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{{trope}}
{{Examples Need Sorting}}
{{quote|'''Attacking Tucans:''' "We should form a musical group."
'''[[Josh Jepson]]:''' "No we shouldn't. That sounds like a horrible idea."
'''Attacking Tucans:'''<ref>Does anybody else think "Attacking Tucans" is a good name for a rock band?</ref> "Lets do it! Band names... We should call ourselves... The Throbbing Masses!"
|''[[Super Mario Sunshine Versus]]''}}
There are a lot of different categories or varieties of band name, and they often correspond to the era or genre of the band in question. This page has some of these, and examples from real life and fiction. Fictional bands often have utterly dreadful names that are poking fun at certain genres.
[
Compare [[Trope Names for
{{examples|Examples of Good Names for Rock Bands include:}}
{{TOCright}}
== "The" Bands ==
The most timeless of band names, this style of band naming transcends genre and is enduringly popular. Probably because of The Beatles. You can't usually tell a lot about how a band will sound if its called The Whatever. Sometimes a joke will be made about someone being out of touch with modern music by having them add a "The" to a band name that does not usually take a "The," such as "The Led Zeppelins" or "The Alkaline Trio." (In a case of [[Truth in Television]], Eurythmics, Pet Shop Boys, Scorpions, Ben Folds Five and others often suffer this. Inverted by [[The Prodigy]], as many people think the band name is Prodigy.<ref>The front cover of their most popular album, ''Fat of the Land'', and the subsequent ''[[Always Outnumbered Never Outgunned]]'' showed only the word "Prodigy." However, Liam Howlett stated that the band's name has always included the article.</ref>) Band names that follow the "The Plural Nouns" style are something of a [[Dead Horse Trope]] and more modern "The" band names tend to be more of a "The Abstract Noun" or "The Adjective" style. Talking Heads were aware of this, and went to great lengths not to be called 'the' Talking Heads, including naming an album, "The Name of This Band is Talking Heads".
It should be pointed out, however, that "The Plural Nouns" would be a really great name for a band. Some guys on ''[[
A note about "The" bands: a few certain bands follow this formula but omit the "The;" for example, one can say "The Bangles" or "The Scorpions" (and most folk do), but technically they are named Bangles and Scorpions. Same with (the) Eagles, (the) Pixies, (the) Arcade Fire, and (the) Faces. (The) [[Pet Shop Boys]] don't use the article in written materials but have been known to say "the Pet Shop Boys" in speech (and sang, or more accurately ''covered'' (!), a song entitled "We're the Pet Shop Boys.")
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An inversion: [[Pink Floyd]] was known as The Pink Floyd during the Syd Barrett year(s).
===
*
=== Film ===
*
* In ''[[Light of Day]]'', Joe Rasnick's band is called The Barbusters.
* The One-ders of ''[[That Thing You Do]]!''
* The Lone Rangers from ''[[Airheads]]''.
=== Literature ===
* The Paranoids (a Beatles ripoff) from [[Thomas Pynchon]]'s ''[[The Crying of Lot 49]]''.
* The Weird Sisters, from ''[[Harry Potter (novel)|Harry Potter]]'', said to be one of the most popular wizard bands out there, and booked to play at Hogwarts at the Yule Ball in ''[[Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (novel)|Goblet of Fire]]''. ([[Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (film)|The film]] made them punk rockers.) Nymphadora Tonks is a fan.
* The Band With Rocks In, from ''[[Soul Music (novel)|Soul Music]]''. Also The Whom, The Blots and The Surreptitious Fabric, all names briefly used by a wannabe band (and not coincidentally all puns on the names of real bands).
* ''[[The Commitments]]''. Chosen deliberately, and explained in the book and film that "all the great sixties bands were 'the somethings'".
** And naturally, there are at least two bands called "The Somethings".
* The Stillborn (from one of [[George Carlin]]'s books)
* The Last Days, from the book of the same name.
=== Live-Action TV ===
* From ''[[Saturday Night Live]]'', [[The Blues Brothers]].
* The Worthless Peons, Ted's band on ''[[Scrubs]]''.
=== Theatre ===
* The Dreamettes from ''[[Dreamgirls]]''.
=== Video Games ===
* The Gavinners, from ''[[Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney|Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney]]''.
** Of course, the band was originally called Garyuu Wave in the Japanese version, ''[[Gyakuten Saiban 4]]''...
* The Knights of Rockville, Achmed and Amir from ''[[Backyard Sports]]''{{'}}s band
* The Midnight Riders from ''[[Left 4 Dead|Left 4 Dead 2]]''.
** They actually have a few songs. If you're wondering, they are in the the game as well as on the band's [[YouTube]] page.
=== Web Original ===
* The Negative Adjectives, from punk webcomic ''[[Nothing Nice to Say]]''
=== Web Comics ===
* The Plural Nouns, of ''[[The Order of the Stick]]'' forum.
* The Crotchmen (who even print bumper stickers that read "Who Watches The Crotchmen?" to sell at their shows) from the webcomic ''[[Sacred Heart]]''.
===
* The Baljeetles from the ''[[Phineas and Ferb]]'' episode of the name name.
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* [[The Agonist]]
* [[The
* [[The Band]] - best name ever
* [[The Beatles (band)|The Beatles]] (They named themselves as such because they were huge Buddy Holly fans and Holly's band were known as The Crickets. Crickets and beetles are both insecty beings.)
* [[The
* [[The Blanks]] - An ''a capella'' group fronted by Sam Lloyd, the actor that plays Ted Buckland on ''[[Scrubs]]''. See The Worthless Peons above.
* [[The
* [[The
* [[The
* [[The Cure]] (though this has been changed/misspelled both as The Cures and Cure)
* [[The Doobie Brothers]] (since they were literally "doobie" "brothers", i.e. not flesh and blood brothers but "brothers", i.e. close friends, united... I don't have to explain further)
...and about a hundred thousand more.
* [[The
* [[The Drums]]
** Named because [[The Smiths]] albums list the members as 'Voice' 'Guitar' 'The Bass Guitar' 'The Drums'
*** Though [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|coolly]], The Drums list themselves as 'The Singin' 'The Stringin' 'The Twangin' 'The Bangin'
* [[The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster]]
* [[The Faint]]
* [[The Fall]]
* [[The Free]], a eurodance band
* [[The Guess Who]]
** They sent a demo tape to a radio station labeled "Guess Who?" in the hopes they would be mistaken for a well-established band. Instead, the station decided their name was Guess Who.
*** Their name gave them some trouble reserving hotel rooms in cities where [[The Who]] had just toured and trashed ''their'' rooms.
* [[The Hives]]
* [[The Killers]]
* [[The Kills]]
* [[The Magic Nose Goblins]]
* [[The Mars Volta]]
* [[The Monkees (band)|The Monkees]]
* [[Moog Cookbook]] (no the), with an album named "The Moog Cookbook"
* [[The Melvins]]
** They tend to flip-flop between "The Melvins" and just "Melvins", seemingly for aesthetic reasons - typically the album cover will say "Melvins" but the disc itself will say "The Melvins". They kind of lampshaded this on the artwork to ''[[A Senile Animal]]'' by rendering their name as "(The) Melvins" and the album title as "(A) Senile Animal".
* [[The Mountain Goats]]
* The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo, later shortened to ''[[Oingo Boingo]]'' and (briefly) to simply ''Boingo''.
* The [[Pink Floyd]] Sound (briefly, before they dropped the first and last words)
* [[The Pipettes]]
* [[The Police]]
* [[The Protomen]]
* [[The Rasmus]], Finnish rock band (they added the article to differentiate themselves from a Swedish DJ of the same name)
* [[The Residents]] (notable because that wasn't their original name, their initial demo got sent out accidentally unlabeled, so they took their new name when a record company sent the demo back marked as 'to: residents')
* [[The Rotted]]
* [[The Smiths]]
* [[The Specials]] (who started life as the Coventry Automatics, then became the Special AKA the Coventry Automatics, then the Special AKA and finally the Specials).
* [[The Stooges]]
* [[The Strokes]]
* [[The Texas Toad Lickers]] (together for only one album, though: the soundtrack to the film ''Vampires'')
* [[The The]]
** [[Attack of the The Eye Creatures|Eye Creatures?]]
** Oh ''no''...
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*** There's also a similar case in the form of a band called :(.
*** For related reasons, the band name "Brazilian Girls" is pretty awesome whether you find a webpage devoted to the band or not.
***
*** The rapper A+ was widely reported to have named himself thus ''precisely'' to make it a hard search term (specifically on [[Digital Piracy Is Evil|Napster]]).
*** And then there's [https://web.archive.org/web/20130807031359/http://bash.org/?514353 this], of course...
* [[The
* [[The
* [[The
* [[The
* [[The
* [[The Verve]] (who were originally called simply 'Verve' but changed the name due to potential copyright infringement)
* [[The
* [[The
* [[The White Stripes]]
* [[The Winstons]]
* [[The
* [[The
* [[The Wyrd Sisters]] (the [http://www.wyrdsisters.com/ ''real'' ones], who predate the first Harry Potter novel by several years).
* [[The xx]] (because nouns are for the weak, apparently...)
== X And The Ys ==
This one is a little rarer than the "The" band. It was most popular in/is most associated with the 1950s, what with Bill Haley & The Comets, but Ted Leo & The Pharmacists prove it is still popular today. However, most modern bands that follow this style don't play it straight in a "Frontman & The Musicians" style, but will just use funny words instead, like Me First & The Gimme Gimmes. The primary exception is [[Country Music]], particularly alternative or self-consciously "old-timey" country, where it retains an air of respectability and old-fashionedness. However, it still occasionally turns up in fiction.
* One of the band names suggested by Yui during the band-naming session in ''[[K-On!]]'' is "Hirasawa Yui and Her Happy Friends". Ritsu is less than happy about having the rest of the cast suddenly be nothing but extras.
=== [[Comic Books]] ===
* Crash and the Boys in ''[[Scott Pilgrim]]''.
* Dennis and the Dinmakers -- the British [[Dennis the Menace (UK comic strip)|Dennis the Menace]]'s band.
=== [[Fan Works]] ===
* At one point in ''[[Drunkard's Walk|Drunkard's Walk II]]'', Doug Sangnoir refers to [[Bubblegum Crisis|the Knight Sabers]] as "Lady White and the High-heel Gang" in a deliberate invocation of the trope.
* ''[[My Immortal]]'': Voldemort and the Death Dealers, anyone?
** And while we're at it, [[Hagrid and the Skoolgurlz]].
* Johnny Mushroom and the Kingdoms from ''[[Stupid Mario Brothers]]''
=== [[Film]] ===
* [[Eddie and the Cruisers]]. (The name of the movie, and the artist the soundtrack was credited to. And the name of the original book, as well.)
* In ''[[Grease]]'', the band playing at the dance contest was named Johnny Casino And The Gamblers.
* Firgin D'an and the Modal Nodes, aka the Cantina Band from ''[[Star Wars]]''.
* "Drimble Wedge and the Vegetation" in the original ''[[Bedazzled (1967 film)|Bedazzled]]''.
=== [[Literature]] ===
* "Sativa and the Tripouts" from ''[[The Butterfly Kid]]''.
* Sick Dick and the Volkswagens from ''[[The Crying of Lot 49]]''.
* Pugilism and the Third Autistic Cuckoo, from ''[[The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul]]'' by [[Douglas Adams]]
* Bertie the Balladeer and his Troubadour Rascals, from ''[[Soul Music (novel)|Soul Music]]''.
* Eddi and the Fey in Emma Bull's ''[[War for the Oaks]]''.
* Johnny and the Contusions in Dave Barry's ''[[Tricky Business]]''.
* Vitaly Chernobyl and the Meltdowns in [[Neal Stephenson]]'s ''[[Snow Crash]]''
* Clark Kent and his Supermen (from ''[[Illuminatus|The Illuminatus! Trilogy]]'')
* In ''[[The Dresden Files]],'' the main character Harry jokingly regards the local werewolf gang's name (Billy and the Alphas/Werewolves) as a bad 70's band name.
** He later gives Nicodemus and the Denarians a similar name in ''[[Turncoat]]''—Nicky and the Nickelheads.
* Little Tommy and the Underhill Gang from [[Esther Friesner]]'s suburban fantasy novel ''[[Elf Defense]]''.
* Gordon and the Gophers, from the [[CBBC]] mascot's spin-off books.
* Barry Jive and the Uptown Five from ''[[High Fidelity]]''
=== [[Live-Action TV]] ===
* ''[[Arrested Development (TV series)|Arrested Development]]'' has a real musician with a fake band: William Hung and His Hung Jury.
** That's kind of stretching the definition of ''"real musician"...''
** Arrested Development is also the name of a real life rap group that formed before the show.
* Parodying the big band example below in ''[[M*A*S*H (television)|M*A*S*H]]'', Trapper once introduced Hawkeye as "Hawkeye Pierce and His Orchestra."
* Jesse and the Rippers from ''[[Full House]]''.
* Smeg and the Heads from ''[[Red Dwarf]]''.
* ''[[Mr. Show]]'' has a skit involving an inspirational band named Indomitable Spirit (whose members pretend to have disabilities ranging from being a disembodied head to being a woman), but a former band member (who is actually missing an arm) reveals their name was originally Flat Top Tony and the Purple Canoes.
* ''[[Battlestar Galactica (2004 TV series)|Battlestar Galactica]]''. When Anders says that Cylon Leoben might have been right about Starbuck having a special destiny, Starbuck replies that "Kara Thrace and Her Special Destiny" sounds like a bad name for a cover band.
*
* "Wexford and the Unbelievers" on ''[[Sanctuary]]''{{'}}s episode "Firewall"
* ''[[The Wire]]'': Cool Lester Smooth and The Bunk.
** Strangely appropriate considering the actors who played Lester Freamon and Bunk Moreland are now on ''[[Treme]]'' as a Mardi Gras Chief and a trombone-player, respectively.
* [[Stephen Colbert|Stephen and the Colberts]].
=== [[Music]] ===
* Bennie and the Jets from the [[Elton John]] song of the same name.
* A rather hard to place example, Ziggy Stardust & The Spiders From Mars, a fake band who exist only on an album by a [[David Bowie|real musician]].
{{quote|...became the special man, then we were Ziggy's band}}
* Robbie Wilson and Sedgley Park, a Robbie Coltrane alter-ego band.
=== [[Puppet Shows]] ===
* Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem from ''[[The Muppet Show]]''.
=== [[Tabletop Games]] ===
* Some combinations of units and squad leaders in ''[[Warhammer 40,000]]'' end up sounding like this. Maugan Ra and the Dark Reapers, for instance.
=== [[Toys]] ===
* [[Barbie]] and the Rockers; this line inspired a two part TV special (which predates the modern DVD movies by 14 years), where in part two they were inexplicably renamed...
** [[Barbie]] and the Sensations
=== [[
* Razor and the Scummettes from ''[[Maniac Mansion]]''
* Silent Alex and the Unspeakables from ''[[Visions and Voices]]''.
* A ''[[Guitar Hero]]'' band called themselves [[The Problem with Pen Island|Pen and The Islands]].
=== [[Web Original]] ===
* [[Thomas Fay Syndicate|Thomas Fay]] and the [[Danny Phantom]] Band
* [[AlternateHistory.com]] has "[[Barack Obama|Obama and the Republicans]]", inspired by the fact that U.S. political discussions commonly used the phrase.
=== [[Western Animation]] ===
* ''[[Josie and the Pussy Cats]]''.
* Jeremy and the Incidentals from ''[[Phineas and Ferb]]''.
** Also Phineas and the Ferb-Tones.
* [[Alvin and the Chipmunks]]
* ''[[South Park]]''{{'}}s Timmy and the Lords of the Underworld (who also appeared in the Rock Band franchise)
* ''[[Regular Show]]'': Mordecai and the Rigbys (There is only one Rigby. They also discussed other cool names for rock bands)
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* Ted Leo & The Pharmacists
* When touring with his (ever-revolving) backing band, Kevin Devine is also known as Kevin Devine and the Goddamn Band.
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* Me First & The Gimme Gimmes
* Lee Presson and the Nails
* [[Hootie and
** But a lot of people thought it was a straight example.. ask Darius Rucker [[I Am Not Shazam|how tired he became of folks calling him Hootie]].
* Echo & The Bunnymen, could be considered non-straight as "Echo" was rumored to be their drummachine.
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* Katrina and the Waves.
* [[Tim Rice]] formed a band with some friends called ''Wang & The Cheviots''. At reunions they still can't decide which one of them is Wang.
*
** X and the Ys is the template for nearly every [[Harry Potter (
*** Draco and the Malfoys... It's more like First Name and the Last Names.
* [[
** Long John and the [[The Beatles (
*** They also considered using the name Johnny and the Moondogs.
* [[
* Johnny Thunders & the Heartbreakers (not to be confused with Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers)
* Neko Case & Her Boyfriends; A double-entry since Her Boyfriends are collectively known on their own As The Sadies.
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* Honest Bob & The Factory-to-Dealer Incentives
* Zombina and the Skeletones
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* Geoff Moore and the Distance
* Faith and the Muse
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* ? and the Mysterians. Yes, you read that right.
* There's actually a ''country'' named like this: Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.
** Now ''that'' is
* [[Huey Lewis and
* Paul Revere & The Raiders
* Reggie & The Full Effect
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* Patricio Rey & sus Redonditos de Ricota... even if 'Patricio Rey' doesn't actually exist.
* Ralph Meyers & The Jack Herren Band
* [[
* George Thorogood & The Destroyers
* Cannibal & The Headhunters
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* Ryan Adams and the Cardinals (although this is more because the Cardinals were his more-or-less permanent backing band while he decided whether or not he wanted to formally start a band...)
* Bohren & der Club of Gore
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20080724083612/http://www.philntheblanks.net/ Phil 'n' The Blanks] ([[Punny Name|groan...]])
* The country pop group [[Punny Name|Jump 'n The Saddle]] had a novelty hit with ''The [[Three Stooges|Curly]] Shuffle''.
** As of 2022, Jump 'n' The Saddle lead singer Harry Reinhart is part of a Chicago-based electric-blues-jazz-swing-rock band called [http://www.skiptowne.com/ Skip Towne and the Greyhounds].
* Eric and the Informers; Eric Bogle's short-lived rock band, memorialised in his song of the same name.
* Morris Minor and the Majors; parody band responsible for ''[[Stutter Rap]]'' and ''This is the Chorus''.
** Not to be confused with Morris and the Minors, who later changed their name to Madness.
* Tony Orlando and Dawn; possibly an aversion as the group was initially named just "Dawn", but was rebilled as "Dawn featuring Tony Orlando" and eventually
* [http://www.discogs.com/artist/Disco+Dream+And+The+Androids Disco Dream and the Androids]
* Four Hits and A Miss, from the big band era, inverts the usual order.
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* Cliff Richard and The Shadows
* Mr Hudson & the Library
* [[Florence
* Jools Holland and his Rhythm & Blues Orchestra
* Wayne County & the Electric Chairs
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* Toots & the Maytals
* Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians
{{quote|
She likes to smear it everywhere
On her face and on her hands
'Til she feels like she's a man...
When your soul's too sore to dream
Try some more Egyptian Cream }}
* [[
** Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers
* Adam and the Ants
* Buddy Wasisname and The Other Fellers
* Diana Ross and The Supremes started off as a The Band until one of them took center stage.
* Johnny and the Self Abusers, a somewhat obscure Scottish punk band from the late '70s. They split up and some of them became The Cuban Heels. The others? Well, they went on to form a much less obscure
* Gerry and the Pacemakers
* Alison Krauss & The Union Station
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* There's a Slovak band called [[Hurricane of Puns|Yuri and the Gagarins]].
* Kool & the Gang
* Mike and The Mechanics, though officially known as Mike + The Mechanics, and also on occasion as Mike + The Mechanics + Paul Carrack (see Punctuation Band Names). A slightly unusual example, since Mike (Rutherford, also a founding member of [[Genesis (
* Al Tuck & No Action. It sounds like a non-straight example, but the band actually ''is'' fronted by Al Tuck, who apparently decided to embrace the potential [[Punny Name|punniness of his given name]].
* [[
* [[
* [[
* Psycho & The Birds, a Guided By Voices side-project. Of course they're actually just named after ''[[
* Fitz And The Tantrums. While their name is pun-based, they do have a frontman named Michael Fitzpatrick.
* M.C. Sar & The Real [[
* Hunx and his Punx
* The Mamas & The Papas, whose name overlaps with the "The" bands.
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* Marina & The Diamonds. [[Word of God|Marina herself]] has said that "the Diamonds" are not her backing band, but her fans (it also refers to her full name, Marina Diamandis).
* Edward Sharpe And The Magnetic Zeros
----
== "Band": Monosyllabic Names ==
Mono rules! Monosyllabic name, that is. No definite article, no frills. Acronyms that are usually pronounced as a single syllable also fit the bill.
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The small size of the name is often compensated by the huge size of the font.
About the coolness of monosyllabic names here is someone who thinks that, in general, [https://web.archive.org/web/20121130003828/http://blogcritics.org/music/article/the-worst-band-names-ever
Anyways, monosyllabic band names have been around since at least the 60's ([[Cream]], [[Love (band)|Love]]).
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* [[
* [[Ash (
* [[Blur (
* [[CAKE (
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[Death (
* [[
* [[
* Fear
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[Love (
* [[
* [[
* [[Muse (
* [[
* [[
* [[Pulp (
* [[
* [[Rage (
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[X (
** Bonus point for the single letter.
* [[
----
These come in two flavors, the A.F.I. style where the letters actually stand for something, (AFI was short for Askin' For It until 2002 when it was changed to A Fire Inside) or the Music/WASP style, where the band just claims that it sounded cool (though initially claimed that it stood for We Are Sexual Perverts). Acronym/initial bands that fall under the first flavor are sometimes initializing themselves because the words that the acronym actually stands for are obscene (the hip-hop group "NWA," for example). There are band names like Rage Against The Machine and My Chemical Romance that are often referred to as RATM or MCR by fans, but these don't technically count as part of this genre.
=== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ===
* ENOZ from ''[[Haruhi Suzumiya]]''. It uses the first letters of the last name of each band member. Mai Zaizen, Mizuki Okajima, Takato Nakamishi, and Miyuki Enomoto. Of this, this is ''also'' a tribute to ZONE.
* DMC ([[Detroit Metal City]]) also counts as a referential name to KISS's song "Detroit Rock City."
=== [[Literature]] ===
* AKT (All Kindly Toes) from the ''[[Jack of Kinrowan]]'' stories by [[Charles de Lint]].
=== [[Video Games]] ===
* The band DCMC (Desperado Crash Mambo Combo) in ''[[Mother 3]]''.
* Strong Bad's band in [[Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People]]. The initials are DOI, but the player gets to decide what it stands for. The other members are the King of Town and Homsar, and each picks one word. It fits multiple categories, as whatever combo you end up with is nonsense, and the O has an [[Heavy Metal Umlaut|umlaut]].
=== [[Western Animation]] ===
* PFT, which is short for [[Phineas and Ferb|Phineas and the Ferb-Tones]], from the episode "Flop Starz".
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* Fugazi = Fucked Up, Got Ambushed, Zipped In. It was taken from a book guitarist Ian MacKaye read about the Vietnam War, thus also making it an example of a referential name.
* AFI (Askin' For It/A Fire Inside)
* [[
** Or, according to [[Moral Guardians]], AC/DC (Anti-Christ/Devil's Children).
* DVDA, from the Executive Producers of [[South Park]], which stands for {{spoiler|[[South Park|Double Vaginal Double Anal]].}}
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** There's also the much more likely story of them wanting a cool name, but, not thinking that "Wasp" was cool enough, punctuating the shit out of it.
** In 1970s/early 80s heavy metal, punctuation was second only to the [[Heavy Metal Umlaut]] for badass typography.
* [[
* [[
* [[
** It's also a pre-existent acronym standing for "Keep It Simple, Stupid."
** Gene isn't necessarily in the clear, since the concept of Satan also exists in Judaism - and, in fact, the name itself is a Hebrew word.
*** "Satan" is a Hebrew word, but it means "adversary." Anyone can function in the role of "adversary," for a period of time, without in some special sense being the one and only "Satan" of all time. Moreover, being in the service of the adversary is something of an oxymoron, since the adversary, in all the stories in which the word is used, is usually performing some sort of function for someone else. Sometimes the satan is just a plot device, and the satan is in service of the narrative, so to speak, or sometimes in services of one character's conscience, but it is difficult to have someone else in service of the satan. In Judaism, anyway. This has nothing to do with how other religions have appropriated the word, but Simmons is correct in his assessment of Judaism.
* [[
** This was also the name of a Swedish company that makes processed fish, and they had to get permission from said company to use the name. The company responded by sending the band a case of tinned tuna and a note saying "Good luck".
* NRBQ (New Rhythm and Blues Quartet)
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* H Y B R I D
* INXS (phonetically, "in excess")
* Among the many versions of [[
* Interesting example of the "Acronym" type: There ''used'' to be a Danish band named "Disneyland After Dark", but they got sued by Disney, and as a result changed their name to D.A.D. - some of their commercials afterward actually played this up, with the story being retold in fairytale format, with the word "Disney" bleeped out.
** Their latest album is titled "DIC.NII.LAN.DAFT.ERD.ARK". Gee, whatever might that random string of letters mean...
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* KMFDM and the closely-related MDFMK. TOW claims that "KMFDM is an initialism for the nonsensical and grammatically incorrect German phrase "Kein Mehrheit F?ie Mitleid", which literally translates as "no majority for the pity" or "no majority for the empathy" but is typically given the loose translation of "no pity for the majority" or "no mercy for the masses.""
** Commonly assumed to stand for "Kill Motherfucking Depeche Mode"
* Danish industrial metal band [
* ELO (Electric Light Orchestra, which was actually a "The..." band name, being as it was a light orchestra with electrified instruments...)
* Metallic Psytrance trio S.U.N. Project falls under the W.A.S.P. type, though they joke that for detractors it can stand for "Stupid Unrespectable Noise".
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* A partial example, of course, is [[JAM Project]].
* BWO (Bodies Without Organs)
* [[
* LMFAO ('''L'''aughing '''M'''y '''F'''ucking '''A'''ss '''O'''ff). An electro-hip hop duo.
* P.O.D. (Payable On Death)
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* NOFX (phonetic for "no effects")
** An alternative meaning has been offered as 'No Fucking X', referring to the way some punks would draw (or tattoo, ouch) an X on one palm to signify that they were 'straight edge', a practice which reputedly annoyed the hell out of the band.
* [[
* O.M.D -- Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark.
** Typically appears with a ligature, e.g. "Manœuvres"
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* MxPx started out as Magnified Plaid, which was abbreviated to M.P. for the band's posters. However, drummer Yuri Ruley's handwriting rendered the periods as x's, so MxPx stuck.
* S-K-O, a short-lived country band. It was first Schuyler, Knobloch and Overstreet, but that proved unwieldy so they became S-K-O. After Overstreet left, it became S-K-B when Craig Bickhardt took over.
* [[MGMT]]
* VNV
* 'NSYNC, whose meaning is identical to the ENOZ example above.
* XTC, a 70's and 80's new wave band from England. It doesn't actually stand for anything and is not a reference to ecstasy (well, not the drug anyway, which wasn't even known as that when they formed).
* PIL -- [[Public Image Ltd]].
*
* U.D.O. -- Udo Dirkschneider's solo band after he left [[
*
*
* OD TAPO
* S.O.D. -- Stormtroopers Of Death
** M.O.D. -- Method Of Destruction (Billy Milano fronts both, and clearly picked similar initials to his earlier band on purpose)
* T.K.O.
* KMD, which (depending on the image they wish to project, at the moment) might stand for "positive Kause in a Much-Damaged society," or "Kausing Much Damage"
* L.E.O. - It doesn't officially stand for anything, but it's meant as a [[Shout
* REO Speedwagon, named for [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/56/ReoSpeedWagon1917-cropped-thumb.jpg an early pickup truck-type vehicle], made by the REO Motor Car Company.
** REO Speedealer, whose name parodied the above band... until REO Speedwagon themselves forced them to drop the "REO" part.
*
* M.D.C. - standing variously for Millions Of Dead Cops, Millions of Damn Christians, Multi-Death Corporations, etc
* D.A.F. - Deutsch Amerikansiche Freundschaft (which is German for "German American Friendship").
*
* WULYF - It's pronounced "woo life", but also stands for "World Unite Lucifer Youth Foundation".
* Run DMC - Darryl [[Mc Daniels]], or if you go by their lyrics, Devastating Mike Control.
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----
This is a really new variety,{{verify}} which only really appeared in the last decade{{when}} and hasn't really been parodied in fiction. Yet. Bands like this are kind of hard to write about because they make sentences look very awkwardly punctuated, especially to those who have never heard of the band in question, and are even more difficult to pronounce. See also [[Lucky Charms Title]].
=== Literature ===
* ''[[Soul Music (novel)|Soul Music]]'' has a band named &U (an obvious [[Shout-Out]] to the real-life band U2).
=== Real Life ===
* ? and the Mysterians of the 1960's is both a Punctuation Band and an "X and The Y's" band. It may be the very first Punctuation Band.
* The Krautrock band Neu! (meaning New!)
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* Therapy? - The question mark initially got into their band name when member Andy Cairns misaligned their name while designing cover art, then used the punctuation to try and cover this up.
* !.T.O.O.H.!. (yep them again)
* !!!, pronounced chk-chk-chk) <ref>
* ¡Forward, Russia! -- Confusing Spain with Russia since 2004.
* Godspeed You! Black Emperor. Originally named "Godspeed You Black Emperor!", they changed the location of the exclamation point to reflect the original placement in the title of the Japanese biker gang movie from which they took their name.
* For odd punctuation bands, Robert Schneider's band credits themselves alternately as "The Apples in stereo" and "The Apples (In Stereo)".
* ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead (though they usually go by just "Trail of Dead")
* And And! And from ''[[The Commitments]]''.
* [[
* Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly. Both a band name, and sound advice for any wannabe superhero. Supposedly taken from a walkthrough for one of the [[Batman]] games for the [[ZX Spectrum]] in a computer mag.
* Does It Offend You, Yeah?
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* Go!Go!7188
* PARADISE GO!! GO!!
* [[
* Delirious? has always been Delirious? since they started releasing CDs, but the album art for ''King of Fools'' had an illustration of their name with a 5 in place of the s, so the band name has sometimes been erroneously spelled "Deliriou5".
* Brazilian rock band Ira! (while the word exists in Portuguese, meaning "anger", "fury", the members have chosen it for being the acronym for the Irish Republican Army, so it's just a half-case of acronym name)
* 3OH!3
* On! Air! Library! (Possibly also the only instance of [[Punctuated!
* [[
* Attack! Attack!
** Not to be confused with Attack Attack!, a completely different band.
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* Queen + Paul Rodgers (though, technically done to maintain that the partnership was a collaboration, not Paul Rodgers becoming a band member of Queen.)
** Also, "Queen+" became the default moniker for many of their recent collaborations and remixes (including "Queen + John Farnharm" and "Queen + Vanguard"). Their third ''[[Greatest Hits]]'' album was even titled "Queen+ ''[[Greatest Hits III]]''" because it featured many duets and solo tracks in addition to strictly-Queen songs.
* Chunk! No, Captain Chunk! (Also a [[Shout
----
== Grossout/Blasphemy Names ==
What's the most offensive or controversial word you can think of? Well, it would make a great name for a metal band. It's usually quite extreme (often Scandanavian) metal bands that adopt [[Intentionally Awkward Title]]s like Corpse Raper or something that involves violence, death or sexual taboos. However, whether or not these names are selected for shock value or convention is up in the air. It's very common for death metal, black metal and grindcore bands to have "offensive" titles, but fans of those genres are used to or even expect those sorts of names, and so if there is any intended shock value, it's usually lost anyways. Bands from fiction often have names like this, especially if they are formed by teenagers, and the ridiculous name is an indication of the poor quality of their music.
=== Live-Action TV ===
* ''[[Peep Show]]'': "We are not calling our band Free The Paedos!"
* ''[[Skins]]'': Misplaced Abortion, whose third record is apparently so far off the top end of the [[Mohs Scale of Rock and Metal Hardness]] that it comes back round again and starts to sound like silence.
* On ''[[The Daily Show]]'', there's [http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-february-21-2012/punanny-state---virginia-s-transvaginal-ultrasound-bill Transvaginal Ultrasound], the 15-member jazz fusion band.
=== Tabletop Games ===
* Parodied in the White Wolf Game Studio supplements ''ReignofEvil.com'' and ''Revelations of the Dark Mother''. The former (a satire of the Scandinavian [[Black Metal]] scene - with [[Darker and Edgier|Satanic supervillians]]!) featured mock album reviews of bands called Painsqualler, Buttcannon, Flesh Blanket (a German band) and Shaken Baby Syndrome. The SBS reference ties back to the earlier ''Revelations''; in that book, the Lilith-cultist poet Patricia de la Forge had gained fame as the founder of Shaken Baby Syndrome. ("Patricia de la Forge," incidentally, sounds and reads like a satiric reference to Punk poet Patti Smith.)
=== Web Comics ===
* The writer of ''[[Questionable Content]]'' points out in the comment that [http://questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=2083 Racist Murdercult] sounds much like a band in this category.
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* [http://everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1388936 The Fuck Fucks]
* Fucked Up - who are a post-hardcore/punk band... from [[Canada]]. They won the Polaris Music Prize in 2009, so even conservative Canadian music fans have heard of them.
* The Fucking Champs
** The "Fucking" was added after it was discovered that there was another band named "The Champs"
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* The Crucifucks: (a.k.a. "Scribbles") When your opening bands consist of mostly high school kids at all ages shows, you need a back-up name for the fliers. After getting signed to Alternative Tentacles, The Crucifucks were the opening act.
* Toronto band Holy Fuck
* [[
* Dying Fetus
* Kinki Kids (Unintentionally in this case, as Kinki refers to the area of Japan both members come from; good luck explaining that after you've said the name out loud though)
* Cattle Decapitation
* Dayglo Abortions (also sort of a [[Line
* [[
** Judas Priest were preceded by the even more blasphemous [[
* [[Carcass]]
* [[J.G. Thirlwell
** They (or actually he) have gone through such variations as You've Got Foetus On Your Breath and Foetus All Nude Revue, before finally just simplifying it to Foetus.
* Probably apocryphal: apparently at some point there was a Japanese noisepunk band called the Goddamn Motherfuck Shitass Bitches.
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* Fuck Buttons, who temper their noisy screaming with dreamy atmosphere.
* Lubricated Goat, Australian '80s noise rock band
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120321014211/http://www.mitchclem.com/nothingnice/351/ "We should start a band called Ass Ass."]
** There is a musician who goes by the name Ass
** At one point, Steve Severin of Siouxie & The Banshees and the noted comic-book author Grant Morrison reportedly had a musical side-project together. The outfit was called Ass2Ass.
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* Twodeadsluts Onegoodfuck
* Deliberately averted by Kittie, a Canadian heavy metal band who wanted a sweet and innocent title as a contrast.
* Shitmat (a not particularly
* Dead Kennedys, the 80's thrash punk band. Though leader Jello Biafra once claimed it wasn't meant as an insult.
** The Dead Kennedys played a concert on the 20th anniversary of JFK’s death, prompting a reporter to ask Jello if he considered this in bad taste. Jello replied that he thought that the assassination wasn’t in very good taste.
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*** Jello has quite a long list of great band names, check out his spoken word album "No More Cocoons" for ideas like "Generic Youth" and "Al Sharpton's Hair".
* Jo-Jo and the Hundred Screaming Niggers, a Blues/ Soul band referred to in a 1980s essay by author Harlan Ellison. It's not gory or blasphemous, but it's certainly offensive enough to remain memorable!
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20111109051555/http://www.placentalarmageddon.com/ Placental Armageddon], self-described as "Hardcore ''a cappella'' metal music from Topeka, Kansas".
* [[Angelspit]]
* [[The Birthday Massacre]]
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* You Slut!
* Butt Trumpet (Long before [[A Very Potter Musical|A Very Potter Sequel]], it should be noted)
* Bastard, the band we now know as [[
* Ogre You Asshole, a Japanese rock band, although they're indirectly named after a ''[[Revenge of the Nerds]]'' quote.
* Bitch Magnet, one of the [[Ur Example|precursors]] to [[Post Rock]]
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* Scrotum Grinder
* Cock and Ball Torture
* Rapeman, a [[
* Star Fucking Hipsters
* Necronomichrist (one member of this blackened death metal band remarked that they deliberately chose the most evil-sounding name they could think of)
* The Child Molesters
* The Pieces Of Shit, who are [[Talking Heads (
* The recently popular Five Finger Death Punch.
----
== [[Double Entendre]] Names ==
One step in vulgarity below the "Grossout/Blasphemy Names" above.
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* CunninLynguists.
* [[
* In the same "raunchy if you only get the reference" manner Steely Dan got their name, '''[[Thin White Rope]]''' is an ejaculation reference also coined by Burroughs.
** And, on ''that'' note, legendarily both '''Lovin' Spoonful''' and '''10cc''' are both references to the amount in the average ejaculation. However, in fact "Lovin' Spoonful" is a reference to a Mississippi John Hurt song, "Coffee Blues", while "10cc" was bestowed on the band by impresario Jonathan King after it [[Unfortunate Implications|came to him]] in a dream.
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* [[Sex Pistols]]
* Morningwood
* [[
* The Well Hungarians. No, [http://www.wellhungarians.net/ really.]
* The Gerogerigegege. It is an onomatopoeia for the sound one allegedly makes when vomiting and shitting at the same time.
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* With Fanny, it happened by accident; they were American, and didn't realize the [[Country Matters|connotations of that word]] in the UK, especially given that they were an all-female band. (The story that they were set up for this by a mischievous recommendation from George Harrison is apparently apocryphal). They were apparently more popular in the UK than the States, in any case...
* Scissor Sisters
*
* Jackofficers, a short-lived side project of the above-mentioned Butthole Surfers.
* Pist-On (sometimes stylized as Pist*On, Pist.On, PistOn, or even the much more subtle Piston). To go with the name, they called their debut ''[[Number One]]''.
----
== Band Names With Numbers ==
These come in three varieties: The band name that has a number describing a certain quantity; and the band that just sticks a number on the end for no apparent reason. A lot of these bands just stick the numbers on because another band already had their original name and threatened to sue, e.g. [[Blink 182]], who stuck the number on because there was a dance band called [[Blink]]. The band names that count their members represent a third type.
A sub-genre of this is the band name that is only a set of numbers, like 911 or 311. There were a lot of number bands in the 1990s, but the fad seems to have ended quickly, probably because people realised that words were infinitely more memorable, and the internet allows you to check if someone already has the band name you want already.
Another subvariety is names in the form "(The) Number Nouns". Unlike the number-only name, this is not a fad but a naming style that has lasted decades, including such groups as [[The Four Tops]], [[The Three Tenors]], [[The Four Seasons]], [[Six Hits and a Miss]] and [[10,000 Maniacs]].
=== [[Film]] ===
* The One-ders from ''[[That Thing You Do!]]''. The fact that spelling out the number caused confusion as to the pronunciation of the name was a [[Running Gag]]. "It's the O-NEEDERS!"
=== [[Video Games]] ===
* The Runaway Five from ''[[EarthBound]]''. There appears to be six of them.
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* Onerepublic—yeah, it's spelled out, and mashed into one word, but it's there.
* The Matt Kurz One (instead of just "Matt Kurz")
* Plus One might be an interesting side note, at
* 2 Unlimited
* [[U2]] (named after a plane)
* 3 (Keith Emerson, Robert Berry and Carl Palmer)
* 3 Daft Monkeys
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* The Minus Five
* Pizzicato Five (2 to 3 members plus studio band)
* 6ix
* Electric Six, featuring six members.
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* 7 Mary 3
* 7 Seconds
* [[
* L7, named after the square shape that forms when you make an "L" with your left thumb and forefinger and a "7" with your right thumb and forefinger and touch them together. The gag being that, if you have to ask what "L7" stands for, then you're probably a square!
* Zero 7
* S Club 7, so named because there were originally 7 members. Once Paul Cattermole left, the "7" was dropped. (Oddly enough, in their various TV shows, they tended to add a "The" in front of their name, but it didn't otherwise appear.)
** Their [[Spin
* [[Nine Inch Nails]], though the nine is always spelled out.
*
* 10 Masked Men
* 10 Years
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* Finger Eleven
* Twelfth Night
* [[
* Matchbox Twenty
* Catch 22
Line 796 ⟶ 866:
* 36 Crazyfists
* [[Music/Thirty Eight Special|.38 Special]]
* [[
*
* Sum 41 lampshaded this in one of their videos, in they pretended that [[Executive Meddling]] led to their band changing their name because "numbers are out, and "The" bands are in".
* Level
* (+44)--which makes them a "Punctuation Band Name" as well.
* The B-52's - named after a hairdo that resembles the nose of an airplane. Renamed The B-52s for proper grammar.
** Indirectly. They were named after a hairdo, which in turn was named for its supposed resemblance to the nose of the aircraft.
* 54-40 (a band from BC, named after US President James Polk's slogan, [
* Starflyer 59
* 65daysofstatic
Line 811 ⟶ 881:
* The '80s Matchbox B-Line Disaster
* M83
* Project 86 (the number is slang for "[https://web.archive.org/web/20120908052543/http://www.indievisionmusic.com/2009/07/13/an-interview-with-andrew-schwab-of-project-86/ rejected]," most often used on drunks being turned away at a bar.
* 88 Fingers Louie
* [[Current 93]]. The name is actually a reference to the works of [[Aleister Crowley]].
* The Old 97's (although that is a reference to a folk song)
* 100 Demons
* Two unrelated English Apollos - Apollo 100 and Apollo 440
* Blink-182
* [[
* BR-549, a country band named after Junior Samples' silly phone number in ''[[Hee Haw]]''.
* Could also go in Grossout/Blasphemy, but Australian band Destroyer 666.
* 808 State
* The Dancing French Liberals of 1848
* Death From Above 1979 - The "1979" was used to distinguish from Death From Above Records.
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* 35007 ("Loose" upside down)
* [http://www.tapefive.com/ Tape Five]
----
== Wacky Word Combos (aka [[Word Salad Lyrics|Word Salad Band Names]]) ==
It may have a meaning or origin to the band, but to the uninitiated it just looks like they threw a few words together. This may leave fans stuck with a lot of explaining to do every time someone asks how a band like [[Cobra Starship]] got a name like that, or it may just be a couple of words that sound cool together. A lot of fictional bands have names like this too, again, in order to make fun of them.
Newspaper humor columnist [[Dave Barry]] certainly popularized this way of naming a band, with a recurring joke in his column, saying "that would be a good name for a rock band" after any particularly odd string of words.
=== Wacky Word Combos UNSORTED Examples ===
* The [[
** Actually this is a running joke throughout Rifftrax in general, such as "Narcoleptic Hobbit" [[The Lord of the Rings (
* Three-Arm Sally, John's band from ''[[John Dies
* Terminal Margaret, Vince's Punk band from ''[[The Mighty Boosh]]''.
* [http://wapsisquare.com/comic/09192001/ Fermented Banana] from the [[Web Comic]] ''[[Wapsi Square]]'', named after [http://wapsisquare.com/comic/09172001/ an unfortunate mishap] by one of the characters.
** NOTE: These early strips look a bit rough. [[Art Evolution|The art gets a lot better.]]
* Oblivion Folder, from ''[[Dominic Deegan]]''
* Mocked in the [[Reduced Shakespeare Company]]'s "The Bible: The Complete Word of God. Abridged." Where, while talking about the Exodus, this line was quoted. "And the Lord God cursed the wicked serpent to henceforth crawl about on its belly. Presumable, the wicked serpent had legs prior to that; indicating that it was more of a wicked lizard. And the Lord God thought to himself that Wicked Lizard would be a good name for a Heavy Metal Band."
** Possible reference to [[Noise Rock]] band The Jesus Lizard, which is actually named after a type of lizard.
* Mocked a few times in ''[[
** "The mariachis begin to play a sinister song. As the song's tempo increases, a rumbling begins, deep beneath the ground. As the mariachis reach a dire crescendo (Hey, have you heard my new band, Dire Crescendo?) the gate behind the statues slowly grinds open, revealing the way to the Sorceress' courtyard."
** "<Familiar name> claws your opponent with his pan-dimensional claws and bites him with his astral teeth for <number> damage. Ladies and gentlemen, coming to the stage right now: ASTRAL TEETH!"
Line 857 ⟶ 927:
** "This is a fully rewinged dewinged stab bat. Have you heard my new band, [[Overused Running Gag|The Joke That Got Repeated Until It Wasn't Funny Anymore]]?"
** "It kicks you with a multitude of phalanges. A Multitude of Phalanges was, by the way, my favorite 80's band."
* One round in ''[[
** "Sharabang Sperm? Sixties rock band."
** In one episode, Graeme Garden challenged the word combination "Lopsided Beret", claiming it was the name of an old blues singer.
* ''[[Hard Core Logo]]''.
* The webmaster of [http://www.fightingtigersofveda.com/ The Jungle] has made observations that certain units/rules in the Warhammer40000 rulebooks sound like they ought to be the name of a band. Explosion of Filth is one notable example.
* Not sure if it counts, but Cartoon Network did this once in a set of station ID ads, using "popcorn fairy" from an episode of [[
* Mystik Spiral, Trent's band in ''[[Daria]]''. (In one episode, however, they briefly considered changing it to "Helpful Corn". Not to mention the time Trent had some phone messages written on one hand and, on the other, "Change nme of Mystik Spiral to 'Something Something Explosion'.)
* [[Rock Band]] has created a virtual cottage industry of such names with its random name generator.
Line 869 ⟶ 939:
* An episode of ''Mr. Show'' centered around a metal band named Wicked Sceptre, with the obvious double entendre.
* Dirt Spigot, another fictional band to which Drive Shaft was compared on ''[[Lost]]''.
* In ''[[Histeria
* ''[[Suicide for Hire]]'' uses these a lot. Band names the characters and/or author have come up with include "The Pro-Life Murderers", "Moose Philosophy", and "Suicide Jesus and the Abominachos".
* Sonic Death Monkey, Barry's band from the film ''[[High Fidelity]]''. Although they never actually perform under that name, opting instead for an X & the Y's format: Barry Jive and the Uptown Five.
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* Creepy Clown Head Funeral from ''[[Zits]]'' got its name from an incident ending with Jeremy getting ticketed for "transporting an unsecured giant clown head during the disruption of a funeral procession".
* [[Firesign Theatre|White Brains On Toast]]
* Last one: The '''[[Flailing Hairnets]]''', as seen on [
* On 4/7/2010 ''[[
* ''[[The Sarah Jane Adventures]]'': Clyde mentions that Pantheon of Discord would be a good name for a band. The Doctor wholeheartedly agrees.
* Referenced in [http://xkcd.com/119/ this] [[
* Yum Yum, Sugary Snacks a werewolf band from the ''[[Lonely Werewolf Girl]]'' novels.
* Sex Factory from ''[[
* [[The Mortal Instruments]] made it a running gag with Simon's band. The name of the band changed every week, the weirdest example being "Champagne Enima".
** Currently they're "Millenium Lint."
* ''Engadget'' gets into the act with [http://www.engadget.com/2011/05/17/blood-turbine-to-power-your-pacemaker-become-legendary-band-nam/ this headline] "'''''Blood turbine''''' to power your pacemaker, become legendary band name".
** It's [[Exactly What It Says
* [[Regular Show|"MUSTACHE CASH STASH!"]]
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* Screeching Weasel
* Shadows Fall
Line 899 ⟶ 969:
** I thought "Dir en grey" meant "The Grey Coin"?
** "Dir" is a German word for "you" that indicates "you" being an indirect object. For example, "Das habe ich DIR gegeben" means "I gave that TO YOU." Consequently, the band's name is probably best translated as "To you in grey." Any way you read it, the use of the dative "dir" makes the exact meaning of the name a bit ambiguous.
* [[
* Band of Horses
* At the Drive-In
Line 911 ⟶ 981:
* Dr. Buzzard's Original Savannah Band
* Gnarls Barkley (a pun on basketball player Charles Barkley, but invented on a whim)
* The aforementioned [[
* [[
* The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster
* [[
** Jeff Mangum claims there's a deep, long story behind it but he doesn't want to tell anyone due to its personal nature. Actually, the Elephant 6 Collective (which Neutral Milk Hotel is part of) is full of these. There's also the Olivia Tremor Control, Marshmallow Coast, Elf Power, the Apples In Stereo, and Pipes You See, Pipes You Don't. Actually, it's more normal for an Elephant 6 band to have a weird name like this than for them to have a typical-sounding name. Weird names to go along with their weird music, I suppose.
* Ms John Soda
* [[
* [[
* Scary Kids Scaring Kids.
* [[
* Better than Ezra
* Wolves in the Throne Room
Line 926 ⟶ 996:
* The World/Inferno Friendship Society (again)
* Blind Melon (though this is also a play on the name of blues musician Blind Lemon). They could also be named after the Cheech and Chong sketch, "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAw-3ERSIIY Blind Melon Chitlin]".
* Wacky word titles are very common in alt/indie rock; of the top of my head, there's The Architecture in Helsinki, British Sea Power, We Are Scientists, Arctic Monkeys, Arcade Fire, Jimmy Eat World, Manic Street Preachers, Cats and Cats and Cats, Enter Shikari (bordering on made-up
** One better: There was a Norwegian punk band called "Morten Jørgensen og Spekkhoggerne som fulgte etter danskebåten uten å røre spyet som rant fra ripa", which translates to "Morten Jørgensen [the lead singer] and the killer whales who followed the Denmark ferry without touching the vomit running from the railing".
** System of a Down's name comes from a poem that one of them wrote called "Victims of the Down" (which makes about as much sense).
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** They actually have a bot set to do this every time someone posts a three word phrase.
* August Burns Red. The name comes from an incident where their former vocalist's ex-girlfriend (August) killed his dog (Redd) by burning it alive. The next day the newspaper ran an article with the title "August Burns Red".
* [[
* (A) New Found Glory (the "A" was eventually removed.)
* Asleep at the Wheel ("Country/Western Swing" band that's been performing since 1970)
Line 960 ⟶ 1,030:
* Tokio Hotel. 'Tokio' (German spelling of Tokyo) comes from their fascination with the city and dreams of performing there one day, and the 'Hotel' part comes from their constant touring and staying in hotels.
* [[Angelspit]]- the name comes from the title of a [[Sonic Youth]] song ("Orange Rolls, Angel's Spit) which they turned into a portmanteau word.
* [[
** And, before Derek Sherinian left the band, they would exchange instruments for a cover of Deep Purple's "Perfect Strangers" and become Nightmare Cinema, the exact opposite name.
** Not to mention, the spinoff band Liquid Tension Experiment.
Line 981 ⟶ 1,051:
----
These sorts of band names are often real words within ''some'' context, e.g. science fiction characters, anagrams, or obscure foreign terms. But to most, they just look like weird, made-up words.
=== Wacky Word/Referential Bands UNSORTED Examples ===
* ''[[My So-Called Life]]'' had Frozen Embryo.
* We're Certainly Dwarfs from ''[[Soul Music (novel)|Soul Music]]'', a parody of [[They Might Be Giants]]. The band formerly known as The Whom etc. eventually performs under the name And Supporting Bands.
* Most of the nonsense phrases Dave Barry said "would make a good name for a rock band" (which tended not to be so nonsensical when viewed in context).
** ''[[The Federal Duck]]'' in particular is a truncation of the real-world "Federal Duck Stamp Program."
* Dingoes Ate My Baby, from ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]''
** This is almost certainly a reference to [
* Everybody put your hands together for... [http://www.xkcd.com/119/
* Glamdring the Foehammer ("it's from ''[[
* ''[[
** Whose logo was their name, lowercase, upside-down, and with a red "o": ʎɥs{{color|red|o}}ןs
** Not to mention "Did that dude just say she likes cloth?" "She Likes Cloth... that's a good band name."
** And, (how could we forget), the sbemail ''[http://www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail16.html band names]''.
* ''Cthia'' (a Vulcan word for "truth") in ''[[
* Geronimo Jackson from ''[[
* In the movie ''[[Yes
* In one of the deleted scenes from ''[[Shallow Hal]]'', Walt's band was named "Worst Case Scenario".
* [[Buddhism|Buddhist]] concepts (harhar) can go a long way:
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** Buddhas And Bhikkunis
** Reincarnage Karmication Snuff Tape
* Sex [[Super Mario Bros.|Bob-Omb]], [[
* In ''[[F Is For Family]]'', Frank Murphy's (voiced by [[Bill Burr]]) son Kevin has a band called "Shire of Frodo". An obvious reference to ''[[The Lord of the Rings]]''.
** His favourite band is called "Lifted Riffs", and obvious parody of [[Led Zeppelin|''Led Zeppelin'']].
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* Fugazi named themselves after a word that guitarist Ian MacKaye found in a book about the Vietnam War. This also counts as an acronym name, as "Fugazi" stands for ''Fucked Up, Got Ambushed, Zipped In''. Fugazi also happens to be Italian for "fake".<ref>Which might qualify them as a real [[Fake Band]].</ref>
* Sixpence None The Richer: According to Leigh Nash, the main singer, "[i]ts name comes from a book by [[C. S. Lewis]] called ''Mere Christianity''. A little boy asks his father if he can get a sixpence—a very small amount of English currency—to go and get a gift for his father. The father gladly accepts the gift and he's really happy with it, but he also realizes that he's not any richer for the transaction. C.S. Lewis was comparing that to his belief that God has given him, and us, the gifts that we possess, and to serve Him the way we should, we should do it humbly—realizing how we got the gifts in the first place."
* Coheed and Cambria (characters in the story line their albums and vocalist Claudio Sanchez's comic, ''[[The Amory Wars]]'', share)
* A Tribe Called Quest (Like [[The Boondocks|A Pimp Named Slickback]], you have to say the whole thing)
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* The Soup Dragons, who took their name from the TV show ''[[Clangers]]''
* Dalek I Love You, a synthpop group from Liverpool
* Dälek, a rap group from NJ. The [[Doctor Who
** I thought it was pronounced "exterminate, exterminate".
* As I Lay Dying, a reference to the book of the same name by William Faulkner, though this may be a common misconception.
* [[Depeche Mode]] ([[Line
* Hadouken! is actually named as a reference to the [[Kamehame Hadoken|fireball attack]] from the ''[[Street Fighter]]'' games, and include an exclamation mark in their name, so they fall into two categories.
* Kaiser Chiefs (after South African football/soccer team Kaizer Chiefs)
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* Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza
* Jack Kervorkian And The Suicide Machines (later shortened to just The Suicide Machines)
* A local{{where}} pop punk band named [[Freaks and Geeks|Sam]] [[Bones|Weir]]. They recently broke up and reformed with much the same lineup as a hardcore band, calling themselves Claire Danes.
* Don Knotts Overdrive.
* [[Joy Division]] (from a book they read about [[World War Two]] history-- "joy divisions" were groups of Jewish or Gypsy women that the Nazis kept for... certain purposes)
** Both '''this''' band and its successor ([[New Order]]) having names with Nazi origins (chosen for [[No Such Thing
* Maxïmo Park are named for a park in Cuba
* Mogwai are named after the species of Gizmo in the movie ''Gremlins''
* [[Death Cab for Cutie]] took its name from an Elvis Presley spoof from a Beatles movie.
* The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band (who, incidentally, performed the song "Death Cab for Cutie") are named after a cartoon dog named Bonzo. The "Doo-Dah" part refers to their fodness for old music-hall songs, but is also apparently a pun on "Dada", an art movement.
* The [[
* Biffy Clyro
* Infocalypse (named for the term used in Snow Crash to denote the fall of Babel)
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* MegaDriver plays heavy metal covers of sountracks from Sega MegaDrive videogames. By the way, it's an [[I Am the Band|one-man band]].
* Toad the Wet Sprocket (a [[Monty Python]] reference. The Python context was a fictional band with an intentionally ridiculous Wacky Word Combo name, which makes this practically [[Meta Fiction|meta]].
* [[They Might Be Giants]] was named for the play/film in which a man believes that he's Sherlock Holmes. The title refers to the famous scene in ''[[
* [[Fine Young Cannibals]], named after the 1960 [[Robert Wagner]]/[[Natalie Wood]] movie ''All the Fine Young Cannibals''.
* The band Fozzy started as a cover band called Fozzy Osbourne (both references should be obvious if you think about it).
* Save Ferris
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* Working For A Nuclear-Free City took their name from the slogan of Manchester City Council in the 1980s.
* Fu Manchu. [[Yellow Peril|Take a wild guess]].
* Uriah Heep, named for a character from [[
* [[
* [[
* Felix Da Housecat, named after cartoon character Felix the Cat.
** As well as the swing band Felix and the Buzzcats
* [[
** They weren't the first to use that reference, or the first to misspell it: in a very early incarnation, Pink Floyd called themselves The Meggadeaths.
* [[
** The Who bass player John Entwistle has also been credited with coming up with this one. There was a split between him and Keith Moon on one side and Pete Townsend and Roger Daltrey on the other. They joked about the two of them starting a band with Jimmy, and one of them said "Yeah, that will go over like a lead balloon". John takes credit for this one in one of his last interviews.
*** This is also commonly attributed to Keith Moon.
*** The lead is spelled "led" because they were convinced that [[Viewers
* The [[Velvet Underground]] is named after a porn novel, specifically one about BDSM.
* [[
* Blackened grindcore horrors Anaal Nathrakh are named after a spell in the movie ''[[Excalibur (film)|Excalibur]]''.
* Vampire Weekend is named after a film made by frontman Ezra Koenig
** This is probably very obscure, but I always thought it referred to an episode of ''[[
* The Pietasters got their name from British slang for "fat ass". Definitely an improvement over their original name, The Slugs. (Which had already been taken, believe it or not.)
* The Toasters are named for the Jamaican tradition of DJs "chatting" or "toasting" over instrumentals, not the kitchen appliance. One of the earliest lineups included a pair of toasters, the Unity Two, and later lineups usually include at least one member skilled in the tradition.
* [[My Bloody Valentine (
* Dixie Chicks (after the Little Feat song "Dixie Chicken"); now just "The Chicks" in reaction to Trump-era pro-Confederacy crazies.
* [[
* ''Belle and Sebastian'' is the title of a French children's novel and two TV series based on it.
** Which nearly led to legal action. Headed off by diplomatic negotiations and apologetic disclaimers printed in the liner notes of some B&S releases.
* Minus the Bear (after
* [[Catherine Wheel]] (either a spinning firework or a medieval execution device)
* Saint Etienne (English band, named after the French football team)
* Aston Villa (French band, named after the English football team)
* Stone Temple Pilots' original name was Mighty Joe Young, after a movie (because a blues musician took the name already, they had to change it due to copyright issues. Their next choice, Shirley Temple's Pussy, didn't fly for different reasons)
* [[Star Trek:
* ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead is a unique band that claims (on its website) to have named themselves after a Mayan Chant. According to the Other Wiki this is an ongoing joke, however.
* The American rock band Rival Schools took its name from [[Rival Schools
* [[Kamelot]] obviously references [[King Arthur]]. Double points for the deliberate misspelling of Camelot.
* Godspeed You! Black Emperor takes its name from a film about a Japanese biker gang called the Black Emperors.
* The Kentucky Headhunters. Taken from the word "headchopping", a term that blues musician Muddy Waters used when he had replaced another gig. After finding other bands already were called The Headhunters, they added "Kentucky" to the name. The band was first known as "Itchy Brother", which as random as it sounds, was actually a real cartoon character.
* The band that [[Dave Barry]] plays in (along with several other authors) is called the Rock-Bottom Remainders, a remainder being a book that was printed in excessive quantity, and usually is sold back to bookstores cheaply as 'bargain' or 'clearance' merchandise.
** Also a member: [[Stephen King]].
* The Decemberists, named after the 1825 Russian revolt, they take this further by having songs referencing historical events and settings.
* Franz Ferdinand, about the poor Austrian archduke whose assassination started [[World War I]].
** Except they say that it was originally named after a racing horse, Archduke Ferdinand, but they liked the implications the Archduke's death made as per starting the First World War.
* [[
* Los Amigos Invisibles took their name after the
* Ska Band Desorden Público. Their name is a pun in the prhase "Orden Público", a concept related with social peace and order.
* The Notorious Cherry Bombs, a side project by Rodney Crowell, Vince Gill and some members of Crowell's former backing band The Cherry Bombs. "Notorious" was added due to a copyright claim by a member who refused to join the project.
* School Of Seven Bells named themselves after a mythical school of South American pickpockets that may or may not have existed in the 1980s, which they heard about while watching a documentary on PBS at 3 in the morning.
* Swedish melodic death metal band Amon Amarth take their name from [[The History of Middle-earth|the Tolkien mythos]], the name meaning "Mount Doom" in Tolkien's constructed language Sindarin.
** Several black metal bands also take their name from the Tolkien mythos, most notably black metal bands Gorgoroth and Burzum.
*** Burzum's sole member, [
* Armcannon, a Buffalo-based video-game-music cover band, takes its name from [[Arm Cannon|the iconic weapon]] of such video game characters as [[Metroid|Samus]] and ''[[Mega Man (
* Kasabian (Named after Manson Family cultist and getaway driver Linda Kasabian.)
* Aiden, named for the character from ''[[The Ring]]''.
* Little My, (presumably) named after the character from ''[[The Moomins]]''.
* Pinback are named for the character of the same name in ''[[Dark Star]]''. Some of their earlier material sampled dialogue and sounds from the film.
* Gogol Bordello
* Veruca Salt, named after one of the children in ''[[Charlie and the Chocolate Factory]]''.
* Punk band Kermit's Finger named themselves after the punchline to the old joke "What's green and smells like ham?".
* Does It Offend You, Yeah? is a partial quote from ''[[The Office]]''
* Crystal Castles, derived from something to do with the series ''[[She-Ra: Princess of Power]]''.
* Cabaret Voltaire, whose name is a reference to [[Dada]].
* [[Coil]] and [[Current 93]] were both named for obscure occult references (the latter to [[Aleister Crowley]]).
* Gastr Del Sol, which seems to mean something along the lines of [[Word Salad Title|"the sun's stomach"]].
* Merzbow, named after the ''[
* Münchener Freiheit (more usually known as "Freiheit" in the UK); they named themselves after a street in their native Munich (which has since been slightly renamed "Münchner Freiheit").
* Mudhoney, after a Russ Meyer film. They'd never actually ''seen'' the movie, they just saw the title somewhere and thought it sounded cool.
* [[Rob Zombie|White Zombie]], after a somewhat obscure film starring Bela Lugosi.
* Ned's Atomic Dustbin got their name from a skit from ''[[The Goon Show]]''.
* Bishop Allen are named after Bishop Allen Drive, a street in Cambridge, Massachusetts that two of the band members used to live on together.
* In what could be considered a variation on Song/Album/Lyric band names, Whirlwind Heat are named after another band's album ''artwork'': The cover to [[Sonic Youth]]'s ''Goo'' includes the text "I stole my sister's boyfriend. It was all whirlwind heat, and flash. Within a week we killed my parents and hit the road.".
* ChChCh HaHaHa named themselves after the [[Leitmotif]] from ''[[Friday the
* The Airborne Toxic Event take their name from a disaster that occurs in Don DeLillo's novel ''[[White Noise]]'', which also serves as the name of one of the sections of the book.
* Chiodos, named for the directors of ''[[Killer Klowns From Outer Space]]''.
* Surf Nazis Must Die, named after a [[Surf Nazis Must Die|cult movie with same name]].
* Soft Machine is named after a [[William S. Burroughs]] novel. Also qualifies as a Hard Word Soft Word name.
* Alexisonfire were named after everyone's favourite lactacting contortionist Alexis Fire.
* Nerf Herder are named after a famous line in ''[[The Empire Strikes Back]]'', where Princess Leia calls Han Solo a "stuck-up, half-witted, scruffy-looking nerf herder".
* Dynamite Hack is named as a ''[[Caddyshack]]'' reference - at one point in the movie Carl Spackler offers Ty Webb some marijuana and refers to it as "dynamite hack".
* The Dismemberment Plan are named after a throwaway line in ''[[
* Sleater-Kinney's name ''sounds'' like a "listing member names" example, but they're actually named after Sleater-Kinney Road, a road in Washington where their old rehearsal space was.
* Ugly Kid Joe's name parodied that of [[Hair Metal]] band Pretty Boy Floyd. Pretty Boy Floyd themselves were of course named after the famous bank robber.
* Boss Hog is biker slang for "cool motorcycle". No connection to [[The Dukes of Hazzard|Boss Hogg]].
* Don Caballero named themselves with an obscure ''[[SCTV]]'' reference: Don Caballero was a character Joe Flaherty played in
* Tiger Trap are named as a ''[[Calvin and Hobbes]]'' [[Shout
----
== Song/Album/Lyric Bands ==
Similar to the above example, can't think of a name for a band? Just name it after a favorite song or album of yours. It's easy! Heck if you want you can name it after a favorite lyric.
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* [[The Rolling Stones]] (Muddy Waters song)
* Funeral Fog ([[Mayhem]] song)
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* Godsmack (Alice In Chains song)
** They actually [[Implausible Deniability|deny they named themselves after the song]], although their main inspiration was Alice in Chains, and the song "God Smack" was off AiC's most well-known album, ''Dirt''.
* [[Mayhem]] ([[Venom (
** Well, "Mayhem" was ''part'' of the name of the song in question, but basically yes.
* At The Drive-In (Poison lyric, from the song "Talk Dirty to Me")
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** Themselves named from a Muddy Waters song.
* Freezing Moon ([[Mayhem]] song)
* Make Them Suffer ([[
* Forest Of Shadows (Funeral Fog song)
* Bullet For My Valentine (Planes Mistaken For Stars song)
* Partial with Heaven And Hell which is named after the famous [[Dio]] era [[
* Averted with Machine Head, the connection to the Deep Purple album was a coincidence.
** Probably not unconnected to the fact that it's the name for part of a guitar. For non-guitarists, they're the things on the headstock (am I going to have to explain that one too?) that let you adjust the tuning of a string.
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** Deep Purple itself is named after a big band song from the 1920s.
* Likewise with Heaven Shall Burn, no connection to the Marduk album
* [[Between the Buried
* Partial with [[Sepultura]] (Taken from a translated [[Motorhead]] lyric)
* Seether (Veruca Salt song)
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* Stars of Track and Field (Belle and Sebastian lyric)
* [[Radiohead]] (Talking Heads song)
* Exciter ([[
** Who in turn got their name from a [[Bob Dylan]] song.
* Stiff Little Fingers (Vibrators song)
* Scary Kids Scaring Kids (Cap'n Jazz song). It's also a little wacky...
* Howlin' Wolf (Muddy Waters song)
* Deacon Blue ([[
* Sisters of Mercy (Leonard Cohen song)
* Monster Magnet ([[Frank Zappa]] song)
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* Santa Dog ([[The Residents]] single)
* Texas Is the Reason (Misfits lyric)
* [[
* Raised Fist (After the lyrics in a Rage Against The Machine song, "Know Your Enemy").
* Temple of the Dog (Mother Love Bone lyric)
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* Video Vamp (Def Leppard song)
* Cock E.S.P. (Hanatarash song)
* [[Running Wild (
* The Drowners (Suede song)
* Powderfinger (Neil Young song)
* One-person example: [[
* Eric's Trip (named for a [[Sonic Youth]] song)
* In Fear and Faith (Circa Survive song)
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* [[Angelspit]] (from the [[Sonic Youth]] song "Orange Rolls & Angel's Spit")
* Mr. Big, after a song by Free.
* Silver Mountain ([[Rainbow (
* Highland Glory ([[Running Wild (
* Starsailor, after a Tim Buckley album.
* Suburban Kids With Biblical Names, after a lyric from The Silver Jews' "People".
* Celibate Rifles (somewhat oblique [[Shout
* Radio 4, after a Public Image Ltd. song. (And so, indirectly, after the BBC radio station.)
* [[Havalina Rail Co.]], who sometimes went by just Havalina. "Havalina" was a song by [[The Pixies]].
* [[
* [[Boredoms]], after "Boredom" by [[The Buzzcocks]]
* [[How To Destroy Angels]], after Coil's debut EP.
* The Lightning Seeds, after a [[Mondegreen]] of a Prince lyric (Raspberry Beret's "...the lightning ''sees''").
* [[
* Cocteau Twins, after an early Simple Minds b-side.
* Urge Overkill, after a lyric in the [[George Clinton|Parliament]] song "Funkentelechy"
* Like The Lightning Seeds, Radio Birdman are also named for a [[Mondegreen]]: in this case one from [[
* The Futureheads, after [[The Flaming Lips]]' album ''[[Hit To Death In The Future Head]]''.
* All Time Low, who took their name from the lyrics to a New Found Glory song
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* Angelzoom, after a song ''[[Angel Zoom]]'' from the first album of [[I Am the Band|her]] [[X Perience|former band]].
* Man Will Surrender, after the Pailhead song "Man ''Should'' Surrender". They were apparently more certain about it than Pailhead were.
* The Billion Dollar Babies, after the [[
* Cherry Ghost ([[Wilco]] lyric)
* Hatebreed, after [[The Misfits]]' "Hatebreeders". They've done a [[Cover Version]] of the song they're named after too.
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* Rites Of Spring, after Igor Stravinsky's ''[[The Rite of Spring]]''.
* Uh Huh Her ([[PJ Harvey]] album)
* [[Demons & Wizards]] ([[Uriah Heep]] album)
----
==
=== Named after one of their own songs UNSORTED Examples ===
* [[Black Sabbath]]
** Their original name was Earth, but when they were mistaken for a band with the same name, they changed it to the name of a song Tony Iommi wrote.
* [[Motorhead]] (written by Lemmy while he was still in Hawkwind)
* [[
* [[Green Day]]
* Iced Earth
* [
* Similarly, Blackfield's first album, Blackfield, contained a song titled Blackfield.
* [[
* Inverted by [[They Might Be Giants]], who wrote a song called "They Might Be Giants", but it went on their third album, ''Flood'', rather than their first album, which was of course called ''[[They Might Be Giants]]''. They were named after a film, not their own song.
* The Shins almost fit this trope: Flake Music, who were essentially The Shins prior to a name change and some switching instruments around, had a song entitled, er, "The Shins".
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* Living in a Box
* 2 Many DJs are named after a song by the two DJs' ''other'' band (Soulwax) called Too Many DJs. Note: the band and the DJ act have become increasingly blurred into one thing over the years (sometimes called Radio Soulwax), hence why it's here under "one of their own".
* [[
* Hellyeah - both their first album and a song on that album are also called "Hellyeah"
* [[The Birthday Massacre]]. Like Counting Crows, their name comes from the lyrics of one of their songs -- "Happy Birthday", which has the lines "I wore my black and white dress to the birthday massacre"
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* Mindless Self Indulgence
* Dream Evil got their name from the Dio album. Originally named Dragonslayer, they were forced to change their name to something less generic. Dragonslayer ended up becoming their first album title.
* [[
* [[Slipknot]] were named after a demo song of theirs.
* The Butthole Surfers had an early song called "Butthole Surfers" (it's unknown if this was the same song as "Butthole Surfer", or just a similarly-titled song that never got released). At one of their shows, when they were going by something else, an emcee somehow mistook the song title for the band name, and it stuck.
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* Subverted: [[Restart]]'s [[Signature Song]] is named "Recomeçar" (which translates to "restart", natch), but the band wasn't named after it. It just happened to be a coincidence.
* Schoolyard Heroes
* Nine
* 4Lyn started as Headtrip, but they changed their name after the success of their song "Lyn".
* Angels Of Light were originally supposed to be called The Pleasure Seekers, but the name was already taken, so they simply used the name of one of their songs, "Angels Of Light".
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----
Small groups ([[Name and Name|duos]] or especially trios) occasionally use this style. (And why the hell do these bands all pick names that sound like law firms?) You don't see a lot of list-of-members names bands these days.
=== Literature ===
* [[Ken MacLeod]]'s novel ''Newton's Wake'' had Winter and Calder. A pun, because Calder is pronounced like the Scots for "colder".
===
* Member listing bands are easy to parody by changing members, such as ''[[Futurama]]'''s "[[Battlestar Galactica (1978 TV series)|Cylon]] and Garfunkel", or the claim on ''[[I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue]]'' that pianist Colin Sell was once a member of both "Colin and Garfunkel" and "Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick, Titch and Colin" (and, oddly, "The Jackson Six").
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* Hamilton, Joe Frank and Reynolds
* Travis and Bob
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* [[Simon and Garfunkel]]
* Peter, Paul, and Mary
* [[The Ramones]] also doubles as a "The" band, as all their members had "Ramone" as their stage surname.
** Likewise The Corrs, except it's their real surname. Many other examples in the same vein.
** The same except with first names goes for The Bens, which consisted of Ben Folds, Ben Kweller, and Ben Lee.
* Tackey & Tsubasa
* The Jackson Five scores a hat-trick for being (The) (Member Names) (Number).
* Variation: [[Bon Jovi]] is named after only ''one'' of its members.
** Same with [[
** And the [[Ur Example]], Santana.
** Winger
* [[Van Halen]]; similar to the Bon Jovi example, though named after ''two'' members rather than one (the van Halen brothers, Eddie and Alex; ''much'' later, Eddie's son Wolfgang would also join the band).
* Subversion: [[Pink Floyd]] was named after two ''blues'' musicians, neither of which were ever in the band. Although that didn't stop journalists asking them early on, [[Did Not Do the Research|"So which one's Pink?"]].
* A more recent use of this is by the Canadian duo [[Tegan and Sara]].
* ''[[Fleetwood Mac]]'', named after their drummer (Mick Fleetwood) and bass player (John McVie). Sort of an aversion - Fleetwood and Peter Green decided to call the band this to ''persuade McVie to join'', not because he was already a member.
* Obfuscated by the band Good Old War. Good for Goodwin, Old for Arnold, and War for Schwartz.
* [[Run DMC]] (another partial case; of their three members, the name comes from the nickname of one and the initials of another, omitting the late Jam Master Jay).
** There was also "Salt-N-Pepa" in the same genre, although like Run-DMC, they were a trio (Salt, Pepa, and their DJ Spinderella)
* Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe, which would've been [[Yes]] if they weren't sued by existing members of the band. And they have indeed drawn the law-firm comparison.
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* Aversion: Eddie From Ohio (has one Eddie and three non-Eddies; none are from Ohio.)
* James, a (currently) seven-man band who decided to take their name from one of their founders, Jim Glennie. Tim thought it would look bad if [[Face of the Band|the band was named after the lead singer]], Gavan was too heavy metal and Paul was too modest to suggest his own name. Only two of them (Jim and Tim) are still in the band, and "which one's James" is the most boring question around.
** They played on this with the cover for their 2001 album ''[[Pleased To Meet You]]'', which [[
** Just for good measure, they'd previously been known as (among other things) a name fitting the X And The Ys mould (arguably also a Grossout name); Venereal And The Diseases.
* Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich.
* Wilson Phillips
* Matt & Kim
* Almost any duo will
* Schuyler, Knobloch and Overstreet. They became just S-K-O one single into their career, however. After Paul Overstreet left, they became S-K-B for about 30 seconds while Craig Bickhardt took over.
* Dolenz, Jones, Boyce, & Hart (two Monkees with two songwriters)
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* Mel & Kim (a duo created largely to share a name with the above as a gag, male comedian Mel Smith and singer Kim Wilde.)
* Aversion: the female comedy duo Garfunkel and Oates. Neither member is named either of those things, rather the name is [[Garfunkel|a takeoff]] on the names of two well-known bands that ''are'' legitimate examples of this convention.
* Sharon, Lois and Bram (performers of children's music, later just "Sharon and Bram")
* [[Kenny Loggins|Loggins]] and Messina; technically an aversion since Jim Messina was simply a producer. Moreover, it was meant to just be Kenny Loggins as a solo artist (which would eventually happen for real), but Messina made such a significant contribution, that the first album was called "Kenny Loggins with Jim Messina Sittin' In".
* Hanson, the band with three brothers whose last name is... you guessed it, Hanson. Often mistakenly referred to as The Hanson Brothers.
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* The Nields - two sisters, Nerissa and Katryna Nields, with Nerissa's husband David who took her last name along with Dave Chalfant and Dave Hower, leaving them with three Daves and three Nields.
* [[Paul and Storm]], although Storm is a nickname.
* [[Tegan and Sara]]
* Ford & Lopatin. They started out as Games, but adopted a "listing band members" name due to potential confusion with the rapper Game.
* Jazz vocal trio Lambert, Hendricks, and Ross
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----
=== Film ===
* [[Spinal Tap]] is usually spelled with an umlaut over the n.
=== Live-Action TV ===
* In an episode of ''[[Reaper]]'', a wannabe rocker/Dreadful Musician whose great idea of a stage name is just "Ryan" almost does a literal [[Deal with the Devil]] and becomes the even-more-ludicrous-sounding "Ryän".
=== Newspaper Comics ===
* One story arc in ''[[Bloom County]]'' had Steve Dallas form a glam-metal band called Deathtöngue with Opus, Hodge-Podge, and Bill the Cat, who performed songs like "Let's Run Over Lionel Richie With a Tank." After a run in with [[Moral Guardians]], they changed their name to "Billy and the Boingers".
** Before they were known as Deathtöngue, Opus wanted to call the band {{spoiler|The Osmonds}}.
=== Video Games ===
* Roughly related is ''[[Brütal Legend]]'', a heavy-metal themed game by [[Tim Schafer]].
=== Web Comics ===
* Deathmøle from ''[[Questionable Content]]''. (The ø isn't an umlaut, either, but counts as a Scandinavian letter)
** The trope itself is also a [[Running Gag]] in the comic.
* When the ''[[PvP]]'' guys formed a band, they named it Dj̈ork (the umlaut's over the j)
=== Web Original ===
* Also roughly related is an article from ''[[The Onion]]'': "[https://web.archive.org/web/20100219021734/http://www.theonion.com/content/node/32404 Ünited Stätes Toughens Image With Ümlauts]".
=== Western Animation ===
* [[Metalocalypse|Dethklok]] uses both umlauts & the o thing, considering the origins of some of the band members.
* [[Phineas and Ferb]] give us "Love Händel" [[Phineas and Ferb/Radar|Getting More crap past the Radar since 2008!]] Also a [[Parental Bonus]] if you assume "Händel" is a reference to the guy who wrote "Handel's Messiah"
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* [[Blue
** Also of note, they got their name when they found Blue Oysters on a menu.
* There's a rap group out of Newark, NJ named Dälek. And no, it's pronounced "dialec" and is not meant to reference [[Doctor Who
* [[Motorhead]]
* Infernäl Mäjesty
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** Evidently, their first world tour had German fans chanting "Muttley Cruh-eh! Muttley Cruh-e!" (Where the german spell "ö" like the vocal in "girl", and not like an "u").
* Moxy Früvous (something of a parody, since the band is pretty far removed from heavy metal)
* [[
* The Crüxshadows (also not heavy metal)
* Amon Düül (Krautrock)
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*** And both [[Justified]]: It's a pre-Islamic Turkish moon god. And, well, they're German...
* Especially hilarious (at least to Swedes) was when the band Trojan decided they wanted an umlaut, so they started spelling their name "Tröjan". Incidentally, that's also Swedish for "the Sweater" or, more generally, "the Shirt." Also, think of the utter hilariousness when you wear a T-shirt with Tröjan on it ( a T-shirt saying 'The Shirt'). Yeah, that's [[Badass]].
* [http://www.metal-archives.com/band.php?id=28752 Lothlöryen]. Funnily parodied [http://www.blind-guardian.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=31829&highlight=lothl%F6ryen here]{{Dead link}}.
* Hüsker Dü is not a metal band, but they got their name by substituting the macrons in "Hūsker Dū?" with umlauts. "Hūsker Dū?" itself is the American name of the Danish board game "Husker du?", with macrons added to make the name more exotic.
* Also amusing is the german punk band Die Ärzte ("The doctors"); although the umlaut in the second word is part of its correct orthography in German, they've started to spell it with ''three'' dots in order to reference the trope.
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----
Also see [[Myspeld Rokband]].
=== Film ===
* Wyld Stallyns, [[Bill and Ted (film)|Bill and Ted]]'s band.
*
=== Literature ===
* Trollz, in ''[[Soul Music (novel)|Soul Music]]''. They wanted to just be called Trolls, because they were, but were eventually persuaded to misspell their name.
=== Live-Action TV ===
* The Crazy Dogggz in [[Flight of the Conchords]].
* ''[[Mystery Science Theater 3000]]'' had ''Spydor'''(in ''[[Earth vs. the Spider]]''), ''Hee-La''(in ''[[The Giant Gila Monster]]'') and ''[[Santa Claws]]''(in ''[[Santa Claus]]'')
=== Video Games ===
* [[Brütal Legend]]: Ironheade. The E at the end is there to show they're not messin' around.
=== Web Original ===
* Taranchula, Lazor, Bigg Nife, and Limozeen from ''[[Homestar Runner]]''.
* Mintz Meat, [[The Hero|NNeil Sinclair's]] old band in ''[[Survival of the Fittest]]''.
=== Western Animation ===
* [[Metalocalypse]]: Dethklok.
* Love Händel, also from ''[[Phineas and Ferb]]''. Also has the [[Heavy Metal Umlaut]], despite not being very metal at all.
** [[Genius Bonus]]? Taken together, the misspelling and the umlat suggest Georg Frederich Händel.
=== [[Real Life]] ===
* [[
* [[
* [[Limp Bizkit]].
* Staind.
* [[
* Kreator.
* [[Def Leppard]].
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* [[Lynyrd Skynyrd]] (Leonard Skinner was a gym teacher at the band members' high school who informed them that they would never amount to anything).
* Too many rappers to name.
* [[
* [[The Beatles (
* uneXpecT. While not really a misspelled word, "Unexpect" could be used like "Whelmed." It's logical, but it makes you sound weird.
* [[
** Isn't this also an acronym for something in Russian?
*** Apparently, "ta tu" is "This [girl loves] that [girl]." (Grammatical explanation for non-Slavs: "Ta" is the feminine Russian form of "this". "Tu" is the accusative [i.e. direct object] form of "ta".)
**** I believe one member of the group explained that in English, the closest translation was 'Tie This Girl To That Girl.'
* [[
** Deliberate, since Chester Bennington could not register the lincolnpark.com domain, so he had to go for an alternate.
* [[
* [http://www.discogs.com/artist/Kebekelektrik Kebekelektrik] (pronounced "Quebec Electric")
* [[The Monkees (
* [[
* The Hellacopters, also an example of [[Punny Name]]
* [[
* Haysi Fantayzee (Pronounced like "hazy fantasy")
* [[
* dEUS
* Brokencyde
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* Mansun (so named because 'Manson' was seen as having negative connotations - which never stopped Mariliyn Manson, but still... May also have been named after an early Verve song, A Man Called Sun)
* Major Lazer, who sort of counts as a band.
* [[
* Toxik
* Tygers of Pan Tang
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* Ezy Meat
* Witchfynde
* Split Enz (spelled that way specifically as a [[Shout
* Mercyful Fate. It may just be misspelt, though.
* Alcatrazz
* [[Phish]]: Though they've given other origin stories, the most commonly accepted one is that it's just a misspelled variation on a nickname for their drummer, Jon Fishman.
* The Bumblebeez. For a while [[Market
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== Hard Word Soft Word ==
Use a word that evokes something hard, strong and deadly, then a word that evokes something soft, fluffy and lovely. Quite common among hard rock bands.
=== Fan Works ===
* [[Pretty Cure Heavy Metal|Pistols N Flowers]]. Given it's a parody of [[Guns N' Roses]]...
* Peppermint Carnage, the band formed by the members of the rock club in ''[[Pretty Cure Perfume Preppy]]'', uses the reversed form.
=== Real Life ===
* ''[[Guns N' Roses]]'', formed when L.A. Guns and Hollywood Rose (respectively) combined, and named after its founders Tracii Guns and Axl Rose.
* Velvet Revolver (which is Guns 'n Roses with Scott Weiland from Stone Temple Pilots replacing post-insanity Axl) is a reversed example.
* Quiet Riot.
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* Iron & Wine
* Killing Heidi.
* The Sex Pistols, anyone? <!-- MOD: Not everyone likes "rough sex" exclusively, so "soft" sex is perfectly reasonable. -->
* Rose Tattoo
* Savage Garden
* A variation in [[Killswitch Engage]]: a kill switch is an emergency shut-off during situations where normal means are inaccessible. It sounds calming when you think about it.
* Iron Maiden, though there is of course the instrument of torture. Might work with [[
* Morbid Angel.
* The Chainsaw Kittens.
* Death in June
* Angel Witch
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== Compound Words ==
Stick two potentially cool-sounding words together into one ''really'' cool-sounding word. [[CamelCase]] is encouraged.
=== Live-Action TV ===
* [[Parks and Recreation|Mouserat]]
* Another one from ''[[Lost]]'': Driveshaft.
=== Video Games ===
* [[Dragon Force (video game)]]{{context}}
=== Real Life ===
* Fastball
* Fightstar
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** Which is an insult in the [[Star Wars Expanded Universe]], roughly equivalent to "bastard," although that's used too. See [[Pardon My Klingon]].
* Redbone
* [[Silverchair]] (It was later confirmed as a reference to C.S. Lewis' ''[[The Silver Chair]]'', but they used to claim it had to do with writing down the titles of [[
* Starsailor
* Stonehoney
* Whitestarr
* Wolfmother
* Megadeth (which means they're in three different categories on this page)
* Hawkwind
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* Edenbridge
* Whitesnake
* [[Remedy Drive
* [[Radiohead]]. Named for the [[Talking Heads]] song Radio Head (two words)
* Sportsguitar
* [[
* [[
* [[
* Powderfinger
* Grinspoon
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* VersaEmerge
* [[Nickelback]]
** Came from Mike Kroeger's time working at Starbucks, at which the coffee was priced so that the customer would get a nickel in change
*** And the similarity to the words Nickel Bag, slang for a $5 bag of marijuana, [[Sarcasm Mode|is purely coincidental]]
*** Coincidentally, a nickelback is also a term used in American football for an extra (fifth) defensive back, coined by analogy with "quarterback" on the offensive side.
* [[Coldplay]]
* Finntroll
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* InnerPartySystem
* teenagersintokyo
* Loverboy, though it may be a long shot
* Soundlovers
* Masterboy
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== Verb the Noun
=== Verb the Noun UNSORTED Examples ===
* [[Bring Me the Horizon]]
* Bless the Fall
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=== Live-Action TV ===
* [[Buffy the Vampire Slayer
=== Real Life ===
* [[She Wants Revenge]]
* [[They Might Be Giants]]
* [[You Were Spiraling]] (though they eventually shortened it to just Spiraling)
* [[God Lives Underwater]]
* [[This Will Destroy You]]
* [[God Is An Astronaut]]
* [[I Love You But I've Chosen Darkness]]
* [[Saturday Looks Good To Me]] (reportedly named after the scheduled day of their first rehearsal)
* [[I Set My Friends On Fire]]
* [[It's a Beautiful Day]]
* [[I'm from Barcelona]]
* [[Success Will Write Apocalypse Across the Sky]]
* [[We Butter the Bread with Butter]]
* [[wecamewithbrokenteeth]]
* [[
* [[...and You Will Know us by the Trail of Dead]]
* [[I Can Lick Any Sonofabitch in the House]] (Taken from the biography of boxer John L. Sullivan.)
* [[Cute Is What We Aim For]]
* [[This Is Me Smiling]]
* [[Frankie Goes to Hollywood]], which actually refers to [[Frank Sinatra]]
* [[Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin]]
* [[Dead Can Dance]]
* [[His Name Is Alive]] (supposedly named after a phrase written in Warren Defever's high school history notes, in regard to [[Abraham Lincoln]])
* [[Speed the Plough]]
* [[Say Hi To Your Mom]], who later changed their name to the much shorter full sentence [[Say Hi]].
* [[Johnny Hates Jazz]] (after a friend of the band who really did hate jazz)
* [[My Dad Is Dead]]
* [[I Am X]]
* [[We Were Promised Jetpacks]]
* [[There Will Be Fireworks]]
* [[And Then There Were None (band)|And Then There Were None]] (after the [[
* [[Pop Will Eat Itself]] (after a music magazine article whose headline asked "Will Pop Eat Itself?")
* [[Let's Get Out Of This Terrible Sandwich Shop]]
* [[Danielle Ate the Sandwich]] (which is actually a solo act)
----
More [[Darker and Edgier|Metal]] counterpart to "The" Band. Band names ending in -ist or -ic, usually a (singular) term for a real or invented ideology, religion or occupation. Popular in [[Technical Death Metal]] genre.
===UNSORTED Examples of *-ist Band===
* Alchemist
* [[Atheist]] — the [[Trope Maker]]
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== Any and All of the Above ==
=== Fan Works ===
* In chapter 9 of the ''[[Undocumented Features]]'' story ''[http://www.eyrie.net/UF/FI/OOTR/TXT/12-federation/ch9.html The Order of the Rose: "The Federation Lives Forever!"]'', [[K-On!|Ui Hirasawa and Jun Suzuki]] discuss names for the band they have decided to form:
{{quote|"Oh yeah, we'll need a ''name'', too. I'm assuming you're not gonna go for The Jun Suzuki Project," [Jun] added with a smirk.
"I was thinking maybe The Ui Hirasawa Rhythm All-Stars," Ui countered, grinning.
"The Western Empire Ballet Company," said Jun.
"Student Drivers," Ui replied.<ref>An idiomatic translation of their band name in the ''K-On! High School'' manga.</ref>
"Orangebender," Jun declared.
"Ooh, that one's not bad," said Ui.
"What? Seriously? It's lame. I was trying for lame. ... Hmm! Trying For Lame."
"That actually ''is'' lame. What about The Above Average?"
"The Junior Varsity."
"That's a little bit on the nose, don't you think?" Ui wondered.
Jun eyed her. "Oh, and 'Student Drivers' wasn't? I know! Media Blackout!"
"Void Where Prohibited..."}}
:They eventually settle on "Frame Shift".
== Other ==
For bands and band names that just don't fit anywhere else.
=== Fan
* In the ''[[Glee]]'' [[Slash Fic]] [http://archiveofourown.org/series/8386 Story of Three Boys], when a homophobic pastor talks about "wayward youth" and "vandalism", Finn says that he's going to start a band called Wayward Youth. Their first album will be called 'Vandalism' and have naked dudes go-go dancing on the cover.
=== Literature ===
* In the books and movies of ''[[Diary of a Wimpy Kid]]'', Gregory's older brother Rodrick's band combines 3 of the common naming conventions into Löded Diper. Though Greg remarks that Rodrick probably can't spell "Loaded Diaper".
=== Real Life ===
* [[wikipedia:Revelstoke, British Columbia|Revelstoke]] sounds like a loud 80's heavy-metal hair band.
* Mr.Bungle fronted by [[Mike Patton]], they take their name from an educational film in a Pee-Wee Herman special, yep their name is as clowny as their music.
* Frightened Rabbit, in that it contains none of the naming conventions mentioned above. Both words are perfectly acceptable alone and together, the name doesn't have the word "the," no "ist" suffix, it isn't a complete sentence, it isn't one word, it isn't a list of members, it isn't a lyric, album or song title of theirs and both words are rather soft.
* It's a common misconception that Green River are named after the [[Creedence Clearwater Revival]] album, or its title track. In fact they're named after Gary Ridgway, a [[Serial Killer]] who was known as "The Green River Killer" because his first five victims were found in the Green River in Washington.
=== Generated ===
* The band name maker and acronym maker on this site come up with some preety good ones: http://www.bandnamemaker.com/ .
* There's also the [https://twitter.com/_mynewband My New Band] [[Twitter]] feed.
* ''AI Weirdness'' has "[http://aiweirdness.com/post/160407271482/metal-band-names-invented-by-neural-network Metal band names invented by neural network]" (salad made by a neural network trained on the entire database of metal-archives.com):
{{quote|Dragonred of Blood
Deathhouse
Vultrum
Stäggabash
Deathcrack
Stormgarden
Inhuman Sand}}
** ...and "[http://aiweirdness.com/post/171776876562/the-bands-of-south-by-southwest-interpreted-by The Bands of South by Southwest, interpreted by neural net]":
{{quote|The BBC gave me a list of the entire 2015-2018 lineup for the South by Southwest (SWSX) festival in Austin, Texas - and I helped them generate names for a “Real Band or Not?” quiz.
...
We have already established that neural nets can learn to sound metal. (More or less)
Death Mill
Bad Carrier
Bogg
Hard The Heart
Death Frothers
...
They can learn the patterns of just about any genre, really. Surfer rock? Classic rock? Indie? A neural network can blend right in.
The Chilliams
Surf Code
High Mile
Freaky School
Love Mine
Bung Guest
Never Beer
Bold Big Stones
Show Comment
Dirty Stone
The Dills
The City Root
}}
{{reflist}}
[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]
[[Category:Naming Conventions]]
[[Category:Music Tropes]]
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