Can’t forget good old Mr. Mister.
Yo-Yo Ma.
Johnny Johnson (and the Bandwagon). Although, according to Wikipedia, his real name was Johnny Mathis. :smack:
When I’m alone in my room, sometimes I stare at the wall. And in the back of my mind, I hear my conscious call. looks deep in hrhomer’s eyes
To the OP, BB and CC Winans.
Mary Mary (gospel group).
And if we are doing bands, Wet Wet Wet, named thrice!
Since the band rule is being broken, Hot Hot Heat.
Just type “!!!” into the search on Wikipedia. They’re not big enough that your grandma’s heard of them, but big enough that the hipster kids can tell you that they’re stale now and were only cool in 1996. “chk chk chk” is the most common transliteration of their name that I’ve seen.
I kinda feel like !!! is willing to trade more people coming to their website for not getting pirated because you can’t search for them. I also feel that the groups “The The” and “The Band” were amazingly prescient in making their names nigh-impossible to Google. Honorable mention to the “? and the Mysterians,” who start their name with a verboten character.
If we’re going classical, my favorite is Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf.
Los Van Van.
Ozzy Osbourne is close – but I suspect it’s rather common for someone to acquire a nickname based on their last name, and decide to adopt the nickname as their public first name.
Flavor Flav
In addition to the OP’s example of Phillip Phillips, there’s also Phil Phillips, who recorded the original version of “Sea of Love.”
Well, in England (and especially in Birmingham), there seem to be a lot of musicians whose first names are replaced by diminutives of their last names. John “Ozzy” Osbourne is the most famous example.
The drummer for ELO was Beverly “Bev” Bevan.
And Tony! Toni! Tone!
Jimmy James (soul singer)
James James (harpist)
Jim James(singer for My Morning Jacket)
Jimmy James (guitarist)
Jimmy James & the Blue Flames(Jimi Hendrix in 1966)
Jimmy James(singer and… drag queen? Not quite sure)
Yes, I linked to their Wikipedia page in my post. Searching on Google, as opposed to Wikipedia, “!!!” gave zero results.
Is that from “I Need Love?” All I remember is something like “You’re soft as a pillow, I’m as hard as steel.” :rolleyes:
Edit : Memories. I remember seeing graffiti on a payphone in about 1987 : “In the immortal words of LL Cool J, “I feel good! About Candayayay!””
Kristofer Kristsofferson.
This is the first time I’ve heard of !!!, but I can tell you that they pinched the name/concept from an Australian band. That’s a little too similar to be a coincidence.
Jackie Jackson (Jackson 5)