Bands Lure Gigs by Grasping at Oddball Names

A glance at a San Fernando Valley music calendar says it all: Today’s vogue band names can come from just about anywhere and mean just about anything, or nothing. The only prerequisite is that they evoke emotion--be it laughter, curiosity or even serious thought--anything that will garner attention in the highly competitive field of local, live music.

Take, for instance, the San Fernando Valley-based blues band B. B. Chun King and the Screaming Buddha Heads. Manager Kerry Lewis said promoting the group is made easier “because no one ever forgets the name.”

Alan Mirikitani, the band’s leader and a Japanese-American, said he wanted an aggressive sounding name that would counter the “quiet and courteous” stereotype society often attaches to Asians.

Initially, he was planning on naming the band simply “Screaming Buddha Heads.” But a friend mentioned that he sounded like Blues singer B. B. King--or rather, his friend quipped, B. B. Chun King.

“And I said, ‘Hey! That works,’ ” Mirikitani recalled with a laugh. Most everyone, he said, is intrigued by the name.

“When people first hear the name, they giggle and go, ‘Oh, really?’ ” Mirikitani said. “Then they say they’ve got to see us.”

And that’s the name of the game in today’s music world, according to Ken Fusion, local music director for KROQ-FM (106.7) in Burbank.

Fusion said bands with extra-odd names have become the norm around the local club scene, whether the band plays blues, rock or country.

“I think it’s done essentially to call attention to the particular band,” Fusion said. “There are so many bands in town that they often get overlooked. So, by giving themselves outrageous names, maybe people will check them out.”

What follows is a sampling of bands that frequent the Palomino, FM Station Live and other Valley nightspots.

Rhino Bucket: An evening of drunken bliss generated the name for this Van Nuys-based heavy metal band, said lead singer George Dolivo.

“We were thinking of names, and we had a few too many beers one night, and we were shouting out words and phrases, like ‘rhino’ and ‘bucket of lard,’ ” Dolivo said. “Then someone yelled, ‘rhino bucket’ as a joke and we all fell to the floor, cracking up.”

Two days later, a booking agent called with a gig.

“We had to come up with a name right then, so I gave him ‘Rhino Bucket,’ and it stuck,” Dolivo said.

In the beginning, few in the heavy metal circuit would take the band seriously because its name didn’t fit the stereotypical heavy-metal mold.

“It is kind of a weird name for a heavy metal band,” Dolivo conceded. “Everyone expected us to be called something like ‘Predator.’ ”

But, he said, Rhino Bucket is now accepted and the band members like the freedom the moniker gives them in coming up with the band logo, which--appropriately enough--is a leather-clad rhinoceros toasting with a beer.

Monkey Meet: This band plays “upwardly mobile funk-a-go-go” or “darn near anything but country and polkas,” said band member Renard Luke. But ask him what the name means, and he’s at a loss to answer.

Monkey Meet manager Clark Lough offered a little more insight.

“It really doesn’t have any meaning to the band,” he said. “It’s just a wacky, fun name.”

Sandy Duncan’s Eye: None of the members in this original-rock band remembers who thought up the name or, for that matter, why.

“I just don’t know. At the time we thought of it, she wasn’t even on TV,” said Campbell Emory, drummer. “She has a glass eye, I think. I know one of her eyes is somehow different from the other, which makes her unique.”

But such uncertainty surrounding the band’s name hasn’t hurt its appeal. In fact, Emory said, the group recently finished a Seattle gig that was offered to it solely because of the name.

“We didn’t even have to send a tape,” he said.

Emory said that, as far as he knows, the band’s namesake is unaware of the group’s existence: “So we’re enjoying our freedom while it lasts.”

Monster Island: This traditional rock ‘n’ roll band gets its name from a movie that features a collection of those famous Japanese monsters, said bass player Kevin Mueller.

“It was sort of like a giant playground,” Mueller said of the movie.

The band’s motto plays off the theme, “When you’re a monster, the whole world’s your playground.”

The name generally draws praise, Mueller said, but it also draws criticism from heavy-metal aficionados who consider it better-suited for their own music. No matter.

“Basically those who understand the name--that it’s a band of guys having fun--they realize how it fits.”

Young Guns: This hard-rock group, by contrast, does not get its name from the recent brat-pack movie of the same name, according to band member Drew Hannah.

“The name’s been with us for a long, long time,” Hannah said.

Young Guns formed about five years ago, but Hannah and the band’s guitarist have been playing music together since they were children in Seattle.

“We were a bunch of little kids in a band and our parents started calling us ‘Young Guns,’ ” Hannah said.

Trailer Park Casanovas: Although his parents had no part in naming the band, stand-up bass player Steve Neal said that hometown heritage, specifically a Midwestern upbringing, played a role in this country-rock band’s name.

“In the Midwest, trailer parks are a kind of art form,” he said. “I lived in one when I was younger, and they’re sort of a community in themselves, where the people are a little different.”

It is hoped, Neal said, that the unusualness will rub off on his band.

Lypswitch: Bass player Kevin Agosta said the name comes from a street sign in Orlando, Fla., where the band got its start two years ago. Members describe their music as “underground punk-funk-street rock.”

So far, Agosta said, the band has been well-received.

“A lot of people think it’s really cool and original, and that makes us feel really good,” Agosta said.

Those same people often debate its meaning.

“They say it doesn’t mean this and it doesn’t mean that,” Agosta said. “We just leave it open and let people decide for themselves what it means.”

And what might that be?

Answered Agosta: “It doesn’t really mean anything.”

Momma Stud: This band features “psychedelic funky soul.” Guitar player Krany Crews said the name came from a “crazy acquaintance who just made it up.”

It worked, he said, because it incorporated a reference to maternalism.

“Mother is Earth,” Crews explained. “Mother is everything.”

Sure. OK. But Stud?