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Names -> Band Name Origins -> E, Page 1
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 E are split into multiple pages: 1 2
There are 4772 Band Name Origin entries on the site.
Name | Origin | Submitted by: | ||
| E (East) 17 | They grew up on this street in London | Bobo | ||
| E (East) 17 | E17 is a postal district in London, England namely Walthamstow (also the title of their 1st album) which is where the 'boys' lived at the time they formed. I incidently lived in E16 (Canning Town, London) until 1976 | Paul Knight | ||
| E Street Band | They are not from London. E Street refers to East of 17th Street in Asbury Park, New Jersey, USA. Most of the band is from New Jersey and the Band was a very popular bar act in the area. E Street is where the famous (infamous) Stone Pony is located, a bar known for having Bruce and many other famous performers show up for a quick jam session. This is according to m'lady, a Joisey Girl with a thing for Bruce. | Barco | ||
| The E Street Band (Bruce Springsteen's band) | One of the band's early members, David Sancious, lived in a house on "E Street", and the band used to use his house for rehearsals. The band were first billed under this name on 12th November 1972. | Michael Barrett | ||
| The E Street Band (Bruce Springsteen's Band) | In Summer of 1967, I was on the road with a cover group called The Basement Wall, and Springsteen's group was still just a garage band. We were playing at a surf club on the Jersey shore called The Surf & Sea, and on Sunday afternoons, local garage bands played our breaks. Springsteens band was one of them, and at that time they were called "The Easy Street Band" then he later shortened it. | Terry Bourdier | ||
| E-Concerto | Stands for "Electric Concerto", so named for the Electronica style of classical music they produce. | darkagespiano | ||
| E17 | Postcode (i.e. zipcode) for the area of London the band came from. (Walthamstow - hence the album title) | Gary | ||
| Eagle Eye Cherry | That's his real official name. When he was born and his dad saw him for the first time, he had his eyes funnily somehow, half shut or something. His dad thought he looked eagle-eyed (whatever that means) and Eagle Eye became his official name. His sister, also a singer is called Neneh, which is also a proof that their dad had a weird taste in names. (I read the story in a music magazine years ago, Smash Hits I think) | Minna | ||
| Eagles | The Eagles -- the country-rock band that sold millions of albums by stealing/improving upon the formula invented by Gram Parsons and the Byrds ---were actually named after a gay club in San Francisco, "Eagles and Angels", according to a Glen Frey interview in Rolling Stone from 1985. | Jason Reeher | ||
| The Eagles | Glenn Frey liked because it sounded like a motorcycle gang. | Dave | ||
| The Eagles Of Death Metal | From wikipedia.org: "Despite the name, the Eagles of Death Metal are not a death metal band. J.Everett Hughes says the name came for a response to a drunken man who argued Poison were death metal. He said that Poison were the Eagles of death metal. Later, Josh Homme inspired him to write music that he thought would be the Eagles crossed with death metal, and their debut album was the result." | Kyle | ||
| The Earls | The Earls chose their name when Larry Chance decided to close his eyes and placed his finger on a a page in a dictionary ... his finger would land on the word "EARL" and that was to be their name. | LostInTheOzone | ||
| Earth, Wind, & Fire | The group's founder and leader, Maurice White picked the name from his astrological chart. Earth, fire, and air (which he changed to wind). | JP Dobbs | ||
| Earth, Wind, & Fire | Band Founder and frontman, Maurice White's astrological elements: earth, fire, and air=wind. | Jason Dobbs | ||
| East 17 | Correction to earlier entry: East 17 (E17) is actually the postcode (or zipcode) for Walthamstow in East london, where the big-hatted boy band are from. | Joe Whiteley | ||
| East 17 | It's actually the zip-code for the part of London the bad members come from | Jorge | ||
| East 17 | It's not after a particular street, but after their postcode (UK equivalent of a ZIP code). | Jenny Turner | ||
| East-17 | This is the post code of where they are from in london/wolthemstow | Christie | ||
| Eazy E | He went by the name Casual before it was Eazy E because he was a laid back quiet kind of guy who didn't say much. | madscientist | ||
| Eazy-E | His name was Eric Wright, he was a laid back man..hence Eazy-E | Gambit | ||
| Eberything But The Girl | A department store in Hull, UK where they would sell you everything in the store but the girl. | John Lewis | ||
| Ebonite Ravens | Raven's are black already. The band decided to add "Ebonite" so the ravens would appear surrealistic. | akk | ||
| Echo & the Bunnymen | For those that entered them as a "Stupid Band Name", read on: One of the working names of the band was just "the Bunnymen" and meant as a send up to all the menacing and self-important band names of the day. The band did not have a drummer in place for their touring dates during their early years (late 70s) and relied on a drum machine to back their alternative rock sound. The drum machine either carried the model name "Echo" or was nicknamed that by the three band members. The band thought it would be a little more humorous and self-effacing to give the drum machine top billing, thus the name. They eventually added a living, breathing drummer (who unfortunately died in the late 80's and has since been replaced - multiple times). By that time they had already made a big enough impression that the name stuck. | Chris K. | ||
| Echo And The Bunnymen | Echo = their drum machine before the late (and one of the greatest drummers ever) Pete de Freitas joined the outfit. Bunnymen = they never wanted to take themselves too seriously. | k | ||
| Echo and the Bunnymen | Echo was the name McCullough gave to the drum machine they used when they first started out. The Bunnymen was their nickname for fellow Liverpool band, Frankie goes to Hollywood | LRonCupboard | ||
| Econoline Crush | I found an interview posted online years ago regarding the band's name origin. The band was going to send a demo tape with FedEx to a record label that was specializing in the industrial music genre. They were "under the gun" to try to find a band name because the FedEx driver was waiting at the door. One of the band members wanted to use the name Crush, and he was set on that. Trevor, the vocalist was sitting there trying to think quick of an idea. He than thought of what got him into music; When he was a kid his family didn't have a car - they had an Econoline van and Trevor would listen to music while they were riding in it. It had a pretty good stereo and Trevor's friends would always want him to take the Econoline out so they could listen to music all together. This recollection gave him the idea of naming the band "Econoline Crush". He suggested the name to the members, no one said anything, they were just sitting there quietly while the FedEx driver was looking at them. He just wrote "Econoline Crush" on the CD, stuck it in and said that they could always change it later. | Yves | ||
| Econoline Crush | The name was taken from French novelist Euxebe Auxtry's book Jeu de Fountaine (in which econoline crush was a drug that gives the hopeless a sense of optimism). | Ben | ||
| Econoline Crush | THE BAND WAS JUST CALLED CRUSH, BUT ONE OF THE MEMBERS THOUGHT IT SOUNDED INCOMPLETE AND WANTED TO PUT ANOTHER WORD IN THE NAME, AND HIS DAD HAD AN ECONOLINE VAN, THIS WAS FROM A RADIO INTERVIEW THE BAND HELD IN PANAMA CITY, WHEN THEY PLAYED OUR LOCAL BEACH CLUB. A FRIEND OF MINE CONDUCTED THE INTERVIEW FOR PIRATE RADIO 97X | ANDY | ||
| Eddie From Ohio | The drummer's Eddie, "from Ohio" was after the guitarist from fIREHOSE, ed "fROMOHIO". | moira | ||
| Edward Bear | The Canadian soft-rockers, who gave us their "Last Song" in the early '70s, borrowed their name from the "birth" name of beloved children's book hero, "Winnie-the-Pooh". | jonaco | ||
| Eels | E (vocals, guitar, keyboards) had two solo albums before forming Eels. He thought of the band as a continuation of his solo stuff and wanted their records together in stores. So they picked a name that started with "e." Sadly, they forgot about all those Eagles and Earth Wind and Fire records in between. | Paul | ||
| Eiffel 65 | The band wanted to be associated with something known or recognized worldwide. The Eiffel Tower was one of the first things that came to their minds. The band was originally named Eiffel 1665 (since there are 1665 steps in the Eiffel Tower), but their manager convinced them to change the name to Eiffel 65 because "it sounded more hip". Personally, I like it better too. | Bill Fung | ||
| Eiffel 65 | Eiffel 65, decided, for some reason that they were going to a have a computer randomly find a word. This word would become their band name. The random word came out to be "eiffel." The 65 on the end of their name came about because the original publishers screwed up and accidentally put some form of the informational numbers for the band. So, "Eiffel 65" became there name. | Mystic Pence | ||
| Eiffel 65 | This Italian dance group had an obsession with computer technology, so they got a computer to randomly choose a word for their band name. It came up with "Eiffel". Then their producer or someone accidentally put the first two numbers of their phone number, 6 and 5, in front of the band name. | Daniel | ||
| Einherjer | The band's name is taken from Norse mythology, where the term Einherjar describes the slain warriors that have gone on to Valhalla and joined Odin's table. | weirdkid106 | ||
| Einsturzende Neubaten | German (lit. "Collapsing New Buildings) Strategic interaction against the oppression of architecture, buildings are opppression but when they fall they make music. Industrial music in response to the blank and featureless weimar-Bauhaus German post-war architekture. | Dr Eagle Sperm-Cannon, LSD | ||
| Eisley | They named their band after the place "Mos Eisle" in the first "Star Wars" film. They cut it down to "Eisley" because they thought they would get into legal trouble by George Lucas. | DrTonberry | ||
| Eleanor's Fault | the lead singer was taking an act test in high school when he came across an incredibly difficult passage about eleanor roosevelt which eventually caused him to recieve a score of thirtyfive so it was eleanors fault that he didnt get a perfect score | ron | ||
| Electric Egg | The guitarist, Sarah, ever since she was little, had wanted a band called "The Electric Egg". Michelle and Holley always thought it sounded stupid but it stuck. | Jesus Saves | ||
| Electric Light Orchestra | "Light orchestra" was a feature of several fancy restaurants in the 60s in the UK. They were really quartets - violin, viola, cello, upright bass - or something like that. They played "light" or string versions of contemporary top hits (like say the Beatles' "Yesterday"). ELO uses electric and electronic instruments and the band name was really some kind of kooky joke. There's also the "electric light" phrase in the name. Look at the first two albums' cover art. The self-titled debut (called "No Answer" in the US by accident) has an ELECTRIC LIGHT BULB on it! The second one has a starship shaped like a (*drumroll, please!* - CLASH!) ELECTRIC LIGHT BULB! Yuk yuk. I just love this band's music, even if the name origin is pretty stupid. | Bad Pun Name 4 a Great Band | ||
| Electric Prunes | The band were put together by a panel of record company executives who held a meeting to decide what name to give them. During the meeting someone told the following joke: Q - What's purple and buzzes? A - An electric prune. Everyone found this absolutely hilarious (suffice it to say that more than just coffee had been consumed at this meeting) and decided that this had to be the name of the band. | Fletch | ||
| Elemeno P | It's how you sing the alphabet | Optimus Lime | ||
| Elisebelle Tears | Elisebelle Tears got their name from the lead singer's ex-girlfriend who had dumped him and caused him much, anger, turmoil, and pain, also he had loved her a lot and had shed many tears for her, hence the name Elisebelle Tears. Source :- Lead singer who is my brother | Kurt | ||
| The Ellen Jamesians | From John Irvings´ novel "The world according to Garp" where alittle girl gets raped and then get her tongue cut out. Angry feminists then start a society called "The Ellen Jamesian Society" or just "The Ellen Jamesians" | Dingo | ||
| Elliot Minor | Elliot Minor is named after the character, Elliot from the television show Scrubs. | Siani | ||
| Elliott Smith | Elliott Smith's real first name was Steve, but he changed it because it sounded too "jockish." | Taylor | ||
| Eloy | Guitarist Frank Bornemann named the band after a people from the novel "The Time Machine" by H.G. Wells (spelled "Eloi" in the novel). | Joey F. | ||
| Elton John | Elton John´s real name is Reginald Kenneth Dwight. As far as I know, he picked Elton and John because they were former members of his first band and he liked those guys. | Claudia | ||
| Elton John | I'd heard the same story as Claudia as to the origin of the name. He changed his name legally from Reginald Kenneth Dwight to Elton Hercules John. Hercules is after the horse in a BBC comedy series "Steptoe and Son". | Tony | ||
| Elton John | Reginald Dwight did indeed pick the names of two of his former bandmembers - singer Elton Dean and sax-player 'Long' John Baldrie. They were in an R&B band called Bluesology together in the sixties. Incidentally, he used to be known as Elton Hercules John at one point. | Richard Braithwaite | ||
| Elton John | From the liner notes on John Baldry's "It Ain't Easy" album: "In 1966 the group became Bluesology, John (Baldry) hired a young organist/pianist called Reginald Dwight, who later combined the names of Elton Dean, Bluesology sax player, with John Baldry's name and came up with Elton John." | Mike | ||
| Elvis Costello | Originally Declan MacManus, he chose the stage name by combining Elvis Presley with his mother's maiden name. | Eschewy | ||
| Elvis Costello | His real name is Declan McManus, from a long line of Irish musicians. The other description about using Elvis Presley's name and his Grandmother's maiden name are correct. The current incarnation of the Attractions have been titled The Imposters. | Feldes | ||
| Elvis Costello and the Attractions | Elvis got his first name from the king of rock, and his last from his Grandmother's maiden name. He dubbed his band of lanky, gangly, and frankly quite unattractive guys jokingly, The Attractions | The Big Crouton | ||
| Emerson, Lake & Palmer | It's the last names of each of the members: Keith Emerson, Greg Lake and Carl Palmer. | Don | ||
| EMF | It's "Electromotive Force", not "English MFs". A matter of electrical engineering and physics, folks. | My Girl Is Unbelievable! | ||
| EMF | That one dude is wrong. EMF stands for Epsom Mad Funkers, which was a nickname for the groupies of the band New Order. Although on the B-side of their hit single "Unbelievable" they suggested it might stand for Ecstacy (NOT Electric) MFs. Although I think the latter was a bit of a joke. | Cat | ||
| EMF | Apparently they said "Electric Mother F***ers" at one interview | Dave the Rave | ||
| Eminem | Mathers was in a local rap duet in Detroit around 1995, and his psuedonym was "MNM", deriving from his initials. He later drew it out into Eminem. | Drakona | ||
| Eminem | Marshall Mathers is his full name. M and M shortenede to M 'n M which is how he orignally spelled it, but later changed it to Eminem, cuz its different | eminem iz pimp | ||
| Eminem | Marshall Mathers thought of 'Eminem' because at his first freestyle competition he was eating a bag of M&Ms, plus he's 'black' on the inside. | dude | ||
| Eminem | His name is Marshall Mathers, Initials: MM = M n'M - spell it out..= Eminem | Zac | ||
| Eminem | He has a fancy for Enimas and he didn't know the correct spelling. When he called a gas station to get the correct spelling the guy answering told him Eminem and Marshall wrote it down on his Application to be a Homie License. | G Thang | ||
| Eminem | His name is Marshall Mathers, and when he had been bullied as a child, the nickname "M&M" had followed him. I believe Slim Shady comes from the street Shady Lane. | Logan Smith | ||
| Endo | Endo is a prefix meaning "within"/ "inside" | MySoulIsTormented | ||
| Enigma | Michael Cretu the man behind the Enigma project decided to make a project without putting his name behind it, to be sort of a misterious project so he chose Enigma | Jose Batalla | ||
| Enter Shikari | The main singer, Rou wrote a play while in school. He called the main character 'Shikari', meaning hunter in multiple languages. He got the name Shikari from a relative that owned a boat by the same name. In the script of the play, there are stage directions. One of the stage directions was Enter Shikari, meaning the character Shikari comes on to the stage. The band thought the name was cool and different, so they used it. The band was originally called Hybryd, but they changed the name when guitarist, Rory joined | Frank | ||
| Enya | A phonetic spelling of her first name, Eithne. | Jenny Turner | ||
| Epiphanic Profoundity | The lead singer of the band, Sarah Rose, was a grammar nut and was always turning nouns into verbs and verbs into nouns and just f*cking with the English language in general. This was one of the things she spouted off one day and Evan Torn, lead guitarist, liked it and said they should keep it. Bootz and Liddy-chan didn't object. A few other considered names were AEG (Always: Extreme Generalization) and Bunch O' Bakas (baka is japanese for idiot/fool). | Shila | ||
| EPMD | Eric Sermon and Parrish Smith chose this acronym for "Eric and Parrish Making Dollars". | Darryl Wilson | ||
| EPMD | Rap duo - short for Erick (Sermon) and Parrish (Smith) Making Dollars. | Bobo | ||
| Erasure | Everytime they tried to come up with a name they wrote it in pencil but they keep Erasing it from the paper, until the Eraser fell off and they decided to call them selfs Pencil without an Eraser, later changed to Erasure | Oxonman | ||
| Erasure | Erasure recorded a lot in germany where 'erasure' means recording tape | phil b | ||
| Erasure | Erasure confirmed in a interview on a local station in Houston during the Spring of 1994 that they sent their demo to a record company to be reviewed, and since they had chosen 'Erasure' as their name..and without any other identifying markings, it was tossed in a bin for 'Erasure' | melshgeek | ||
| Erasure | They have said that their name came from the movie "Eraserhead". The many stories involving a demo tape being mistakenly marked "Erasure" have never been confirmed. | erasurefan | ||
| Eriam Sisters/EriAm Sisters | Stands for Eritrean American Sisters | Robert D. Arndt Jr. | ||
| Eric's Trip | Named after a Sonic Youth song. | Kris Gallimore | ||
| Esquivel | Esquivel is a famous Mexican writer of what we usually call lounge music or exotica. Known for his unusual instrumentation, which straddled the border between kitsch and avante-garde. | Blinky | ||
| Esquivel | Tha hell with Steve-O´s explanation, Esquivel is NOT a band, Esquivel comes from Juan Garcí¡ Esquivel´s name a Mexican music composer and a genius arranger, it just sounded better for the U.S. audiences so he billed himself with a single name. | Daniel | ||
| Esquivel | This band picked the name because they knew this gay kid named Chris Esquivel, they thought it sounded cool. | Steve-O | ||
| Esra Dekan | It is Naked Arse backwards. The guitarist Paul Normington thought of it before the band was formed and they all thought it was great. | Jeremy | ||
| Eternal | They wanted to reflect their religious backgrounds and were originally to be called 'Hymn', but people just didn't get it. So then came 'Eternal' instead. | nerd | ||
| The Eurythmics | I heard a similar story as the previous entry, the only exception being that the duo decided on "eurythmics" as it was a hybrid of "european rythmn" - the way they saw their music at the time; a cross of various elements of the sounds across Europe. | craig mac | ||
| Eurythmics | the word was defined in the american heritage dictionary as "the choreographic art of interpreting musical composition by a rhythmical,free-style graceful movement of the body in respose to the rhythm of the music." | gloria | ||
| Eurythmics | Euryhythmics is a Greek system of dance that Annie Lennox learned when she was a child. They took the first h out to make it easier to spell. Dave Stewart liked it 'cos it summed up the European and rhythmic elements of the band. | Sophie | ||
| Evanescance | ok, so I can't spell! But I saw this interview where they said they wanted a word that was beautiful but not many people had heard of it, like themselves + their music | Az | ||
| Evanescence | Guitarist Ben Moody found the word. He suggested it as a name, saying that it was exactly how most bands out there are, being there and popular one minute and nothing the next. Apparently he didn't think they'd last, but the name stuck, and...they're still here! | trinsa | ||
| Evanescence | The dictionary. Ben Moody (former guitarist) started looking in the E's 'cause he thought they could do some cool art with that and they found Evanescence-to disappate like vapor. Amy Lee (lead singer) says "it makes you think of a ghost". | Ellie | ||
| Evanescence | \Ev`a*nes"cence\, n. The act or state of vanishing away; disappearance; as, the evanescence of vapor, of a dream, of earthly plants or hopes. --Rambler. | ?M嶩r H?17? | ||
| Evanescence | They were looking in the dictionary for something that starts with the letter E. it means slowly disapating like vapor, and it fit their mood. | foufou | ||
| Evanescence | Amy Lee and Ben Moody, 2 members of the band were looking in a dictonary for any word that would mean something cool, and they found Evanesence, which means "disapperance of water/vapor" | kevin | ||
| Evanescence | they had a longer name previously, but they changed it to a shorter one. they looked through the dictionary under "E" because Ben Moody decided that an "E" name sounded cool. they chose Evanescence because it made you think of a ghost or something like that. | Evanescence Fan | ||
| Evanescence | Evanescence means to fade from site. When something is evanescent, it is at the back of the crowd, unnoticed. | Ikeman | ||
| Evanescence | Refers to an usual, unexpected disappearance like vapor. | Colin | ||
| Evanescence | Well his is what it says on their homepage! evanescence (ev'e-nes'ens ): a dissipation or disappearance like vapor Although the band's name may suggest a sudden vanishing, the music of Evanescence is poised for longevity. Fallen, the Wind-up Records debut of this talented quartet from Little Rock, Arkansas, is an emotional, ethereal work of undeniable potency guided by the heavenly vocals of Amy Lee. "We're definitely a rock band," says the 20-year-old Lee. "But the twist is that the band's music is epic, dramatic, dark rock." ©2003 Wind-up Records | GAP (Noname22) | ||
| Evanescence | They decided to look through the dictionary and pick out a random word, and Ben and Amy both wanted the letter to be E because you can do cool artwork with it. They came across the word "Evanesce" (Which means to disappear as vapour) and thought that it sounded cool, and so added "nce" on to the end. | Aimee | ||
| Evanescence | Evanescence is a form of 'evanesce' which means to vanish like vapor.... to me this band is going to b around for a long time- woohoo! | Katie | ||
| Eve 6 | On an episode of the X-Files, they cloned a girl named Eve and the 6th clone was insane and evil. | Sean Dougherty | ||
| Eve 6 | They are huge X-Files fans, but Eve 6 isn't the one who got away-- she was the craziest Eve who bit a guard's eyeball.... and they named the band after her.. maybe b/c they're... crazy? | Sarahfh82 | ||
| Eve 6 | The band got it's name from an episode of the X-Files, "Eve 6". The episode was about a bunch of Adam and Eve clones, and Eve number six was a psychopathic killer. The drummer of the band, Tony Fagenson, is a huge fan of the X-Files. (So am I) ; ) | Peqie |
Entries starting with E 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.
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