If I started up a girl band, it would not be called the Swingalings. We would not be called the Go-Go Gals. We would not be called the Tra-La-Las.
We would be something, oh, entirely in keeping with the times. You know, like Grey Moon Timez. Or the Whisker Perch 3. Or Spandex Fortune.
Why not, I say? Today, apparently, anything goes. Today, let's face it, Maroon 5 and The Barenaked Ladies are decidedly passé.
A recent check-in with the Grammys demonstrates those old monikers of the past - think Dave Clark Five or the Steve Miller Band or the Allman Brothers - are about as old school as you can get. Hey, why name yourself after one of your band members when you could be, oh, Slipknot or Highly Suspect?
Up for the big prize was My Morning Jacket, which I gather is not to be confused with My Afternoon Trenchcoat or
My Nightime Pyjamas.
Then there was Death Cab for Cutie. No idea where this one came from, but it makes me want to bypass a taxi in favour of a bus.
Numbers are also really big in band names these days. We've had Four Fried Chickens and a Coke, for instance, which I'm thinking plays a decidedly unhealthy genre of music, and 4 Out of 5 Doctors, which has me wondering what the fifth person might happen to be. A dog groomer, maybe? A Latin dance teacher?
Not to be outdone in the
I-don't-get-it department is the British band The The. Now I don't know about you, but this one strikes me as completely off the wall.
If I ever get my girl band together, it might be called Wired West or Toolbar Trophy Four, but I simply cannot imagine it being called This This.
I like Radioactive Squirrels, but that one's also been taken, as has Mary Carves the Chicken. (I suppose, however, that I could always do a variation of this one. Maybe Cathy Makes the Bed? Or Laura Folds the Laundry?) Today, for crying out loud, something like the Alan Parsons Project would never make the cut - not when we have Children of the Vending Machine and The String Cheese Incident.
Want to find success in the tough old world of music these days? You have to think beyond America and The Supremes, and go for Weirdest Band Name Ever.
