unless they've got a bit of education/cultural/obscenity reference

Here's my starter:

Status Quo
The Pogues
Pearl Jam
Joy Division
New Model Army

(Please nobody post the Sex Pistols)

pearl jam 🙂

I think if you're including status quo then you can probably also get away with

scissor sisters
dire straits (?)

I only get one of those!

And I don't care!

Keep reading FHM boys

how can you not list "Steely Dan"?

go back and start again

(edit)

i'll add

Duran Duran
Depeche Mode
Heaven 17

pearl jam . Snigger snigger 🙂

only one i dont get is pearl jam
i'll add pet shop boys

The Doors

10CC

Uriah Heep
The Boo Radleys
Zuzu's Petals
This mortal coil

Loving spoonful

So is anyone going to give an explanation then ?

From memory, so don't be shy about correcting me if I got these wrong.
Rolling Stones = From Bob Dylan lyrics.
Beatles = apart from the obvious "beat" pun, the insect themed name was inspired by Buddy Holly and the Crickets.
The Doors = The Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley
Heaven 17 = a ficyitious band in the novel A Clockwork Orange
The Straycats = A fictitious band in a film with Ringo Starr and David Essex, I can't remember the title.
Duran Duran = A character in the film Barbarella.

I'm guessing pearl jam is what makes the same necklaces… never thought of that before!

jethro tull

Rubicon

I do know that the 10cc refrence is nor about the amount of erm, man juice according to one of the band members( can't do this without absurd double entendres) it was just an invention by a record company drone. Something short and snappy that people would remember. The " explanation" came ( oh dear) later

Butole surface

Mark, 'surfers' has the same number of letters as 'surface', so its seems your new language isn't just laziness, you're actually incapable of spelling anything. what are you a student of? how do you cope submitting projects if you write them all with thumbs on your mobile?

jethro tull ? seed drill ?
what about mott the hoople ?

I always thought Pearl Jam was a reference to Eddie's great grandmothers jam, mainly because he said it was, but wiki says:

In an early promotional interview, Vedder said that the name "Pearl Jam" was a reference to his great-grandmother Pearl, who was married to a Native American and had a special recipe for peyote-laced jam.[13] In a 2006 Rolling Stone cover story however, Vedder admitted that this story was "total bullshit" (even though he indeed had a great-grandma named Pearl).

instead it is just a reference to jamming.

FFs dude u sownd lik my gramma

if your gramma sounds like an Irish bloke, that might explain a few things innit

Anyone here know the genesis of Pearl Jam. They formed from the remnants of a one off album made in tribute to a mutual friend of the bands Mother Love Bone and Sound Garden, the former lead singer of Mother Love Bone was called Andrew Wood and his nickname was Dog. The tribut album is called 'Temple of the Dog'. If you're a Pearl Jam fan and don't know about this album seek it out as it's utterly brilliant.

Eartha Kitt ? 😆

I have always wondered which is the correct genesis of

REM

FFs dude u sownd lik my gramma

I do hope not, your grammar is appalling.

Unless the band has been invented by Simon Cowell, it is almost inevitably full of smartarses who are determined to select a clever name for their band by a process of try-hard cultural referencing. 🙂

And Butole surface is a really good effort. 😉

Datz rite

Spear of Destiny
the levellers

Apart from the Datz (hoo iz jeany-us innit), is this a convention of the sort of music fan that 6Music desperatly wished it had more of (but thankfully doesn't)?

So is everyone else going to carry on smugly listing band names without an explanation as if they are some sort of in joke that no one else gets ?

The Levellers = A movement during the English Civil War that promoted equality for all people rather than being ruled by parliament or monarchy.

UB40

So is everyone else going to carry on smugly listing band names

Yes. Yes, they are. 🙂

Take That
East 17
Boyzone

kiss my arse you fascist love slaves !!!!

UB40 = A WW2 German submarine, famed for the a cappella harmonies of it's crew.
Take That = The name of the Indian restaurant where the band members played their first gig.
East 17 = The grid reference of the bands home town
Boyzone = A gentlemen's interest magazine.

status quo- no change
the pogues- used to be called pogue ma hone gaelic for kiss my ar5e
joy division- think this was nazi sex workers
New model army- wasnt this Oliver cromwells army?
scissor sisters- lesbial sexual position
Uriah heep- character in a Dickens novel
Boo Radley- Anti hero in To kill a mockingbird (one of the best books ever IMO)
Rubicon- think this refers to a river crossed as a point of no return by Caesars army (and what about Styx)
Spear of destiny- ? the spear used to pierce christs side on the cross
UB40- Signing on card
E17- Bands postcode

And i always thought pet shop boys was gay slang but im not so sure now

The Thompson Twins = Two characters in the Tin Tin comics.

Level 42

eritrky love how folk think they know one then it turns out to have been fabricated by NME etc.

Loosers!

Level 42

seriously, love how folk think they know one then it turns out to have been fabricated by NME etc.

Loosers!

Why do we have to 'understand' anyway? Can't we just listen to the music, or is that just too mainstream? 😉

Led Zeppelin = Some sort of pun on going down like a lead balloon, however, as "The Who Live at Leeds", meaning a live performance, not recorded, often got mispronounced as if the Who lived in Leeds, they deliberately misspelled lead.