Band Name Etiquette

People with the same names co-exist peacefully enough, so I don't see why bands can't do the same...

e.g.
Paul Kelly -v- Paul Kelly
Maysa -v- Maysa

Mind you, Bono felt he had to change his name to something silly out of respect for this guy

Well that's an interesting link, but Wikipedia doesn't mention Paul Hewson. For sure you must be taking the piss.

What about the way The Raconteurs have to rename themselves The Sabateurs for the Australian market? Cos some crappy Queensland band refused to give up their name for a half decent amount of money. And Blink 182 had to add the 182 because of an Irish band called Blink.

If you do get big, you may have to pay out to some bunch of eejits. However, surely every original band name in the world is taken by now!

#12 - and Paul Kelly

I was in an occasional band, with a website, but no myspace, when a bunch of upstarts in a town not 90 minutes down the road called themselves the same thing and became mildly famous.

I suggested to our "leader" that we just call ourselves something else, since the name was not that important to us, and we were unlikely to lose too many bookings, but he decided to take firm and decisive action - by sending them a sarcastic email. To his surprise they didn't foldimmediately but ignored him and proceded to tear up the obscure indie charts. For our most recent gig, the venue posted the other bands bio in the local paper, thanks to google and cut & paste no doubt.