Band Toon

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

When a music act (band or solo) gets big enough, sooner or later, someone will probably attempt to make a TV show featuring said musician(s). This show is often animated, and the band members may be Not Quite Starring.

The standard format for such shows usually goes like this: the band is Touring the World, often riding in a Cool Car or tour bus (or even better, a Cool Tour Bus!). They have an adventure in every city. They solve the issue in time to sing a song at the end of the show.

Alternately, it may be a flashback series, showing the band in their hometown as up-and-coming performers looking to make their big break. And getting in and out of adventures and singing a song at the end. Other series may go even further, casting the band as Superheroes, secret agents, or the like who just happen to be able to sing or play really well: a very literal Five-Man Band. If the group also recently had a movie released, the cartoon may be a continuation of that, usually (when necessary) changing the names of the movie's characters back to the performers' real or stage names. Expect a Gratuitous Animal Sidekick to be added to the crew. Often, They Fight Crime using The Power of Rock.

Inevitably, fame being what it is nowadays, most groups end up declining in popularity shortly after the airing of these shows. This might be because getting one's own cartoon usually happens at the height of one's popularity, and one can only go down from there. It could also be claimed, however, that getting your own cartoon is a sign of "selling out." (Though one could argue that many of the examples listed never bought in.) Whether this is true or not, you gotta admit: If someone offered the opportunity for you to have your own cartoon, wouldn't you take it?

A form of Animated Adaptation. See also Celebrity Toons. Not to be confused with banned toons, which are a different matter entirely.

Examples of Band Toon include:

Non-Animated Examples

  • The Monkees
  • Starland Vocal Band, whose show was so bad, that their announcer stated that he was glad that nobody would be watching the show. It was cancelled shortly after it began. Their announcer did slightly better. His name is David Letterman.
  • "KISS Saves Christmas" may have been inspired by an actual Hanna-Barbera telefilm, KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park, released at the band's height of popularity. In it, the band battles a Circus of Fear with? Guess. They were also rock-based superheroes in their short-lived comic book.
    • Which in turn spawned a video game.
  • S Club 7 had Miami 7, LA 7, "Hollywood 7", "Viva S Club" and The Movie "Seeing Double", about a British pop group trying to make it big in America (as well as the unrelated "S Club Go Wild", a safari show). It's debatable whether the band was made for this purpose or not.
  • allStars* were probably made for their TV Show, STARStreet*, but again, it's debatable.
  • Pink Lady ...And Jeff, which tried to make a J-pop girl duo into stars in America. It failed, and was canceled after only a couple weeks on the air.
  • Avenged Sevenfold: The Cartoon. Need I say more?
  • Who could forget The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour? OK, maybe a lot of people would want to forget that one.
  • The Fresh Beat Band
  • The Aquabats! Super Show!, a live action/animated Widget Series featuring aforementioned superhero rock band The Aquabats!, from the fine people that brought you Yo Gabba Gabba!. Subversion in that The Aquabats have been trying to get the show off the ground since 1997 (and it serves as the closest brush with fame they've had since that year as well).
  • Inverted with Spinal Tap- a fictional band, but because of the parody/mockumentary, they actually do have a few albums out, and a hit called "Big Bottoms".
  • Subverted and averted with Almost Famous. A very fictionalized movie account of the protagonist's start, using several real examples from real musicians/bands, such as the quote about beiong a golden god, and the use of the name Stillwater, which was a real band, for the titular band. Songs were written for the film, and are not similar in style to the actual band Stillwater, but became well-known. So for the ACTUAL band, it was averted, and subverted in other facets.