It can also be written into a contract that the record label owns the name - when the Jackson 5 left Motown Records, Motown reminded them that the label, not the band, owned the name. So when they moved to Epic they were forced to become “The Jacksons”.
British pop group the Sugababes have a similar thing - all the original members have now been replaced, and one of the originals took the management (I think?) to court over the rights to the name. Sugababes, with new members, are still going so I suppose the original member must have lost.
Lawsuits of this nature happen regularly when bands split and some members want to carry on using the original name. A fine example is Pink Floyd after founder member Roger Waters quit. An ugly lawsuit ensued.
An unusual example was with old cosmic rockers Hawkwind, where the trademark was owned by sole-surviving founder member Dave Brock. A number of ex-band members tried to reform under the moniker “Ex-Hawkwind”, but had a lawsuit slapped on them preventing them from doing so. Cue much acrimony.
IIRC, the Steely Dan dildo was steam powered, no less. Ouch. Here’s a neat list of other band name origins.
Thomas Dolby is an interesting case - his real name is not “Thomas Dolby” (it’s Thomas Robertson), but he was known by the nickname “Dolby” because of his interest/proficiency with electronic music equipment (such as made by the Dolby company). This caused concern on the part of the Dolby firm, but the muscian and the acoustic equipment company agreed to terms after a while - “Thomas Dolby” the musician is always and only referred to that way, never as simply Dolby. Meanwhile, one feels bad for the son of the founder of the Dolby firm - whose name really is Thomas (Thomas Dolby - Wikipedia)
Are you absolutely sure about this? I’ve only ever known of one band of that name, and I can’t find any reference to two bands either in Google or on AMG. But I am, of course, happy to be corrected.
I just think it would be weird if your born name was Thomas Dolby and everyone who heard it confused you with someone who merely adopted that name because he liked the equipment that your own family made.
Well, I’ve seen comments from UK writers that use the figure 10cc. It’s not accurate, but it’s an idiom and common enough for it to be used in, say, political columns.
As for King, that’s just false ingenuousness. “Oh, I never realized the name I chose in my dream was a common phrase that everyone in the UK knew was a reference to male ejaculate.” Right. :dubious:
The band origins is missing a few notable ones, as well as mis-stating others. Off the top of my head:
Foghat - the founder of the band took the name from a private joke between him and his brother. They were playing Scrabble, and one of them tried to pass off “foghat” as a word. It became a running joke between the two of them.
Porno for Pyros - the founder made an art film for school which featured a lot stuff burning and getting blown up. His sister told him it looked like “pornography for pyromaniacs”.
Stone Temple Pilots - the lead guitarist, like many before him, affixed an STP sticker to his guitar. So they wanted a name constructed from the letters “STP”, and originally named themselves “Shirley Temple’s Pussy”. Eventually realizing that record producers and performing venues would very likely not have the nerve, they renamed themselves to something fairly meaningless, retaining the “STP” initials. Not to mention that Shirley Temple Black is still alive, and would probably have sued. I suppose they could have dug around for stock footage of Shirley Temple hugging a cat for an album cover, and tried to get it published with the name emblazoned over it.
