Names are a touchy subject with bands. Finding a good band name that everyone can agree on, and that is available for your use, is no picnic. Bands have broken up over lesser issues. That provides all the more reason to do things the right way when choosing your band name, and to take the steps to keep your name proprietary, once you finally find it.
Finding a Good Name Is More Difficult Than Ever
It has been widely reported that “all the good band names are taken.” No less an authority than John Paul Jones (formerly the bassist and keyboardist for Led Zeppelin, now with the supergroup Them Crooked Vultures) has lamented in print, “Think of a great band name and Google it, and you’ll find a French-Canadian jam band with a MySpace page.”
It used to be easier to find a good band name, assuming you were a local act with no superstar ambitions. If a name you liked was already being used by another small act in some distant location, there was no problem. This is because the chances were good that the two bands would never encounter one another, nor one another’s fan base.
You really cannot depend on that kind of coexistence any longer, however. When virtually every band has a MySpace page, a Facebook page or a website (or all three), it becomes more difficult to argue that such a thing as “separate territories” exists. Anyone can access those sites from anywhere and be exposed to the band and its music.
Verily, as the Internet giveth, so the Internet taketh away.
Search Your Band Name
For this reason, when you are choosing a new band name, it’s important to search the name to ensure no one else is using it in a way that might result in an infringement challenge. This doesn’t mean it has to be a name that no one else is using for any goods or services – merely that the public won’t mistakenly believe there is some connection between your use and the use anyone else is making.
So, how do you search names? First, you should be doing your own online checks as you go along with the name consideration process. Like John Paul Jones, you should be checking potential names through Google, Facebook, MySpace, Sonicbids.com, Pitchfork.com, AllMusic.com, and any other music site you can think of. There also are dedicated band name databases that are worth checking.
When searching, focus on the key words in your proposed name. Ignore any differences created by generic buzz words like “the” and “band.” Are there a number of bands coexisting with the same key word but combining it with other distinctive words? Calling yourself “The Kiss” isn’t going to keep Gene Simmons from suing you, but “Kiss My Grits” might.
If you find a potentially conflicting band name on any of these sites, investigate further. Mere difference in types of music is not a good basis to assume it’s safe to go ahead with use of the name, but it may be another story if the other band is defunct. So is the band still in existence, or did it release one album in 1989 and then disappear? Or was it last heard from a year ago? All of these may mean different things in terms of the assessed risk level.
It’s Worth Talking To An Attorney
Once you find a name that passes your own search test, it’s a good idea to share and discuss your results with an attorney experienced in trademark law. It’s also a very good idea to have him or her conduct a more detailed search that includes registered marks.
There are many reasons why an attorney search is highly recommended. Among them is this: your trademark counsel will have a better sense of what’s a problem in non-musical goods and services. For reasons that will be more apparent in the next installment, that insight can be very important.
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