Bands with letters in their names

Cafe Society
1

(It’s something of a broad topic, I know.)

What I’m looking for are musical groups that use acronyms, initialisms, or other abbreviations in their names. Driving home from work last night, I heard the song Restart (YouTube link) by the group BNQT (pronounced “banquet”). It prompted me to think about other bands with only letters in their names, such as:

Acronyms (abbreviations that form pronounceable words):
[ul]
[li]ABBA[/li][li]INXS[/li][li]XTC[/li][/ul]

Initialisms (abbreviations with letters representing words in a phrase that are pronounced separately and that don’t themselves form words)
[ul]
[li]KMFDM (abbreviation for “Kein Mehrheit Für Die Mitleid”)[/li][li]NRBQ (abbreviation for “New Rhythm and Blues Quartet”)[/li][li]REM (abbreviation for “rapid eye movement”)[/li][/ul]

Other abbreviations:
[ul]
[li]MGMT (short for “management,” a reference to the band’s original name of “The Management,” but pronounced as separate letters)[/li][/ul]

There are also bands that went under both their full name and the name’s abbreviation, such as Emerson, Lake & Palmer (ELP), and Electric Light Orchestra (ELO).

I’m not necessarily looking for common but unofficial shortenings of band names, such as “TFF” for “Tears For Fears,” but they can certainly be added to the discussion. What you got?

2

MFSB – Mother Father Sister Brother (officially).

NSYNC (from the last letter of the first names of the singers)

PFM – for Premiata Forneria Marconi, the name of the band. The group released albums using both names.

3

The most obvious: AC/DC

4

GTR - their name was an abbreviation of “guitar”; their album infamously received a review that read, in its entirety, “SHT.”

5

I don’t think this counts as an acronym. What do the individual letters stand for? And it isn’t really a “pronounceable word.”
What about band names made up of both letters and numbers, like U2 or UB40?

6

The joke I heard was it stood for “Kill Motherfucking Depeche Mode”

AC/DC is the first one to come to mind.

From the early 90s, there was

EMF
The KLF

Bachman-Turner Overdrive frequently used the BTO acronym in album titles (usually live albums or best-of compilations)

7

I think XTC is pronounced similarly to ecstasy.

8

OMD (Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark)

9

KISS - Knights in Satan’s Service, of course

b52s

10

CSS, which is short for Cansei de Ser Sexy, which is Portuguese for “tired of being sexy.”

11

GRIMMS, a supergroup made up of members from the Bonzo Dog Band, the Scaffold, and the Liverpool Scene (all much bigger in the UK than the US) got its name from the last name initials of the members: John Gorman, Andy Roberts, Neil Innes*, Mike McGear**, Roger McGough, and Vivian Stanshall.

Pacific Gas & Electricchanged their name to PG&E after a threatened lawsuit from the utility company of the same name.

Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young are referred to as CSN and CSNY, but that’s more unofficial.
Same for CCR for Creedence Clearwater Revival.

Tyrannosaurus Rex shortened their name to T-Rex, so that half fits.

*“The seventh Python.” As in Monty.
** Real name: McCartney. Yes, his brother.

12

N.W.A. = Niggaz Wit Attitudes

13

ZZ Top (Nearly)

TCMF-2L

14

P.O.D.

S.O.D.

D.R.I.

15

As well as ELP for Emerson Lake and Palmer there was ELP2 for Emerson Lake and Powell.

TCMF-2L

16

As well as often being called MSG, the Michael Schenker Group also used the initials as an album title.

Plus for the double: Michael Schenker himself rose to fame in UFO. (After starting in The Scorpions.)

TCMF-2L

17

Not to be confused with CCS, who had a hit in 1970 with a cover of Led Zep’s “Whole Lotta Love.” I never knew what their name stood for; Wiki tells me it’s Collective Consciousness Society.

18

Yes, but my point is that that’s not pronouncing it as a word*—it’s pronouncing the individual letters. (As if you pronounced ABBA “aybeebeeay.”)

19

Russian female duo t.A.T.u. perhaps best known internationally for the hit All The Things She Said (note use of lower case letters to distinguish from the Australian female band Tatu.)

tCMf-2L

20

Though it never really got off the ground, there was, briefly (late 1980-early 1981), a supergroup entitled XYZ, for “Ex Yes and Zeppelin”; it featured Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin (Robert Plant was invited, but opted out after one rehearsal), and Chris Squire and Alan White of Yes.