How To Name Your Band

If you're in a band the first thing you have to do is come up with a cool name.

It's well-known that cool bands have cool names (e.g. Jesus Lizard) whereas very few uncool bands have cool names (e.g. Sugar Ray). It's unlikely you could be cool and fail to come up with a cool name and vice versa, although sometimes you find a good band with a crap name (Live) and a crap band with a good name (but I can't think of any off the top of my head).

Choose carefully because if it's lame (Maroon 5) you will be forever thought of as lame even if you get some hard-core street cred (e.g. singing competition judge).

I love making up band names and keep lists of them for fun. One of my early favorites was Velcro Apology. Sometimes we'd play one-off gigs and make up a name for the occasion, like the time we played a lawn party in Connecticut and called ourselves The Unfaithful Housewives. Brainstorming names for kicks is a blast; a friend and I came up with Steve’s Funnel, which evolved to That’s Steves’ Funnel and finally to That’s Steve’s.

I don't have any one favorite band name but I like Daft Punk, Urge Overkill, and US Maple. If your parents gave you a weird name just use that, like Sufjan Stevens or Bjork. The lamest stage name anyone gave themselves was The Edge followed closely by Sting.

A good name should provide a basic idea of the bands' sensibility like The Flaming Lips. You might not be able to tell from that name what you're in for musically but you know it's not mainstream. Sometimes a band name initially strikes you as contrived until you get to know the music, after which you can't imagine them being named anything else, like Led Zeppelin. Other bands have copied that formula (and failed), which is how you got Def Leppard and Limp Bizkit.

Some bands have names that evoke their musical style (Queen, Cheap Trick) and some don't (Extreme, Survivor).

With so many possible word permutations why limit yourself to ordinary names like The Cranberries, Zombies or The Envelopes? I don't even know if The Envelopes is a real name but I wouldn't be surprised. You can be gimmicky and do something like The The, or !!! but those wear off fast. *Subsequent Google research informs me there IS a band called the Envelopes.

LOOK AROUND
One trick that works well is to just look around your house and read stuff, like Total Nutrition, Chunky Salsa, Extra Virgin, Get $5 in Coupons Today and Niacin 6%. Or look for stuff lying around your apartment and go with that, like The Empty's, Chip Bag, and Random Girl from Last Night.

DEFINITE ARTICLE NAMES
The Beatles wanted an insect name because of Buddy Holly and the Crickets, so they went with Beetles (Lennon later added the “a” to pun on the word “Beat”). Then everyone wanted definite article and insect/animal names like The Turtles, The Who, The Yardbirds, The Doors, and The Kinks.

Yawn.

Bands started deliberately misspelling names for the quirk factor like The Byrds. Let's face it - The Birds is absolutely stupid but Byrds is cool(er). Imagine how lame the following band names would be with the correct spelling: Black Crowes, Motley Crue, Linkin Park, Phish, Korn, and Ratt.

But you have to have a definite article name if you’re doing a New Wave, Punk, or Retro thing like The Clash, The Sex Pistols, The Ramones, The Cars, The Police, The Jam, and The Strokes. If you have a self-destructive lead singer try something like The Hives, The Vines, or Scott Weiland Band.

THREE WORDS
You might want to try a three-word name so people can refer to you by the initials such as CCR, Bachman Turner Overdrive, ELO, ELP, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Public Image Limited, and Nine Inch Nails. I suppose you could use an existing three letter name and insert different words like Elephant Leg Operation just to see if you'd get sued by Jeff Lynne.

If your band rocks, consider allusions to metals, stones, or religion. Stone Temple Pilots in one shot covers stones, the church element, and initials (STP).

HORSES AND COLORS
What if you want to be tough but don't want to embarrass your family with a name like Butthole Surfers? This is where stones and rocks come in handy like The Stone Roses or Stone Ponies. You can combine metals and hair color (Platinum Blonde), straight hair color (Blondie), color paradox (Blonde Redhead) or references to hair color which no one in the band has (4 Non Blondes). Or you can fool your audience and name yourself Ben Fold's Five when there's only three guys.

Maybe switch it up unexpectedly like Ass Ponies. I think Ass Ponies should have gone for the trifecta and called themselves Ass Stone Ponies (stones, animal reference, abbreviation AND acronym for a snake).

FUZZY NAMES
If you have normal families and friends and don't want to insult or challenge anyone there are names like Wallflowers, Gin Blossoms, and Dave Matthew’s Band. Be careful with soft words and flower references unless you couple them with firearms like Guns N Roses and Velvet Revolver. If you're Indie, combine metals with alcohol (Iron & Wine). And these subtle distinctions, my friends, define Indie and Rock. If Guns N Roses were Indie they would have used an ampersand (Guns & Roses) and if Iron & Wine were Rock they (he) would have gone with Iron N Wyne.

ALPHANUMERIC NAMES
If words, names, and sentences don’t interest you can use letters that sound like words (INXS or XTC) or go for numbers and letters like U2, UB40, B52’s Level 42, X, 311, Matchbox Twenty, and Blink 182. One problem with naming your band after a number like 2,487 is your fans won't know how to find your CD if the store has them alphabetized. There are probably a lot of fractions and irrational numbers still available like 1.618.

If you can combine numbers and letters with some sort of reference to rocks or ponies you're gold.

INDIE NAMES
Indie and quirky bands need random names (Arcade Fire, Kaiser Chiefs, Fountains of Wayne) or which reference France like Les Savy Fav, Violent Femmes, Cocteau Twins, French Kicks, Bon Iver, and Of Montreal. If it hadn't already been used I'm sure there would be an Indie band called Au Bon Pain by now. Bon Iver sounds cooler than the translation "Have a Nice Winter" and there are too many cold climate band names (Snow Patrol, Arctic Monkeys).

FOUND NAMES
If you’re a new band without lots of cash to promote yourselves try coming up with a name already widely in use. The advertising is practically done for you. Names like Stop, Falling Ice, Yield, or Wendy’s. If you want to be less obvious maybe go with something like Parking Lot Shuttle. Southwestern bands could try something like Restricted Nuclear Facility, or the Dorito's.

MONOLITHIC NAMES
If you have seven to twelve musicians in your band and write overblown corporate rock you might want to go with 70s Arena Rock names. These are usually single-word statements like Asia, Toto, Kansas, Queen, Heart, Styx, Boston, Journey, Starship, Foreigner, and Genesis. You’ll also want airbrushed spaceships on your album covers and at least one ballad by Diane Warren that everyone despises.

CALENDAR NAMES
If you’re partial to weekday names you’re screwed. The Mondays, The Tuesdays, The Wednesdays, The Thursdays, The Fridays, The Saturdays and The Sundays are all taken. You can’t even use Till Tuesday, Late Tuesday, or Early Monday Afternoon (although they’ve probably broken up by now). Month names are risky and probably most have been used or alluded to like The Decembrists. Pronoun names have mostly been used like the Who, the What, the Guess Who, and The When, but it would have been cool to see all of them on the same bill.

MASH-UPS
If you’re into Pop Culture references try a celebrity name mash-up like Gnarls Barkley, Mary Tyler Morphine, Brian Jonestown Massacre or mashing/punning like Alchoholocaust or Vampire State Building. I’m waiting for someone to come up with Kim Carcrashian and Iran-Contraband. Metal bands might try something like Matt Daemon or Halley's Vomit. Fans of the TV show Cheers could go with Diarrhea Pearlman.

If you do trippy stuff I guess you can go with drug references like Chemical Brothers, My Chemical Romance, or We Take Drugs.

FREAK-OUT NAMES
There have always been the “we-have-the-weirdest-name-ever” names like My Dog has Hitler’s Brain, Hello I’m a Truck, The Fat Chick from Wilson Phillips, and the excitement-generating Congratulations on Your Decision to Become a Pilot.

Two of the longest band names ever are:

The Clouds That Fondle Jagged Crags And Raging Storms Conspire And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of The Dead

and a Mexican band called:

Paracoccidioidomicosisproctitissarcomucosis

Trying too hard?

Geeky bands choose nerdy names such as They Might Be Giants, Toad the Wet Sprocket, and Weezer. The key is to keep the name as white and sexless as your music, like Trivial Hirsute or for writerly types something like Bad Kelsey Grammar.

If you're European try names with ominous Nazi overtones like Spandau Ballet or Phil Collins.

SCARY NAMES
No-nonsense bands should keep it basic like Blur, Filter, and Tool. If you aren’t going for the Luciferian angle you should always reference some sort of alloy or mechanical device.

Metal and hard-core bands need names that are blasphemous or evil. The goal is to strike fear into your suburban-teen-mostly-white-male audience, which is why Metal names are influenced by slasher films, Halloween, murdering, things that cause death, and Jr High School ideas of Satanism.

The more obvious names referring to being murdered or endangered are Slayer, Scorpions, Slaughter, Poison and Megadeth (the most amount of death possible, also deliberately misspelled). Take it farther and try I’ll Kill You and Your Family in Their Sleep, Murder Everyone, or Scott Wieland Project.

If you become a superstar you only need to use your first or last name. The original first-namer was Elvis and his female counterpart was Cher. This led to Madonna, Prince, Sade, Seal, Beck, Enya, Jewel, Dido, Beyonce, Pink, Shakira, Ussher, and Gotye.

I'd rather use a fake first name for a band like Greg. Other possible choices would be Craig and Matt.

If you want to sound hardcore (even if you aren't) go with basics like Garbage, Concrete, Hole, or pavement-like names such as Pavement and Assfault Cracks.

What if you're frat boys and can't think of a band name? Try words or phrases you might use on a given night, such as Where's The Bitches and You Know You Want It.

Country bands should keep things simple and honest. But for Indie and New Country bands, names like Oak Ridge Boys and Waylon Jennings won't work. I would try something along the lines of Adolph Coors has the Same First Name as Hitler, We're Probably Related, or The Racists.

There has to be a perfect band name yet to be discovered. If you think you've found it, let me know.