A great band name does two things: it sticks in your memory, and it tells you something about the music before you hear a single note. Classic rock gave us some of the most memorable names in music history — and the stories behind them are often as interesting as the bands themselves.

Led Zeppelin

The name comes from a joke. Keith Moon and John Entwistle of The Who were talking about the idea of a supergroup, and Moon suggested it would go over like a lead balloon — meaning it would fail spectacularly. Jimmy Page loved the image, dropped the 'a' from 'lead' so it would not be mispronounced, and Led Zeppelin was born. The irony is that the band became one of the most successful in rock history.

AC/DC

Angus and Malcolm Young's sister Margaret spotted the letters on a sewing machine and suggested them to the band. The brothers liked the electrical energy the name implied — raw power, direct current. What they did not anticipate was that AC/DC would become slang in some countries for bisexuality, which led to some awkward early press. The band kept the name anyway, and it became one of the most recognizable in rock.

Fleetwood Mac

This one is straightforward but clever. Mick Fleetwood and John McVie were the rhythm section, and guitarist Peter Green named the band after them as a way of guaranteeing they would stay. He was worried they might leave for another project, so he made their names part of the band's identity. It worked. Fleetwood and McVie outlasted every other original member and are still with the band today.

The Rolling Stones

Brian Jones named the band after a Muddy Waters song — Rollin' Stone, recorded in 1950. Jones was obsessed with Chicago blues, and the name was a direct tribute to the music that inspired him. The same song also inspired Bob Dylan's Like a Rolling Stone and the magazine Rolling Stone. Muddy Waters cast a long shadow.

Guns N' Roses

The name is a combination of two earlier bands. Axl Rose and Tracii Guns had been in a band called L.A. Guns, while Izzy Stradlin and others came from a band called Hollywood Rose. When the groups merged, they combined the names. Tracii Guns left shortly after, but his name stayed in the title — which must have been a strange feeling as the band became one of the biggest in the world.

Aerosmith

Drummer Joey Kramer came up with the name, and his bandmates initially thought he was referencing the Harry Nilsson album Aerial Ballet — which he later admitted he had never heard. He just liked the sound of the word. The rest of the band was not enthusiastic at first. Steven Tyler thought it sounded too much like a drug reference. Kramer insisted it was just a made-up word. They went with it.

Bon Jovi

Named after the frontman, which sounds obvious, but the story is more interesting than it appears. Jon Bongiovi had been working at a recording studio in New York, and his cousin Tony Bongiovi owned the place. Jon used the studio time to record Runaway, which got radio play under the name Jon Bongiovi and the Wild Ones. When the band formed properly, they simplified the name to Bon Jovi — partly because it was easier to say, and partly because it sounded less like a solo act.

The Eagles

Glenn Frey and Don Henley were both playing in Linda Ronstadt's backing band when they decided to form their own group. The name came during a camping trip in the Mojave Desert, reportedly after the band consumed substances that made the desert sky feel particularly significant. The eagle as a symbol of American freedom fit perfectly with the California rock sound they were developing. Whether the story is entirely accurate is debatable, but it makes for a good origin myth.

Def Leppard

Drummer Rick Allen was fifteen when the band formed, and the original name was Atomic Mass. Vocalist Joe Elliott sketched out a new name — Deaf Leopard — on a school notebook. The spelling was changed to Def Leppard to avoid looking like a punk band, which was the dominant genre at the time and not what they were going for. The misspelling became part of the identity.

Metallica

Lars Ulrich's friend Ron Quintana was starting a metal fanzine and was deciding between two names: Metallica and Metal Mania. He asked Ulrich for his opinion. Ulrich told him Metal Mania was the better choice for the magazine — and quietly kept Metallica for the band he was forming. It was a calculated move, and it worked out reasonably well for everyone involved.

The Name Is Part of the Story

Every great band name has a story, and every story tells you something about who these people were before the world knew their music. The accidents, the jokes, the tributes, the calculated moves — they are all part of rock history.

At Radio Pig, we play the music these bands made and the stories behind it. Tune in at radiopig.com and hear the classics that gave these names their meaning.