# I just wrote a "Band Name Generator" **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 2, 2006, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-wrote-a-band-name-generator/362985 "2006-07-02T23:35:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2006, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-wrote-a-band-name-generator/362985/41 "2006-07-03T20:12:34Z")
[QUOTE=ianzin] Okay, but you know that ‘Pearl Jam’ is not an instance of ‘random words’, right? Think ‘10 cc’ and ‘The Lovin’ Spoonful’. [/QUOTE] Huh? Are you saying it’s a sperm reference? I’ve never heard that one, and neither has my brother, Pearl Jam uber-fan if there is one. The oft-repeated story is that it’s a reference to Great-Grandma Vedder’s (Pearl) hallucinogenic preserves (Jam). The true story, according to Ament, McCready, and Vedder, in a Rolling Stone piece, is the following: > [@](#): > > Legend has it that Vedder wrote the lyrics to the songs in one burst, while surfing.That particular story, he tells me in his Chicago hotel room, is “100 percent true.” But he concedes that another oft-told tale is less accurate: that the name Pearl Jam came from Vedder’s great-grandmother Pearl, who, he used to claim, was married to an American Indian and was in the habit of making preserves spiked with various hallucinogenics. His great-grandma really was named Pearl. The rest is, indeed, “total bulllshit.” Told of Vedder’s admission, Ament and McCready seem relieved. They cough up the true – if less romantic – tale behind the band’s name. Brainstorming in a Seattle restaurant to come up with something, anything, to replace their original name, Mookie Blaylock (inspired by the NBA star), Ament came up with “pearl.” The band didn’t settle on the second half of its name until a 1991 trip to New York to sign a deal with Epic Records. Gossard, Vedder and Ament drove out to see Neil Young play Nassau Coliseum. “He played, like, nine songs over three hours. Every song was like a fifteen- or twenty-minute jam,” says Ament. “So that’s how ‘jam’ got added on to the name. Or at least that’s how I remember it.” [From Rolling Stone via Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pearl_Jam) ---
**Author:** ![ianzin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ed655f/32.png) [@ianzin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ianzin)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2006, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-wrote-a-band-name-generator/362985/42 "2006-07-03T20:32:34Z")
Hi **pulykamell**. I was indeed under the impression that ‘Pearl Jam’ was a euphemism akin to ‘10 cc’ and ‘The Lovin’ Spoonful’. However, I admit that I can’t offer any cites or sources to back this up. It’s just something that was ‘explained’ to me a long time ago and I’ve never questioned it. I could be totally, utterly wrong, and if so I apologise. Also, I guess my previous post on this matter sounded more authoritative and ‘knowing’ than it had any right to be. Sorry. ---
**Author:** ![wolf\_meister](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolf_meister/32/15202_2.png) [@wolf\_meister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolf_meister)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2006, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-wrote-a-band-name-generator/362985/43 "2006-07-04T02:30:30Z")
\*\*ianzin and pulykamel \*\* Please let’s put a stop to the [10 cc Urban Legend](http://www.snopes.com/music/artists/10cc.htm). (Very _slight_ worksafe warning - the page has a drawing of a sperm cell about 1 screen down). ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2006, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-wrote-a-band-name-generator/362985/44 "2006-07-04T04:51:44Z")
[QUOTE=wolf\_meister] \*\*ianzin and pulykamel \*\* Please let’s put a stop to the [10 cc Urban Legend](http://www.snopes.com/music/artists/10cc.htm). (Very _slight_ worksafe warning - the page has a drawing of a sperm cell about 1 screen down). [/QUOTE] I actually didn’t know the origin of the 10cc name, but I had heard the sperm explanation before. I just had never heard a similar Pearl Jam explanation. For that matter, I haven’t heard “The Lovin’ Spoonful” referring to ejacuate before, either, and I’m not sure I buy the story. ---
**Author:** ![dnooman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/839c29/32.png) [@dnooman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dnooman)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2006, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-wrote-a-band-name-generator/362985/45 "2006-07-04T05:31:55Z")
[QUOTE=Argent Towers] “Third Eye Blind” and “Vertical Horizon” and “Pearl Jam” and “Better Than Ezra” and the whole phenomenon of random words for band names is very 90s. [/QUOTE] “Pearl Jam” has just been done. “Better than Ezra” is as rondom as it gets. However “Vertical Horizon” albeit cheesey, is just a skewed version of our typical horizon which is…say it with me… Horizontal. Would horizons at the poles be considered vertical? I don’t know. “Third Eye Blind” is also kinda cheesey, but it refers to the [third eye](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_eye) concept of spirituality and enlightenment. Meaning that if one is “Third Eye Blind”, they lack a degree of spirituality and/or enlightenment. From the “Third Eye Blind” wiki article: > [@](#): > > A common misconception is that the name of the band is a euphemism for penis. However, Stephan Jenkins indicated during a radio station interview that the band’s name came from the metaphysical idea of a mind’s eye, a topic of a book he had read. The other group members liked it and chose it as the band’s name. In the past, Stephan has also joked about an Ouija board and vodka being the sources of the name. In Finnish, “Third Eye” means “asshole”, not in offensive means. In some Finnish jokes, it is considered “the blind eye”. I like to think that my interpretation makes the most sense. YMMV. ---
**Author:** ![Silence\_of\_the\_clams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Silence\_of\_the\_clams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silence_of_the_clams)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2006, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-wrote-a-band-name-generator/362985/46 "2006-07-04T16:22:09Z")
**Persistent Sex Saints** Weeeeeeeeeee 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2006, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-wrote-a-band-name-generator/362985/47 "2006-07-04T17:38:49Z")
[QUOTE=dnooman] “Third Eye Blind” is also kinda cheesey, but it refers to the [third eye](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_eye) concept of spirituality and enlightenment. Meaning that if one is “Third Eye Blind”, they lack a degree of spirituality and/or enlightenment. [/QUOTE] For me it evoked the image of a gruesome, yet pointless, mutation or birth defect. I always assumed that was what they were going for. I’m happy to be wrong. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-wrote-a-band-name-generator/362985.md?page=2)