Artists You've Written Off/Pointedly Ignored because of their name

I just realized I only consciously realize I've written off an artist because of their name when one of their songs comes up in a Spotify playlist and I think "huh, maybe the War on Drugs are worth listening to"

Mudvayne

That reminds me. Collapsed Lung. They did "Eat my Goal". How does it go? I have no idea. The name puts me off.

sexual jeremy

Eyehategod

Kurt Vile

didn't even realise it was his real name

King Gizzard and the whatever Lizard

Kurt Vile

didn't even realise it was his real name

Big Head Todd and the Monsters

Well, the name and the fact that the lead vocalist seemed very skeezy during an appearance on The Real World 25+ years ago

morrissey

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxK-jFI9xPU
before the name got any recognition. I think I saw something saying they cherry picked the name from a longer sentence or had teh significant parts revealed to them from their state of intoxication or something. Something about it being part of a Chris Roberts review or something.

I came across the lp in the 2nd hand record shop I used to frequent when they were still very unknown. Pink/puke coloured vinyl lp somehow new in an otherwise 2nd hand record shop. I picked it up put it on the listening player, liked what I heard so bought it. & hearsd later taht I got it oddly early, Seemed to be before the actual release date. Yerself Is Steam.

I caught a few dates on the end of the tour they had started supporting Ride on. They did about 4 more dates on their own.

I don’t care how many AOTYs it gets, I’m not listening to a band called Jockstrap

Peaness.

Would make a good double bill with Jockstrap.

Couple more novelty band name I recently came across:

Lana Del Rabies
Michael Cera Palin

Tallest Man In the World
Portugal the Man

probably some other bands with "man" in the name

"Lana Del Rabies" and "Joanna Gruesome" are both incredible names because the reference material is somewhat insular, as opposed to awful names like "Wevie Stonder" or whatever

I wrote off Portugal the Man because of their name and finally broke down and listened and there i was writing Portugal the Man off again

Tallest Portuguese Man in the World

I had a dream the other night about a band called The One Night Show with Lay Jeno, which they subsequently shortened to Lay Jeno. I would not listen to them either way, if they actually existed.

Happy The Man

Mortugal the Pan

Blake Mills

Cage the elephant
Foster the people

Was shocked to learn that Blake Mills was not a Detroit techno guy...

Ha Ha The Moose

(docked an additional star for being a moe. side project)

Alvvays
Chvrches

Both of those seem like bands who found a non-annoying name they like, but couldn't get the twitter handle / trademark / discogs entry, so they inflected it enough to be unique. I do sympathize with bands trying to find an unclaimed band name in 2023 without resorting to "ha ha the moose".
(also, your loss on both of those bands)

One of these days we should have a poll of ungooglable bands. The Band, The Music, X, The The.

!!!

The oldest I ever felt was when I found out there's a band called Alvvays. Spelling shit in a Transylvanian accent is a thing now? No fucking way.

Anyway I later found out it was just to make the name google-able but the damage was done.

― The 25 Best Songs Ever Ranked In Order (Deflatormouse), Tuesday, May 31, 2022 12:47 AM (one year ago) bookmarkflaglink

ROFL @ "Ha ha the moose"

I don’t care how many AOTYs it gets, I’m not listening to a band called Jockstrap

There was a trailer all over BBC 6Music a few weeks ago for a show called "Lose Yourself With Jockstrap", delivered in that terribly earnest 6Music trailer voice. Did wonders for my mental wellbeing.

tbf the 6Music voice would make anything sound horrible

Ha ha the moose

said Gramps, watching Rocky & Bullwinkle.

I would like that name a little better if I knew that's where it came from.

One of my favorite jokes:

A moose hunter and his friend are hunting in the woods. They come across a third man, who puts up his hands and says, "Don’t shoot, I’m not a moose!" But the moose hunter raises his gun and shoots him. The hunter's friend turns to the moose hunter and asks, "why did you shoot him? He told you he wasn’t a moose!" And the moose hunter goes, "Oh, I thought he said he *was* a moose.”

I stayed away from Prefab Sprout for a very long as I thought they were a prog rock band based off there name

i thought it was '90s indie rock for a long time, and then i realized i was mixing them up with Tobin Sprout

(also, your loss on both of those bands)

I want to give them a fair shake!

(Perhaps more for the ILX Dreams thread) but last night I was dreamed about a band called Ha Ha The HOOS

Blake Mills

ok, wait, I am going to ask for some further clarification about this one. a) it is literally his real name, and b) not even a bad one at that. struggling to see why this would chase someone off.

"guy's name = it's gonna be characterless and boring, if he had any imagination he'd give it a band name like The Mountain Goats"

-14 year old me

I was wondering what subset of Prog Rock 'Hats Off Gentlemen, It's Adequate' might be.

xp As a flip side to this, I remember explaining to a friend that Lou Barlow of Sebadoh used the name "Sentridoh" for his solo stuff, and my friend frowned and was like, "What's the deal with this guy??" Like he found the concept genuinely outrageous and distasteful for some reason...

I did hear Beach House once but their name just puts me off.

They're a good band, the name is a bit strange though because it seems to imply a different style of music to what they actually play.

Personally, I think that's the only cool thing about them. I'm a sucker for that particular bit of misdirection. See also: Swans, Cherubs. Trying to think of an example of the opposite approach - gnarly name, chill band. I guess The Grateful Dead sort of count

Spandau Ballet

(answering Paul)

"I did hear Beach House once but their name just puts me off."

in a record store the other day I overheard two gen zers talking and one said to the other "if someone likes more than one Beach House album that's a total red flag" and the other one agreed. I don't know what is going on anymore.