CMJ 2009 Band Name Trends Revealed

I'm in New York City for the annual CMJ Music Marathon this week. With all of the panels, music performances, parties, films, and events going on, it's hard to decide what to do amid all of these choices. One of the first things that I did today was scan through the extensive list of participating artists in an attempt to figure out who was worth my attention. As I did this, I noticed some interesting trends in band names. Whereas a few years back it seemed that all of the hot bands had "wolf" in their name; 2009 is all about letters, family, death, and the color black.

Here are the top band name trends this year at CMJ:

Letters
One of the most buzzed about shows this week includes a performance by The xx, so it should come as no surprise that one of the biggest band name trends this year revolves around letters of the alphabet. Letter bands this year at CMJ include:

UUVVWWZ
xx
zZz
Zs
K-Holes

In a Family Way...
A bunch of bands also played around with generational themes, including:

Grandchildren
Frat Dad (perhaps my favorite band name this year)
Mother of Three
Family of the Year
Papa
We're Pregnant

Death
Death is always a favorite for musicians. Here are some death-themed names at CMJ this year:

Dead Heart Bloom
Dead Leaf Echo
Dead Sexy Inc.
Dead Stars
Deadbeat Darling
Die! Die! Die!
Kill Kill Kill
Kill Krinkle Club
We Should be Dead

Black
Along those same dark lines, black is another popular word showing up in band names:

Black & White Years
Black Cherry
Black Diamond Bay
Black Holes
The Black Hollies
Black Swan Green
BLACK TAXI
Black Tie Party
the black watch
Black Whales
Cruel Black Dove
Small Black
Soft Black

We are....
Most surprising to me was the number of band names beginning with the phrase "We are..." I wonder why?

We are Country Mice
We are Enfant Terrible
We are the World
We are Wolves

Stay tuned. In the coming days I'll be posting recaps of various panels and performances that I attended at CMJ this year.