When a great name is also the name of one of your favourite bands, it's about as big win-win as you can get. Foo Fighters rose from the ashes of Nirvana after the death of Kurt Cobain. Chief Foo Dave Grohl combined his love of aliens/UFOs, super-catchy pop music, punk and heavy metal to create one of the biggest bands in the world. The group got its name from the UFOs and various aerial phenomena that were reported by Allied aircraft pilots in World War II, which were known collectively as "foo fighters". "Around the time that I recorded the first FF tape (that became the first record), I was reading a lot of books on UFO's. Not only is it a fascinating subject, but there's a treasure trove of band names in those UFO books!" Dave Grohl said. Although he played all of the instruments himself on the first album, Dave stated that "I wanted people to think that it was a group, I figured that FOO FIGHTERS might lead people to believe that it was more than just one guy. Silly, huh? Had I actually considered this to be a career, I probably would have called it something else, because it's the stupidest fucking band name in the world." Dave Letterman professed his love for them time and time again, culminating in the Foos closing out Dave's final show with his favourite song, Everlong. And let's not forget Dave's other projects: Queens Of The Stone Age, Them Crooked Vultures (with QOTSA's Josh Homme and Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones), the "PROBOT" heavy metal album he conceived featuring all of his fave metal vocalists, producing country megastars The Zac Brown Band's latest album, and bringing down the house at the Country Music Awards in 2013... Oh yeah - guesting on Drunk History and being a substitute Chelsea Handler on her 'Chelsea Lately' latenight show. Here's an almost-complete (though somewhat anti-non-metal/rock) list. But we shouldn't gloss over the fact that the band are some of the nicest guys in music. Almost to the point that the only bad things said about them are that Mr. Grohl is way too overexposed, or that he is sometime a dictator instead of a bandleader (er... why do people thing Springteen is called "The Boss"?) To sum up, stupid name or not, the Foo Fighters will be in the Rock N' Roll Hall Of Fame someday, if not first-ballot-worthy in 4 years. And when it happens, the stage won't be big enough for the people wanting to pay tribute.
Speaking of tribute, this one might beat em' all...
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Ever felt ripped off? Like that time when someone said that you were going to get something then you were left standing there, looking like an idiot when nothing happened? Man, that sucks. Don't worry - We Were Promised Jetpacks from Edinburgh, Scotland has your back. Beyond embracing that time you didn't get that experimental propulsion device from the military, the Jetpacks make some sweet, sweet alt-pop music. There's no eccentric or epically fun story behind the name, and maybe that adds to the allure of the band.
Either way, they may have turned me off picnics for a long time... What is a Zef Ninja Rap Rave Crew? Can a duo from Cape Town become internationally revered with a name that means "The Answer" in Afrikaans? All will be revealed in this wee little profile on Die Antwoord, quite possibly the most perfect balance between mainstream and bat-guano crazy. Formed in 2008, Ninja and ¥O-LANDI VI$$ER combine elements of rap and rave with a South African counterculture movement called 'Zef'. According to Ninja, "Zef is South African underdog kind of style. Zef has been an insult for long in South Africa. It's seen as an embarrassment. The thing is, the word kind of started transforming about 10 years ago. It's kind of abstract. For me, this is what zef was born out of: Rap overtook country music. Everything became super too-fast-too-furious, WWF information overload. And you're sitting in this little fishing village in the bottom of the world, and it feels like almost like an apocalyptic wasteland. It's like, kind of bad, but kind of like this apocalyptic debris that we've stuck together. People say trashy; it's not really trashy. It's not having money, but still fokken having style. So we kind of embraced that." The great jam bands in rock history have had names that are quirky, to say the least (Phish, The Grateful Dead, Gov't Mule...). Crested Butte, Colorado's The Cheese String Incident is no different. You'd be forgiven to think that they're named after a third-rate political thriller movie about dairy products, or a cover band based on Guns N' Roses' cover album The Spaghetti Incident, but you'd be very, very wrong. There are a few stories out there about where the name came from, which has made it into quite the solid rock myth: 1) A Spinal Tap-esque event happening on stage at a 1996 Cheese String Incident show involving a broken mandolin string. 2) Being stopped by the police while possessing a Tupperware-esque container of weed marked "String Cheese". 3) A bar food fight with jack cheese, beans and salsa ending becoming so epic the members decided to call themselves The String Cheese Incident to never forget that experience. All solid options, but even more fun is trying to identify the multitude of musical styles in every song. So sit back, grab a tasty beverage or three (heck, order a pizza while you're at it) and enjoy this close-to-2-hour jam session. Such an epic name - so emotionally visceral. And now that I know how it came to be for this renowned post-punk/neo-psychedelic(?) Liverpuddlian outfit, I want to scour every comic book I own for similar out-there inspiration. The Teardrop Explodes, whose style is also referred to as "bubblegum trance"(??), formed in 1978 and laid the groundwork for much of the 80's British Invasion (The Smiths, Siouxsie and the Banshees, The Cure...) and some of the 90's one too (Blur, The Auteurs, Pulp...). It also seems they were trailblazers in the "running around dilapidated factories/warehouses" video concept. I could provide a word-for-word anecdote of the group coming up with the name, but you won't get the same effect as closing your eyes and imagining you're a young Julian Cope, defacto head-Teardrop, reading this nonsensical page of Marvel Comics' Daredevil, issue #77: The 'teardrop' is actually a spaceship(???) that takes Prince Namor/Sub-Mariner (the dude in the green Speedo lifting the tree) away to somewhere else. What's that sound? Yeah, that's your mind, blown.
Their music would've ensured the band's legacy anyways, no matter they could've been called. But this is a Hall Of Fame-level name origin to an exceptional band name. Now, time to read my comic stash and pore over Teardrop song titles... One of the most eclectic and revered bands out there, Oklahoma City's The Flaming Lips have close to the perfect career: do what they want, when they want, and their fans will love 'em no matter what. Short of recording a duet with Donald Trump or Vladimir Putin, they can do no wrong. Writing songs about being a frog... ... penning one of the most gorgeous ballads ever, then shoot the video with Japanese models and bunny mascots in Vegas... ... or recording a track-by-track cover album of the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band with none other than Miley Cyrus... Put it all together, and it's best left to frontman Wayne Coyne to talk about where the Lips' name came from:
“Back in 1983 when we were approaching our first gig, we really didn’t know what we were gonna be called. It was still sort of the punk era back then, but we didn’t want to be called something too political like the Dead Kennedys. I’d read somewhere about a group called the Flaming Hands, which was a name I’d liked and that led to the Flaming Lips. "But I’ve had a lot of people come up to me and tell me that they really know where the name comes from. Some folks have told me that I got the name from an old Fred Astaire musical that it supposedly shows up in. Others said we took it from a quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson. Nope, it happened like I said it did. I even remember making a flyer for the show where I cut out a picture of a woman with her legs spread and put a mouth over her, uh, parts — so there was this idea of a throbbing orifice. It just proves that if a man is completely left to his own devices, he’ll always go straight for vaginas.” “Oh, we had a bunch of ridiculous ideas. We had considered things like the Tijuana Toads; the Corporation; the Firm. Silly names like that.” Riiiight, Wayne - Flaming Lips not silly, Tijuana Toads silly. Actually, maybe starting a Flaming Lips cover band is in order. Think we'll call ourselves the Tijuana Toads... This one has fascinated me since my teens. What is a Bone Thug? And does it require Harmony to be complete? Sadly, the true answer is nowhere near the philosophical mindbend my questions suggest. The Cleveland, Ohio band's name comes from none other than legendary N.W.A. co-founder Eazy E, who coined the name "Thugs N Harmony", which captured the "mean streets: vibe the group gave off, all the while taking note of the melodic backbone that gave them their trademark sound. The Bone handle comes from every member using it in their own names. Speaking of coining terms, the Thugs may be originators of the "gangsta ghost" sub-genre, as witnessed in 'Crossroads': So, the lesson for today, kids, is that Heaven (or whatever you like to call that higher plane with all those fluffy clouds) isn't just filled with Mother Teresa and Mr. Rogers.
Haven't gone with any huge band names here, but I've always been curious about the origin of Metallica. Back in the early 80's, drummer/co-founder Lars Ulrich's friend was starting a metal fanzine. The friend was debating between two names for the 'zine: "Metallica" and "Metal Mania". He asked Lars for his opinion, and Lars told him that he should definitely go with "Metal Mania", because secretly Mr. Ulrich wanted Metallica for his band (who at the time went by such esteemed names as Red Vette and Blitzer). Another theory is that a 'heavy metal bible' of sorts by the name of Encyclopedia Metallica was in every music and book store in 1981 London, where Lars also happened to be at the time. Hmm... Well, over 110 million records sold, an entry into the Rock N' Roll Hall Of Fame, and a concert with the San Fran Symphony Orchestra later, they can still get as raw and loud as metal bands half their age. And there's almost no one else could make moths sound so kickass. This almost makes one forget the Napster incident...
Finally!! A band that named itself after a random Gary Busey quote! The world owes you one, iwrestledabearonce. I was starting to get writer's block from the stress of not finding any group that would take this oh-so logical step. But now that 's been taken care of, I can relax and let the words flow again. The L.A.-by-Shreveport/Louisiana band are primarily known for their musical diversity and their propensity to shift genres in-song. Call them avant-garde metal, metalcore, mathcore, deathcore, whatever. When it gets down to it, I'd like to refer to them as 'uniquecore' (not Uniqua, the purple hippoesque thing on kids' TV show Backyardigans). Wow. Now I get it. With so many time changes and ideas going on, how else were they going to say their name while playing live unless they jammed everything together into one word? It's also the perfect social media handle, and the perfect random thought to mutter at a party just to keep everyone on their toes.
Inspiring. While I'm on a creative high, maybe there's some potential fake song/album title or band name ideas in this treasure trove of a montage... This week's entry could be the title of a James Bond film or biography about Central American dictators. It's neither, but just as or even more cinematic in scope. The Last Shadow Puppets are a English supergroup sideproject fronted by the Arctic Monkeys' Alex Turner and the most-Mod-of-Mods-not-named-Paul-Weller, Miles Kane. they were inspired by early Bowie, groovy orchestral master David Axelrod and They both wanted the word 'shadow' in the name somewhere, not necessarily for any particular reason, but more for the ambiguity the word can have. “It’s The Last Shadow Puppets, because hopefully it means there won’t need to be any more Shadow Puppets,” laughs Turner. “It’s quite big and dramatic,” suggests Kane. “You can look at us as shadow puppets, I guess. We’re both in our bands, so this is in our own shadows. It’s in our own little world.” And this video flows right into the video for Everything You've Come To Expect. A mini cinematic opus, if you will. But then, they go and make the best perfume ad/Italian movie never made. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you "Miracle Aligner". Hmm... Miracle Aligner would be a great fake band name... |
The officially unofficial blog of Faux Rawk. Everything you read is true, although some of what you read is 100% false. Whoa... trippy, man. Archives
June 2017
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