Tech consultant for Olympia, Lacey, And Tumwater

Sexual Chocolate

Ok, so as a follow up to my “Top Ten Worst band names Ever!” post, here is my top 10 tips to a good band name. I figured it was only fair since there might be a few of you second guessing calling yourselves “I went To The Store To Buy A Grape For Lunch”. Please notice that I am calling these tips and not rules. Why? Because rules are made to be broken. Tips are something to consider. So sure there will be exceptions. I know there are great bands that defy these tips. That is why they are just tips. Not rules. For the most part however, they hold true and should be strongly considered.

1. Keep it short.
Although a one word band name will most likely end up with you in court with ten million other unimaginative losers who thought of the same band name, you don’t want anything too long. Two words is a little more safe, but three words is the limit! Anymore than three words and your band name is very likely a inside joke that will get old very fast and most won’t even get. This will cause most people to just dismiss your band before they even hear the first note. You say the band isn’t serious anyways? Most of the greatest bands around were started off as just something to pass the time. So make sure the band name isn’t something you will think of as a curse when things shockingly get serious.

2. Can You Chant It?
Try chanting the name Slayer. Pretty easy eh? Now try chanting any of the bands from my worst band names list. Sucks, don’t it? Even if you are playing to 100 friends at the local tavern, you will want a name that will remain fun to chant for years to come.

3. Is it taken already?
Check every source you can. Check Amazon to make sure there isn’t a cd from a band with that name. Then check Wikipedia. Then check MySpace music section. If you are a Metal band check Metal-Archives. They have a database of Metal bands that is so big it is ridiculous. Check Cd Baby too. Then check to see if you can get the dot com domain. If you can’t get the dot com website don’t bother. Once you check all of those, grab those spaces as soon as you can before someone else does!

4. What Does It Say About The Band?
I hate to reference Slayer so often, but what does that name say about the band? They are going to slay! You know right off the bat they they are not some wimpy acoustic folk band. There was a local band around the Seattle area in the 90′s called Forced Entry. What does that say about the band? What does Trans-Siberian Orchestra say about that band? With that you know it is going to be some epic music with some really well thought out arrangements. You know that there is going to be some really great orchestral instrumentation. Pick a name that sends the right message for the band.

5. Make sure it doesn’t sound like that other band
So if you have a band name that confuses people into thinking you are another band, you will get some pretty ticked off people showing up at your concerts. Imagine if a band was called something like “Epic Nirvana”? Or how about “Anthrax Exodus”? That last name might be good for a Thrash Metal tribute band, but otherwise it would suck the taint of a dead pigeon (if a pigeon has a taint)!

6. Don’t use any brand names
It might be funny to name yourselves “Microsoft Blue Screen” for awhile, but the joke will get old when the lawyers come knocking at your door.

7. Enough with the name dropping!
I have seen a trend where bands will use a famous actress or actor in their band name. Stop it! It makes it hard for your fans and friends to find you on the internet because all they will find is that actress. It also might land you in court. Plus, joke names get old really quick.

8. No swear words
Notice how many of these rules could be reduced down to a rule of “No joke names”? They get old real quick and create more problems than they are worth. You will have a hard time putting up flyers, coming up in search engines, getting on even the local band radio shows, or even sometimes getting shows.

9. Think about search engines
In this day and age you need to think about search engines. Do you have at least one word that will help your band own that “phrase” in search? I have to say that I thought the band name Arkaea was stupid at first. Then I started putting it into search engines to research for an interview with the band. They always came up first because it isn’t a real word. They made the word up so they wouldn’t have to compete with anyone in any way. Smart guys I have to say.

10. Can fans spell it?
Yes, I know I just gave the band Arkaea points for coming up with a name that gets great Google juice, but I have to look up Fear Factory every time to remember how to spell the damn thing! Your band won’t have that reference, so make sure people can spell it!

Now I know that if you try to think of a band name that fits all these tips you will drive yourself crazy. That’s ok. A little insanity has done Ozzy well, right? Seriously, if you have the imagination to write great songs this should not be a problem. I remember a few years ago people started complaining that all the good website domain names were taken. Since then my wife and myself have grabbed RockMyMonkey.com, HeavyAsHell.com, QueenOfCheese.com and many others. If you have the imagination it will happen. If you can’t pull off a good name, you don’t have what it takes to write great music anyways. This is the first test. Will you pass?

Wyld Stallyns

A band name is a tricky thing I know. First off you need something that hasn’t been taken yet. The best one word band names were taken a couple decades ago. Slayer, Bitch, Overkill, Motorhead, and many more. A band with imagination however can still come up with something cool. Look at Goatwhore! That has to be one of the best band names in history and they have only been around since 1997!

So what makes a great band name? Look for another top ten list coming very soon to this blog! Until then here are the Top Ten Worst Band Names EVER! In case you think I made any of these horrid names up, I have linked to the websites of each and every one of them. Enjoy?

1. Iwrestledabearonce
Ok, I have no issue with the gay connection. Rob Halford is gay and one of the coolest people I have ever had the pleasure to interview. But that is more like a sentence than a band name. Try and chant their name for a few seconds and then try and chant Slayer and see which one roles off the tongue better.

2. Scary Kids Scaring Kids
Why not just be Scary Kids? This name is just plain retarded. It shows zero imagination and that is something a band might need people to believe they actually have.

3. Horse the Band
Ok, so the band name Horse was already taken? Why not something like “Horse Rider” or Horse Trainer” or “Horse Lover”? Now that last one I might be able to believe.

4. I Set My Friends On Fire
Really? Now this could be used as a cd title and no one would have said anything. Sure it’s about as stupid as it gets but it sounds like a cd title. Not a band name.

5. Attack Attack!
Ok, so if a band name you want has already been taken, just repeat it until you can claim it as yours? If this band was talented at all they could have come up with a better name.

6. The Devil Wears Prada
Now I interviewed this band a few weeks ago and even they regret the name. While many may get the message of anti-materialism, most will just think they named themselves after a stupid chick flick.

7. The Number Twelve Looks Like You
I understand that this is a name taken from the title of an episode of the The Twilight Zone. But it is still lame as hell. This is another one that might pass off as a really weak cd title. As a band name it just smells like yesterdays diapers.

8. Circle Takes the Square
Seriously? They named themselves after a cliche from a game show my grandma used to watch? A band name should make a statement and this band obviously wants you to know they both suck and blow.

9. See You Next Tuesday
Yes I know that this is a reference to C U Next Tuesday. Which spells out the word you never call a female unless you really want to piss her off. Most of the bands on this list have a band name that would make a worthless cd title, this band name would have made a great cd title. It’s just a bad band name.

10. Starring Janet Leigh
Have we run out of ideas this bad? Really? Do I even have to say why this band name screams a lack of the same imagination that is required to make good music?

Spam

Is spam really a problem? In minutes I was able to get rid of about a hundred spam messages from my inbox this morning. The email set up I have doesn’t send things to a “spam box”, but it does mark the spam messages very clearly. I’m sure there is a way to do this, but honestly I have kind of got used to it all being in one place. This let’s me know if any legit messages are being marked as spam. I have had a few very important contacts marked as spam before. Because press agents send a ton of bulk messages, they get marked as spam often. So I have everything go into the main inbox and deal with it there. As I said, it takes me just minutes to go through and clean out the spam. It doesn’t bother me much at all.

Once I take a minute or two to clean out the spam messages, it takes me several hours to take care of the legit email. I think that it is that long daily trek through legit email that makes people hate email. Then they need a scape goat to blame and spam is one easy target. It’s junk mail and is unwanted, so it is easy to blame. But if people were being honest they would admit that spam is nothing in the grand scheme of things.

So what is the solution? Well Google Wave tried to solve this, but it was a total flop. People treated it as a social network, added everyone they are connected with through Twitter and Facebook, and then found it to be a productivity killer instead of a help. Now if I had the money to hire a programmer I could automate most of my email. Each press agent has their own strange little quirks. So the program would have to treat each contact differently. So if the inbox got a message from Dude@fakepressagent.com it would look for the text “FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE” and post everything from that to “###” on my website as news. But when hottie@notrealpressagent.net sent a message it would just have to post everything until “For more info”.

Of course there would have to be some major formatting to clean up everyone’s horrid html emails (I despise html email), but that would be in the backend. Then there would have to be a way for me to preview the news pages and reject or make live the posts before the public is able to see them, but I already have that. The problem is that I (along with 99.9% of the people out there) don’t have the resources to automate email in this way. So until then I think we should just say we hate email. Spam is not the issue. It’s the legit email that creates work and work sucks. Sorry Monty Python. I still love ya!

So I have tried all of these services. Granted, I have used Friend Feed and Ping way longer. I have been using those two for years. But this blog post is about why I will keep paying attention to them and ignore Google Buzz.

Strategy Fail

Now there has been tons of “buzz” about how Google Buzz has a horrid privacy issue because they expose a person’s email address. I don’t care who has my Gmail address. For years I have used it as a place to send email I don’t want to ever see. It is pretty much my spam catcher. So please send all spam to rockmymonkey@gmail.com. I can give you a 100% chance I will never even see it. I have two email addresses that I check almost daily. One is at RockMyMonkey.com and the other is at this site. Contact me there. My Gmail has been ignored for years. I never even look at it. So the privacy issue is not an issue. Since I never look at my gmail I don’t want any social network through that account. With Friend Feed I don’t have to worry about that at all. Friend Feed is like Google Buzz without the annoyance of being forced to have it connected to Gmail.

Plus, what if I am burnt out for the day and just want to zone out on Social networking? Sure Social networking is a business tool for someone like me, but it is also a place for pure brainless fun. I try to keep my social networking updates about 90% fun and 10% business. Otherwise my followers get annoyed and stop following me. So I do a lot of social networking after i am done “working” for the day. Sending links to sites like Giant Bat Farts is work, but not anything like email. I want to keep those things separate!

Now Ping.fm is great for sending one update to all my social networks from one place. For those that are getting confused, http://friendfeed.com/markcarras & Google Buzz is for catching all your updates in one place where as Ping is for sending all your updates from one place. I like it because I can do it from my phone as an SMS (text message) or through their website. I have heard that people use Friend Feed and are now using Google Buzz for the same thing, but I would find that annoying myself.

Now the biggest thing that will kill Google Reader though is that I couldn’t find a way to send my profile url out to people. With Friend Feed is painfully simple. http://friendfeed.com/markcarras is about as simple as it gets. Facebook is the same way. http://www.facebook.com/markcarras is pretty easy to send out to friends. What is the url to my Googel Buzz? Is it buzz.google.com/MarkCarras? I seriously doubt it. Is it Googlebuzz.com/MarkCarras? I don’t think so, but it should be. Did they even think to reserve that url? I don’t care because it is not the one they are using and I was not able to grab my “vanity url” for it. If I could I might care.

Now I love the Google Reader and I would rather have people connect with me through that. I would post a link, but I have no clue what that is either. Whatever it is, I am pretty sure it is one long annoying url. Either that or I have to expose my email address. Which of course with Gmail is not a security problem for me, but would be for most people. However, it is a problem for me. If I expose my Gmail address people will think that is my contact info. They try over and over again to contact me there. I don’t ever see it, so I don’t reply, so they think I am a jerk because I “ignored” them.

Google might be one of the most successful online companies around, but they have had more failures than successes. I predict that Google Buzz will be another one unless they make some major changes quick. And it better be more than just weak ass placating.