amps and wearing all black, backlit by green floodlights, Rossdale strummed out buzzy chords backed by a string quartet.

“It’s not my time, to wonder why/ Everything gone white, everything’s grey/ Now you’re here, now you’re away/ I don’t want this, remember that/ I’ll never forget, where you’re at,” Rossdale in his signature gravely voice, strumming along before dropping his guitar out to sing much of the second verse of the 1994 single a cappella.

For those old enough to remember, the performance was a throwback nod to the band’s first visit to the Tonight Show in 1996, when Jay Leno was behind the desk. As with Tuesday’s run-through, at the time Rossdale appeared by himself on stage, surrounded by a forest of candelabras and a string quartet to perform the song from the band’s multi-platinum 1994 debut album, Sixteen Stone; “Glycerine” peaked at No. 28 on the Billboard Hot 100 and spent 20 weeks on the chart.

The band — with Rossdale as the only original member — will celebrate their 30th anniversary this summer on a 32-date North American tour, Bush — Loaded: The Greatest Hits Tour. The outing slated to kick off on July 26 at the Hayden Homes Amphitheater in Bend, OR will feature support from Alice In Chains guitarist and solo act Jerry Cantrell and Candlebox and more guests to be announced soon.

Loaded The Greatest Hits 1994-2023 — Bush’s first-ever hits collection — is out now, compiling the band’s seven No. 1 singles, the new track “Nowhere to Go but Everywhere” and a studio cover of the Beatles’ “Come Together.” Among the beloved hits on the collection are: “Everything Zen,” “Little Things,” “Comedown,” “Glycerine,” “Machinehead,” “Swallowed” and “Greedy Fly.”

Watch Bush on The Tonight Show below.