Names -> Band Name Origins -> Latest Entries
Do you know why a band picked out it's name? Feel free to let us know.
I can't verify all of these stories, so do take them with a grain of salt. I try and delete the ones that I know to be bogus, but I don't know the origins of every band name (and some bands intentionally tell different stories about picking their band name).
The 20 most recent entries are listed below. There are 4443 Band Name Origin entries on the site.
Name | Origin | Submitted by: | ||
| Average White Band | I was managing a hotel in Detroit in 1980 and they were playing a venue called Center Stage and staying at our hotel,Hamish told me that they were trying to come up with a name when a girl walked through the room and said "you're just an average white band" and he looked at everyone and said "that's it."From the horses mouth. | David Smith | ||
| Nazz | The band (which launched the career of Todd Rundgren) derived its name from a Yardbirds song, "The Nazz Are Blue". The word originally came from the title of a Lord Buckley monologue. | Todd W. Zimmerman | ||
| Five Finger Death Punch | The name is taken from the ultimate kung fu finishing move, mentioned in the movie Kill Bill, Vol. II | Brett Mohler | ||
| Animal Farm | Contrary to popular belief, Dane didn't get the name from the George Orwell book, but rather from a lyric in the Blur song "Country House" which he first hear when he was a teenager. It was chosen because it fit in the "A" section of the record store between "ABBA" and "Ash" which he didn't consider a bad thing. Plus, it was at the beginning of the alphabet, and so it would be more visible for shoppers to spot at a record store. | InAltruism300 | ||
| Grateful Dead | It comes from the Egyptian Book of the Dead, not the Tibetan Book of the Dead, and the line from which they they drew the phrase is as follows: "In the land of the night the ship of the sun is drawn by the grateful dead." | Jim Webster | ||
| Ramones | Paul McCartney used the alias "Paul Ramone" when he would check into hotels, incognito. Bass guitar player Douglas Colvin (aka Dee Dee Ramone) was a big fan of the Beatles and suggested the name as tribute to Paul McCartney. | CrypticWizard | ||
| Heaven 17 | The name does come from a band in "A Clockwork Orange". But where does THAT band's name come from? The Heeren 17, the Board of Directors of the old Dutch East Indies Company, which ran Indonesia while it was a Dutch colony. | Jay Flynn | ||
| Longfellow | Longfellow, a popular Orange County punk band from the mid to late nineties, took their name from Longfellow Road, a street, near their high school in Placentia, California, on which band members used to deliver pizzas. The street was named after the famous American poet, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The name is also a sexual reference, being a moniker for ones penis. | TKS | ||
| Simple Plan | It's been said on several occasions in interviews that it was purely lack of imagination. It is also said that the band was their 'Simple Plan' to get laid. | Optimus Lime | ||
| Simple Plan | Members of SP have given many answers one of which being: the band was their simple plan to avoid obtaining a "real" job. | Optimus Lime | ||
| 3oh!3 | They're named after the 303 area code, which includes Boulder as well as the Denver metropolitan area. | Optimus Lime | ||
| 48May | They lived at 48 May Street in Hamilton whilst they were at University. | Optimus Lime | ||
| Motorhead | "Motorhead" is British slang for a speed freak. Lemmy wrote a song by that title. Also, at least in America, a "motorhead" is an auto engine enthusiast, a car junkie (I once saw a newspaper article about Japanese motorheads who love US car models). | Thrasher | ||
| Ramones | The band took on the name after Paul McCartney's hotel alias but also the band members took on the name as a parody of all those "family" music acts of the time like the Brady Bunch, Partridge Family, Jackson 5, the Osmonds, etc. Did somebody say "Hanson"? ; - ) | I Saw The Ramones Live 4 Times! | ||
| Living Colour | Guitarist Vernon Reid was watching a program on NBC-TV and before it began NBC made a PSA that said that the following program is coming via satellite to your home in stereo where available IN LIVING COLOR. Vernon suggested that phrase for the band name, they liked it and adopted it. | Living Colour Rocks The House! | ||
| Alice in Chains | The band Alice in Chains got its name origin from the legendary King of ShockRock Alice Cooper, who was a big inspiration. Alice Cooper's theme dark, spooky, scary, gory, & terrifying was were "Alice" came from, then the "in Chains" part come from their own dungeon, all alone, trapped, no fear, mid evilish theme. So "Alice" is for Alice Cooper & "in Chains" means dungeons & mid evil theme. | Sydnei Nicole Frank | ||
| Phish | I thought everyone knew this. .. Phish is a delicious vegetarian fish substitute made by Morning Star. Available in fillet, crumble and flake style. The band lived on this stuff early on. | Dick Clark | ||
| Foo Fighters | The band name has nothing to do with American pilots during WW2. French pilots would report seeing fireballs in the sky during the war, and called them feu fighters. Feu means fire. Dave Grohl then changed it to Foo Fighters. He chose this name because he is a total UFO buff, and Roswell Records which the first album was released on is actually Dave Grohls own label. Even the album art was of a ray gun | thesquire | ||
| Matchbox 20 | the submission that claims Paul Doucette thought up the name can't be correct as he wasn't in the original band line-up, he joined after Adam Gaynor left in 2005 | FP | ||
| Set Your Goals | Taken from CIV's first album. | nunya |
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