Making fun of music, one song at a time. Since the year 2000.
Check out the two amIright misheard lyrics books including one book devoted to misheard lyrics of the 1980s.
Names -> Band Name Origins -> G, Page 2
Do you know why a band picked out it's name? Feel free to let us know.
I can't verify all of these stories, so do take them with a grain of salt. I try and delete the ones that I know to be bogus, but I don't know the origins of every band name (and some bands intentionally tell different stories about picking their band name).
Latest Entries
Entries starting with G are split into multiple pages: 1 2
There are 4774 Band Name Origin entries on the site.
Name | Origin | Submitted by: | ||
| Grand Funk Railroad | A mutation of the Grand Trunk Railroad, a Michegan landmark. | Bobo | ||
| Grand Funk Railroad | Taken from the Grand Trunk Railroad in Michigan. | Dee Alan | ||
| The Grapes Of Wrath | named after a steinbeck book ''the grapes of wrath'' | Nicolas Bastien McCallum | ||
| Grateful Dead | It comes from the Egyptian Book of the Dead, not the Tibetan Book of the Dead, and the line from which they they drew the phrase is as follows: "In the land of the night the ship of the sun is drawn by the grateful dead." | Jim Webster | ||
| Grateful Dead | After it was discovered there was another band called the Warlocks, Jerry Garcia opened up a dictionary, and picked a random page and pointed to the first word he saw. He happened to point to the Grateful Dead. | John | ||
| Grateful Dead | Randomly opened the dictionary and pointed to two different words, the first being grateful and the second being dead. | uncle butter | ||
| Grateful Dead | The band got this name (after having to change from the Warlocks which was already in use) from "The Tibetan Book of the Dead" which talks of the I-Ching and the "grateful dead" . The book was a permanent fixture at Ken Kesey's house in California and he and his Merry Pranksters always had the Dead at their "Acid Tests" in the 60's. You can find this in Tom Wolfe's book "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test" and also in Hunter S. Thompson's "Hell's Angels". | Heather | ||
| Grateful Dead | Contrary to popular myth, there is no mention of the "Grateful Dead" in the Egyptian Book of the Dead. In fact, there is no official "Book of the Dead". The band was going by the name The Warlocks and Jerry Garcia went to a dictionary and said "whatever I point to will be the new name". He then opened up the dictionary and placed his finger on the page. When he looked down, he had chosen "Grateful Dead", which is an American folk myth. When a person pays to bury a body that no one claims it is said to appease the dead & making him grateful - the Grateful Dead. This is a story passed to me from one of the band's writers. | Steve | ||
| Grateful Dead | Refers to a series of Old English folk tales with the same basic theme. A traveler enters a village and finds the villagers desecrating, or refusing to bury the body of a dead man because he died owing creditors money. The traveler pays the dead man's debts and sees to a decent burial. Later in his travels the man is saved by a mysterious event, which is credited to the dead man's grateful spirit. Hence, The Grateful Dead. The band was originally the Warlocks, and picked Grateful Dead after realizing there was another band called the Warlocks. | Bobo | ||
| Grateful Dead | Actually, The old name was The Warlocks. But They changed it because "The Grateful Dead" Was an old Egyptian prayer he found in the dictionary. Trust Me, I know, I wrote a 19 page speech on them. | Eliza | ||
| Great Big Sea | Hove = To rise; to swell; to heave; to cause to swell (past tense of HEAVE). Ex., The sea hove so high that it destroyed a portion of a Newfoundland community. According to a Newfoundland heritage site about costal flooding: Probable result of Lisbon earthquake. Emptied Bonavista harbour and 10 minutes later water returned and overflowed parts of the community. Song 'A Great Big Sea Hove In Long Beach' may have originated from this event. (Song actually titled "Gone By the Board") | Aron26 | ||
| Great Big Sea | Ok it's not "great big sea HOVE"......it's "great big sea COVE" But of course that is where the band gets their name..a traditional Newfoundland folk song. | Fritter | ||
| Great Big Sea | This is a HUGE Canadian band who've taken classic songs from their native Newfoundland and updated them. One of the first containe the line "Great Big Sea hove in long beach" about a storm that bought a killer tide and washed away an entire Newfouldland village. They thought it fit.. | WCBM | ||
| Great Big Sea | The name came from a Newfoundland folk song called "Great Big Sea Hove In Long Beach." | Bobo | ||
| Great Crusades | Mike Rader, the first (and best) Great Crusades drummer, suggested this name at practice after having read an old Trouser Press review of Big Black credited to [John Leland/Ira Robbins/Jack Rabid/David Sprague/Yancey Strickler] in which Big Black was likened to "a cross between Gang of Four, PiL and the Great Crusades (not a band)." The band had wanted to be "The" something or others, and "the Great Crusades" was well-received by the other band members. It wasn't until months later that Mike revealed the source of the name to his bandmates. | Roderick | ||
| Great White | "Great White" was a nickname lead singer Jack Russell had given to his guitarist, Mark Kendall. | Grey | ||
| Green Apple Quick Step | 1970s slang for diarrhea | David Lewis | ||
| Green Apple Quick Step | Post-grunge quintet Green Apple Quick Step took their name from an the title of a Gene Parsons/Clarence White instrumental on the 1971 Byrds album, Byrdmaniax. | Bobo | ||
| Green Day | Billie Joe's sister said this herself..The band got their name from one of their own songs, "Green Day". The song is about smoking weed all day, so they used it for the band name as well. | Sherae | ||
| Green Day | In numerous interviews, including Alternative and Kerrang, Green Day has cited the meaning of their name. While Billy Joe and Mike were still in High School, they refered to days when they would sit around and smoke pot as a 'Green Day.' They honored these days like the sabbath - refusing to do work or move from the couch for fear of interupting the trails of potato chip crumbs on their Sex Pistols TShirts. The song titled Green Day off the "39/Smooth" release was written to reflect Billy Joe's first experience with marijuana. | Jake | ||
| Green Day | green day got their name when someone told them it would be a green day in hell before they made it....obvisouly hell is green according to that guy! | mike logan | ||
| Green Day | Green Day is slang in the bay area for a day of just getting high and taking hits off bongs. | Tony | ||
| Green Day | I'm not sure if this is true, but I heard they got their name because they were leaving high school early so they could spend more time on their music. Their principal told them that the day they became famous "would be like a green day in Hell." | Rebecca | ||
| Green Day | When they were in high school they decided that they would drop out of school just to be as a band and when they told the principal he said, "It'll be a Green Day in Hell before you all make anything of yourselves." So then they played as a band and made mass amounts of money so apparently it was a Green Day in Hell. | Eric | ||
| Green Day | The band was originally called Sweet Children , with a different drummer. Then one night, the lead singer, Billie Joe got high and wrote a song called Green Day about marijuana, featured on their first album, 39/Smooth . He decided that the band name Sweet Children had to go. So, he renamed the band Green Day after the song. | The Daywalker | ||
| Green Day | They were watching the movie "Soylent Green" while smoking pot, and read the supermarket window which said "Soylent / Green Day" and they thought Hey! lets name out band Green Day!! | PistolPocketeer | ||
| Green Day | One day, the members of Green Day, at the time, got so high, that everything looked green. Therefor the name Green Day was accepted into the Punk/Pop style. | Russ | ||
| Green Day | The band got really stoned and watched an episode of 'Sesame Street', where Ernie said 'It's going to be a Green Day.' Before that, the band was called 'Sweet Children'. | KingBee | ||
| Green Day | Before the band became famous, Billie Joe had a part time job as a painter and decorator. One day he was painting a room green when he accidently spilt the paint over Mike (bassist). Billie Joe then said "Its just one of those green days!" | Mr T | ||
| Green Day | Well their name was first Sweet Children but people got the name confused with an other band "Sweet Baby" so they changed it to Green Day which is a basically a day doing nothing, but weed... | Tessa | ||
| Green Day | Billie Joe got the idea from Ernie using the phrase "a green day" on "Sesame Street". | Alicia | ||
| Green Day | They were watching Sesame Street when they were high on marijuana Ernie (the Muppet from SS) said, "Today kids we are having a green day" or something like that. The guys thought it was funny and decided to have it as their band name, because it's like when you sit around all day and smoke weed. Weed is green, so therefore it would be a green day. | Pegz | ||
| Green Day | The phrase "green day" is Bay-area slang for a day with lots of green bud where you just sit around taking bong hits, hanging around. | Jessie | ||
| Green Day | The band was named after April 20th, National Pot Day (420). | sweet_surrender | ||
| Green Day | I once read in a magazine that once a week, the band members would read Ninja Turtles comics and watch the tv show (They called it a Green Day). That was their original band name,but changed it to green day for legal reasons | Muzakman | ||
| Green Day | When the band members told their principal that they were dropping out of school, he said it would be a "Green day in Hell" when they would get anywhere with their lives. | Stephanie | ||
| Green Day | When the band announced they were dropping out of school, their principal said they would make it when there was a green day in hell. | Emily | ||
| Green Day | There is a scene in the movie Soylent Green, where a sign is visible with the words "Green Day." This refers to the day of the week when Soylent Green is available to the public for rations. | MarkMc | ||
| Green Day | they chose this name because they could not fit any marijuana in there shoes to get past custom officials therefore they didn,t have a green day | johnfan | ||
| Green Day | This is really how it happened. Green Day formed in Berkley California. They were originally called Sweet Children. They started playing at Gilman Street where punks/ outkasts would gather. Sweet Children wasn't punk enough for thier fans. So they name the band Green Day after thier first experience with marijuana. | dave | ||
| Green Day | This name came from their high school guidance counselor, who told them that it would be a 'green day' in Hell before they made anything of themselves | alibaba | ||
| Green Day | Greenday is a public holiday for Japan(April 29th)since 1926 April the 29th had been a national hol to celebrate the emperor dudes birthday,then he died in the 80's so the name of the hol was changed to Green day cause he loved nature.So yeah maybe the name has got somthin to do with pot cause i know Greenday wouldnt love nature for the pretty birdies.I think they just thought the name sounded cool | Fred Blogs(aka Danielle) | ||
| Green Day | A green day is a day where you just lay around, have no worries, and do nothing but smoke marijuana and goof off. The band used to smoke pot even more than they do now, hence that is how they chose the name. | Justin | ||
| Green Day | One of the first song's BJ wrote for the original incarnation of the band (who's name escapes me at this moment) was called Green Day and it's a term used for a day devoted to chilling (out and) smoking weed. The song is on 1039/smoothed out slappy hour album, a collection of the first 3 ep's. | ipper | ||
| Green Day | Billy Joe wrote a song when he was really high and called it Green Day. The drummer got it put on a jacket and people thought it was the band name and it stuck, they were originally Sweet Children (Source: Behind The Music: Greenday) | Terry | ||
| Green Day | The story you've already got is almost right. Their drummer had written Green Day (the name of the song) on a jacket he kept wearing at shows, and people mistook that as the name of the band. They decided they had more notoriety with Green Day than their real name and decided to adopt it. | Dan | ||
| Green Day | Tre Cool has been a member of Greenpeace for many years now, and he reads the monthly magazine the organisation sends out. In one issue there was a poem called "Green Days" which he liked so much he wanted the band to be named after it. | Meriadoc | ||
| Green Day | Named after the term for smoking pot all day and goofing off. Once while watching Sesame Street, they heard Oscar the Grouch say, "Green Day" and they thought it was hilarious for being on a kid show... Thus, they named themselves, Green Day. | jonny | ||
| Green Day | They were called Sweet Children before they named themself after one of their songs. A green day is a day where you smoke a lot of weed. | Morten Bendix | ||
| Green Day | At fist they were called Sweet Children. Billie Joe wrote a song called "Green Day", which was just a song about smoking pot all day. Then they just changed their name to Green Day. | Elise | ||
| Green Day | Green Day is slang for a day of smoking pot. Which was exactly what they were doing while watching Sesame Street. During the episode, Ernie exclaimed "Green Day!" which probably would have been hilarilously funny for a bunch of guys smoking pot. A few years later, Billie Joe Armstrong was writting a song about smoking pot when he the phrase came to him. Al Sobrate, who was the drummer at the time, also had the phrase stiched onto his jacket. Later, when Al was replaced by Tre Cool, they renamed the band Green Day after the song. | Alfred | ||
| Green River | Named after the Creedence Clearwater Revival Song of the same name. | Ari | ||
| Green River | This Seattle area band was named after the Green River Killer, who terrorized that region and was never caught. | Bobo | ||
| GreenDay | The phrase "green day" was actualy from an offhand remark by Ernie from Seasame Street. I'm not sure what ernie meant by it, but Billie and mike used it as a joke / slang term for one of those long, "lackadaisical" days viewed through a pall of smoke, where nothing get's done and one hour slips nonchalantly into the next. <-sourceGreenday biography by Jon Ewing | Ant | ||
| Greenday | When the band members went to their high school principal to announce to him that they were dropping out, he acpeted, only saying that it would be a "Green day in hell" if they ever made it in this world. | shorty3000 | ||
| greendiVe | After going out, the band members pushed each other (and dove) into the bushes. Hence "green"-dive. | GD | ||
| Grinspoon | The name Grinspoon comes from pro- marijuana activist Dr. Lester Grinspoon. | tia | ||
| Grinspoon | These Aussie rockers got their name from a Dr. Grinspoon, who supports the use of marijuana. | Clare | ||
| The Griswolds | Not surprisingly, they are named after the family from "National Lampoon's Vacation" and its sequels. | Brian Kelly | ||
| GRITS | this christian rap group stands for Grammatical Revolution In The Spirit | steve mcmahan | ||
| Grizzly Bear | Grizzly Bear began as a moniker for songwriter Ed Droste's music in the early 2000's. Regarding the band's origins as a solo project, Droste said that it was just like doing a little home project, and he thought "oh, this is fun, I'm just going to call this stuff Grizzly Bear" and that it was a nickname for an old friend of his. | Sarah D. | ||
| GTO's | Girls Together Outrageously | Bobo | ||
| GTR | The band labeled some of the tracks for their album "GTR" for "guitar". | Brian Kelly | ||
| Guadalcanal Diary | The band named themselves of the war movie of the same name. | dustyhands | ||
| Guess Who | Canadian bands in the '60s had trouble getting noticed in their own country, let alone in the U.S. The band's label sought to overcome that by issuing a single under the name, "Guess Who?" to create a rumor that the band was secretly the Beatles. The strategy worked, giving the group its first hit in Canada and the U.S. No one could quibble with success and so Guess Who it was. (Source: John Einarson's "American Woman: The Story of the Guess Who") | Greg G. | ||
| Guide | From guitarist Garrett Wilkey's journal called 'The Guide". | braxton Wilkey | ||
| Guns 'N' Roses | the roses part from axl's name (axl rose) and the guns part from the fact that axl thought of the rest of the band as 'hired guns' | PeTeR | ||
| Guns 'n' Roses | Guns 'n' Roses got there name when Tracii Guns of "L.A. Guns" started a band with Axle Rose. They didn't get along, so Tracii left the band and started "L.A. Guns" while Axle stuck with the name "Guns 'n' Roses." | Mark Godwin | ||
| Guns 'N' Roses | The person who gave you the reason that Axl thought of the rest of the band as "hired guns" is incorrect. Here is the true origin: Both "Guns" and "Roses" were derived from the band's founding members last names---"Guns" was taken from the lead guitarist Traci Guns; "Roses" from W. Axl Rose. Traci was let go from the group (went on to form L.A. Guns) and was replaced in the band with Slash, however the name still stayed Guns 'N' Roses. | Naz | ||
| Guns N' Roses | It was named after the original band memebers: Axl Rose(vocals), Duff "Rose" McKagan(bass), and Tracii Guns(guitar). Tracii later left to form LA Guns. He was replaced by Slash. | MantlePicture | ||
| Guns N' Roses | Slash said in an interview on Conan O'Brien that "Originally I wanted to call the band Guns N' Robots. I still believe that if we had just called ourselves 'Guns N' Robots' we'd still be together." | The Robmaster 2000! | ||
| Guns n' Roses | Guns n' Roses arose from two LA-bands, the L.A. Guns and the Hollywood Roses | TobStarr | ||
| Guns N' Roses | Named after original guitarist Tracii Guns (who later started L.A. Guns) and lead singer Axl Rose. | ChrisPC | ||
| Guns N'Roses | Axl and Izzy were in a band Called HollyWood Rose. They joined with the band L.A Guns that ft. Tracii Guns. So they took Guns from L.A Guns and took Rose from Hollywood Rose and it made Guns N' Roses. Then Tracii left with the drummer and then the founded Slash and Steven, after that they almost changed it to Heads Of Amazon. | Luc | ||
| Guster | "Well, Guster was originally called Gus, and the first few copies of Parachute have that name on them. There are about ten dozen different stories about where they got Gus, including that it was the name of Ryan's freshman roommate Evan's dad, or that it was short for "asparagus". The one that's been claimed by the band the most is that they were named for the 1976 Ed Asner-Don Knotts masterpiece "Gus", about a failing football team that hires a field goal-kicking mule and goes on to great success - the band gave this story in a 1999 online chat and later repeated it in a recent interview on "Austin City Limits". It's quite possible that none of these stories are true, but the important thing is that they soon discovered that about ten dozen other bands were called Gus too. Popular myth (or just Brian) would have it that that in the midst of their struggle with what to rename themselves, Brian's friend Rit Zbikowski was leaving for Japan to teach English. As he walked out the door to go to the airport, he called out "Guster!" It stuck. As irony would have it, the artist who originally forced them to change their name, has now changed his name and is touring as Gus Black."-From the 'vividgreen.net/guster' website. | Shana | ||
| Guster | The band originally named themselves 'gus,' which was short for asparagus. When another artist already had that name, one of their friends suggested adding the 'ter' at the end. | Todd | ||
| Guttermouth | when the lead singer was cleaning his gutters he got a mouthful of the junk therfore making the name | ronnie | ||
| GWAR | GWAR is an anacroymn for "God, What An Awful Racket." | [CARGO] | ||
| Gwar | It is not "God What an Awful Racket" as explained in many interviews with Dave Brockie. The original name of the band was something like "GGGGGWWWWWWWWAAAAAAARRRRGGGHHH". A sort of primal scream. They later realized that this name would not work in the long run for obvious reasons. It was shortened to "GWAR". Any other explanations for the origin of the name are fan speculation and rumors promoted by the band themselves. | Dustin | ||
| GWar | Some rumors: "God What an Awful Racket", "Gods of War", "Gay Women Against Rape" (or make up your own). A band member on the Jerry Springer Show said they were inspired by the "GWWAAAR" sound that monsters make in movies. | Bobo | ||
| GWAR | God What a Racket... ^^ | Travis | ||
| The Gynas | It sounded funny. It's dirty but it's not , a split decision between band members resulted in rock paper sissors. It was up against Hamburger hole, Jon Benet's Placenta, and Goggles Pisano. | Chris |
Entries starting with G are split into multiple pages: 1 2
New entries in this section are currently reviewed by Brian Kelly. Previous editors (if any) are listed on the editors page.
Submissions
Got something that should be added to this page? Check out the submission form.