There are a lot of interesting and creative names for the varied surf bands on this site. I bet many here would be interested in how one determined, or why one chose, the name of their band. I’ll start.

Being a bunch of surfers ourselves, and knowing we would appeal more to a surf crowd than not, we chose the name CUTBACK. For those who don’t surf, a Cutback is a surfing maneuver where you reverse the direction that you are surfing in one smooth fluid move. Since our music covers a wide range of surf songs, from the early days of Hank Marvin, Dick Dale, the Ventures, etc., to the more modern songs of Davie Allan, Gary Hoey, The Ventures 2000 etc., and to our own edgier original instrumentals – we’re always doing Cutbacks and reversing direction between past & present.

Between songs we “talk story” as the Hawaiians say and explain the meaning behind many of the songs. This really gets the crowd going and helps the non-surfers get into the vibe. So, switching between the different generations of songs and switching between the varied narratives, we’re constantly changing direction – or doing Cutbacks. (I’m not sure how smooth and fluid our maneuvers are, but that is another subject.)

CUTBACK

Well, I wanted something that could be easily spelled by the local press (having seen some baffling typos on my previous bands The Delusionaires, the Vodkats, and the Del Spektros -- Orlando doesn't exactly boast a high caliber of journalism...), and that sounded familiar enough that folks might at least THINK they'd heard of us somewhere... And watching "Leave It To Beaver" one night, it hit me that the hapless Larry Mondello was as appropriate an icon as any (a tubby loser kid always getting in over his head & saying exactly the wrong thing -- it's like we were separated at birth...). And thus... The Mondellos.

And yes, we're not the first band to be named the Mondellos, but hell, take it up with the fifty or so rockabilly bands named Rocket 88 out there...

Last edited: Apr 30, 2007 21:39:13

Lava Rat is "Taraval" spelled backwards. Taraval is a street in SF that runs to the beach, and there was a crew of surfers back in the '50s that surfed Ocean Beach who were widely-known badasses. They surfed the frigid waters without wetsuits or leashes, and were supposed to tear it up in a major way. We hope to tear it up like they did, except musically.

~B~

Being the drummer for The Torquays for the last 13 years...I have seen our band name misspelled, mispronounced and misunderstood in a wide variety of ways…

The Torques, The Torguays, The Torkers, The Torqueys, The Turkeys, The Turnkeys, etc.

Jerry, the guy who started our band way back when…did what so many others did…named the band after a tune. Ours was by The Fireballs, of New Mexico.

I guess a lot of bands over the years have taken their name from tunes while others named their tunes after bands?...

• Surfbeatnik

T H E ✠ S U R F I T E S

I decided I wanted to have something with "aqua" in the name. I thought of "aquatudes" and googled it - nothing out there so far, so I reserved "aquatudes.com" immediately. Like some of the others here, I'm a one-man instro-band so far. Now all I need are a bass-player and a drummer to make it real.

http://www.aquatudes.com
http://www.facebook.com/theaquatudes

In 1983 I had a little rock band made up of fellow DeVry students. One day we were noodling around and the guitar player (I was the drummer) started playing "Walk Don't Run" and the rest of us all joined in, leading me to proclaim (jokingly) that we should call ourselves the "Surfonics" (Surf + electronics)
We didn't.
Fast forward to 1993:
I had started a little trio with some friends and we were looking for a name. I wrote a bunch of names down, including the name "The Surfonics" and that was the one we all liked best. We weren't really even a surf band per se at that point, but after naming the band The Surfonics it was only natural that we proceeded in that vein. There was no internet at the time so it was not as easy to find out if someone else was using that name, so I was a little miffed when I found out a few years later that another band had used the name Surfonics, but they had changed their name to The Reverbs so I decided to keep the name I'd thought of almost 20 years earlier.

image

"as he stepped into the stealthy night air... little did he know the fire escape was not there"

https://www.facebook.com/reluctantaquanauts/
https://www.facebook.com/TheDragstripVipers/

What is a Reventlo, anyway? No one knows for sure, but some say that the band copped the name from playboy/racecar driver Lance Reventlow, who, if you believe the legend, was the last man to share a brew with James Dean before Dean was sent to hell on a lonely California road. Their music is even harder to pin down, a heady emulsion of every influence they’ve managed to soak up since they first plugged in a guitar. They call it “death-surf/Afro-billy”, and they hope you have as much fun listening to it as they did making it. Together since 1995, and after three albums, one is left to wonder how they keep coming up with new musical ideas. “It’s easy”, says head writer and evil genius Greg Staples. “We steal from anyone. If you don’t like one song, wait for the next---it will be completely different”. Believe it. The Reventlos stock in trade is to take a revered musical form, trash it, then reassemble it into something altogether unique and different. The results can be intoxicating, and you will definitely dig it. As an instrumental band, they often get lumped in with the surf crowd. The purists don’t know what to make of them, and tweaking purists of all genres has become a rewarding by-product of their music. Get a Reventlo CD now, and crank it up. Thanks for listening!
Gaspar du Venchey, Antwerp, 2007

Los Fantasticos
We figured that a little modesty would go a long way!

My previous band, Dead Man's Curve
Well, pretty obvious really.

Los Fantasticos