SXSW

What's in a bizarre band name?

Some of the uniquely monikered at SXSW discuss the origins of their musical identifiers

By Patrick Caldwell
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Wednesday, March 18, 2009

You might not catch the 88-year-old actor Abe Vigoda, best known for his roles in "The Godfather" and "Barney Miller," at the South By Southwest Music Conference and Festival, but you can see an identically named punk foursome out of Los Angeles. Or, if that doesn't strike your fancy, take in a show by We Were Promised Jetpacks. Or the tantalizingly dubbed Jesus Makes the Shotgun Sound.

South by Southwest always can be relied on to bring the world's most oddly titled bands to Austin. For those who delight in such things, a glance through the list of showcasing artists leads to a potpourri of grimaces, laughs, raised eyebrows and double takes. We caught up with five of SXSW's most peculiarly named bands and asked the question no doubt on the minds of many a festivalgoer: What's up with that name, anyway?

Abe Vigoda

The band: A Los Angeles quartet whose combination of short, energetic rock songs and breezy SoCal vibes has been described as "tropical punk."

Represented by: Guitarist and vocalist Juan Velazquez

How did you single out Abe Vigoda, of all people, as your band name?

(Abe Vigoda vocalist and guitarist Michael Vidal and I) had the idea of starting a band and we while were chatting late night on instant messenger and we stumbled across an episode of Conan O'Brien with him in it. We threw it out as a joke name. But it stuck around. It's really silly, but I like it. We were very young teenage boys making a stupid joke, but nobody's ever said it's stupid, which should probably happen a lot more often.

You've got a lot of young fans — do they always get the reference?

Younger kids don't necessarily know who he is. But on the other hand, we played a show at (Los Angeles all-ages venue) The Smell where some old guy in his 60s showed up, thinking Abe was actually going to perform and do a monologue or something. The door guy assumed he was one of our grandparents. I think that guy was disappointed.

SXSW showcase: 12 a.m. Thursday, Red 7, 611 E. Seventh St.

DD/MM/YYYY

The band: A Toronto-based experimental art rock band combines everything from traditional six-string guitars to '80s video game synthesizers.

Represented by: Bassist Mike Claxton.

Just how do you pronounce that?

We've always said "day/month/year." It rolls off the tongue after a while. We're all about shortcuts. A lot of people pick up on it right away, but a lot of them don't. And it's fun to hear the mispronunciations.

How'd you settle on this name?

We've all been in bands before, and we were kind of sick of having to pick names in the first place. We were trying to think of ways to not have a name. So, we thought, why don't we just use the name of the date of the show? Originally everything was just going to be the date it happened. Our name would be whatever the date of the show was and any record would be named after the date it was released. Promoters just ran out of patience and started billing us DD/MM/YYYY.

SXSW showcase: 2 p.m. Wednesday, SESAC Day Stage, Austin Convention Center, 500 E. Cesar Chavez St.

Terror Pigeon Dance Revolt

The band: A Brooklyn dance rock band signed to David Byrne's Luaka Bop label, whose elaborate live shows incorporate costumes, light shows and more manic energy than you can shake a glow stick at.

Represented by: Frontman Neil Fridd

That's an odd combination of nouns and adjectives. What is it supposed to mean?

I originally used to write organ songs. And I called myself Terror Pigeon, which was sort of an oxymoron, this terrible word paired with the most helpless and harmless creature imaginable. It was me; I was this little scrawny kid who was upset about girls so I was writing and yelling but I was also very harmless. "Dance" came in when I just wanted to put together a live show that was a total party with friends and screaming and dancing. The "Revolt" is about shooting for something that's highly atypical, with no egos and no worrying about whether or not people are going to think to think what you're doing is cool.

Are you happy with it?

I have a very love/hate relationship with the name. I'm sometimes like "Ugh, so many words." But other times I'm like, "No, this is who I am." But I do have friends who change the name of the band a lot, just in the middle of the show. We'll call ourselves the Terror Squirrel Pants Patrol. I also have a friend who says we should do an album of Eastern Indian music and call ourselves the Turban Pigeon Dance Revolt.

SXSW showcase:11 p.m. Friday, the Rio, 301 San Jacinto Blvd.

Natalie Portman's Shaved Head

The band: A five-person strong electronica sensation out of Seattle, whose emphasis on frenetic beats attracted the attention of Lily Allen, with whom they embark on a nationwide tour after SXSW.

Represented by:Guitarist and keyboard player David Price

What inspired you to go with this name?

The story goes that (band mates Shaun Libman and Luke Smith) and I were sitting in humanities class in high school, doing vocabulary Olympics. And that was the day (Natalie Portman) had shaved her head for "V For Vendetta," and everybody was talking about it. So for some reason or another we decided to pick Natalie Portman's Shaved Head for our team name. And we won that day. And then we had our band name.

Have you had any contact with Natalie Portman?

Back in the day, the joke was that we put her on the guest list for every show, because we didn't have all that many people coming anyway. But (bassist and keyboardist) Claire England's sister works at Magnolia Café in New York, and one day Natalie Portman came in. Claire's sister usually treats celebrities like regular people, but she told Natalie about our band. And Natalie said "That's ... interesting." She did get a signed autograph for Claire.

What kind of impact does the name have on the band's identity?

I think it kind of grounds us and keeps us in the state of having fun. Music doesn't have to be a completely serious thing. You should be able to go on stage and freak out for an hour and play your songs and just enjoy it.

SXSW showcase: 1 a.m. Wednesday, Dirty Dog Bar, 505 E. Sixth St.

This Bike is a Pipe Bomb

The band: A trio from Pensacola, Fla., who play politically oriented folk and country songs with punk-rock speed and energy.

Represented by:Bassist and vocalist Terry Johnson and guitarist and vocalist Rymodee

As anarchists, you've found a name that combines two of the movement's greatest signatures: explosives and bicycles. Where did the idea come from?

TJ: We had already booked a tour with some friends, but we hadn't chosen a name yet. So we were doing that thing where we were sitting around bandying names about, and gradually getting sick of each other. And then we like to say that the heavens opened up and dropped a name on us. And we just pulled it out of the skies. Basically my answer is that it was magic.

R: There were so many ridiculous things being thrown out. And we were like, hey, here's one we haven't argued about in 15 minutes. Let's go with that one.

Your name has led to a lot of security scares — bikes with stickers of the band on them have shut down college campuses, mass transit lines and courthouses. How do you feel about that?

R: It was definitely bizarre when we first started hearing about it. What's bizarre is that the stories are almost identical, you just change the city name. They shut down the Metro in Washington, D.C., and I guess the worst case scenario was at Ohio University, where the Athens bomb squad came in with robots and destroyed the bike. We started so, so pre-9/11. There wasn't anybody freaking out about our band name for 5 years. You could staple a sticker with our name onto your forehead and walk into a sheriff's office and be fine. With the last one in Memphis I actually did break down and say something. If you're going to take your bike onto a plane or a train or anywhere important, you shouldn't with that sticker. Two cents worth of electrical tape will cover it, and we'll send you another sticker. We don't charge for them.

SXSW showcase: 12:15 a.m. Wednesday, Habana Bar, 708 E. Sixth St.

Casiotone for the Painfully Alone

The band: A solo project for San Francisco musician Owen Ashworth that uses lo-fi beats and cheap keyboards to generate dizzying swirls of melancholia.

How did you wind up with this name?

A friend of mine had just gone through a breakup and wanted some painful, sad songs. So I wrote and played some music for her, and when I gave her the tape I wrote "Casiotone for the Painfully Alone" on it as kind of a joke. She decided I should play a show, so she just put it on a flier. So I couldn't back out of it.

Have you ever thought about changing it?

Every step of the way I kind of thought I should change it, and now I've lugged it around for 11 years. I have an Excel spreadsheet with probably about 85 pretty good names at this point. Every time I finish a record I'm like "Maybe, just maybe, I should call it something else." But it never seems like the right time.

SXSW showcase: 1:15 a.m. Wednesday, The Beauty Bar Backyard, 617 E. Seventh St.