Bands
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50 free Bands trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Every band has to call itself something, and the stories behind those choices are often stranger than the songs. Names have come from sewing machines, gym teachers, bad reviews, unemployment paperwork and a dart thrown at a map. This quiz mixes three kinds of question. Some ask where a famous name came from, or what a group was called before anyone had heard of it. Some hand you the clues, such as an early line-up, a talent show or a set of stage personas, and ask you to name the group. The rest come from the school band room: instruments, the sections of a marching band and the terms printed on the music. It is written for music fans, quiz hosts and band students alike, and it runs from rock and pop to girl groups, boy bands and marching bands. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so you can play it straight through or print it for a group.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which pop group had to ask a Swedish fish-canning company for permission to share its name?
ABBA
ABBA is also the name of a Swedish seafood canner, so the group negotiated for the rights to it. The firm agreed as long as the singers did nothing to make it feel ashamed.
Q 02Which hard rock band took its name from a label on the Young brothers' sister's sewing machine?
AC/DC
AC/DC was printed on the power adapter of Margaret Young's sewing machine. Her brothers Malcolm and Angus felt the electrical symbol captured the raw energy of their music.
Q 03Which Southern rock band's name mocks a Florida gym teacher who enforced a rule against long hair?
Lynyrd Skynyrd
Lynyrd Skynyrd is a respelling of Leonard Skinner, the P.E. teacher at the band's Jacksonville high school. Years later he made peace with them and introduced the band at a hometown concert.
Q 04Which band's name is said to come from a quip by two members of the Who that a supergroup would flop?
Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin reworks "lead balloon", the flop Keith Moon and John Entwistle are said to have predicted. The band dropped the "a" so nobody would say "leed", and swapped the balloon for an airship.
Q 05Which Canadian rock band's name came from the change its bassist handed customers at Starbucks?
Nickelback
Nickelback echoes Mike Kroeger's line at the till: "Here's your nickel back." The group had started out playing other people's songs under the name Village Idiot.
Q 06Which rock band is named after a World War II airmen's term for unidentified flying objects?
Foo Fighters
Foo Fighters was a name Dave Grohl chose to stay anonymous, hiding that he had made the first album mostly alone. He recorded it in about a week after Nirvana ended.
Q 07Which 1960s band was put together by television producers to star in its own NBC sitcom?
The Monkees
The Monkees were conceived in 1965 as actors playing a band, and at first session musicians performed on their records. From the album Headquarters on, the four mostly played as a real group.
Q 08Which school band instrument counts as a woodwind even though its body is made of brass?
Saxophone
The saxophone makes its sound with a single reed, and that is what puts it among the woodwinds. Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax invented it in the early 1840s.
Q 09Which South Korean group's full name translates literally as Bulletproof Boy Scouts?
BTS
BTS stands for Bangtan Sonyeondan, which is why fans also call the members the Bangtan Boys. The group was formed around the underground rapper RM and debuted in 2013.
Q 10Which band grew out of the Quarrymen, a skiffle group formed by Liverpool schoolboys in 1956?
The Beatles
The Beatles emerged in 1960, after Paul McCartney and George Harrison had joined John Lennon's group. The Quarrymen took their name from the school song of Quarry Bank High School.
Q 11Which British band did Brian Jones name after a track on a Muddy Waters LP lying on the floor?
The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones got their name in a hurry: a journalist on the phone asked what the group was called, and Jones's eye fell on the song title "Rollin' Stone".
Q 12Which band did Syd Barrett name by joining the first names of two Piedmont blues musicians?
Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd honours Pink Anderson and Floyd Council, whose records Barrett owned. He is said to have invented the name on the spot when another band called the Tea Set turned up on the same bill.
Q 13Which Los Angeles band took its name from an Aldous Huxley book title that quotes William Blake?
The Doors
Q 21Which band grew out of Smile, a London student group whose singer Tim Staffell quit in 1970?
Queen
Queen formed when Freddie Mercury, a fan of Smile, joined its guitarist Brian May and drummer Roger Taylor. Staffell had tired of the group's hard rock sound and its lack of success.
Q 22Which band's members took on the comic-book personas Starchild, Demon, Spaceman and Catman?
Kiss
Kiss kept the face paint on until 1983, when the members began performing without makeup and costumes. The original four put it all back on for a reunion in 1996.
Q 23Which boy band was assembled from five solo auditionees on the 2010 series of the British X Factor?
One Direction
The Doors borrowed from The Doors of Perception, a title Huxley took from Blake's line that if the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear infinite.
Q 14Which Birmingham band took its name from a Boris Karloff horror film showing across the street?
Black Sabbath
Black Sabbath was drawing a queue at the cinema, and bassist Geezer Butler found it strange that people paid so much to see scary movies. The band set out to make the musical equivalent of horror films.
Q 15Which folk rock duo scored a minor hit as teenagers under the cartoon-sounding name Tom & Jerry?
Simon & Garfunkel
Simon & Garfunkel were 15 when they recorded "Hey, Schoolgirl" as Tom & Jerry. Art Garfunkel became Tom Graph, and Paul Simon became Jerry Landis after the surname of a girl he had dated.
Q 16Which rock band with horns cut its name short after a city's transit company threatened to sue?
Chicago
Chicago began as the Big Thing, then released a debut album as Chicago Transit Authority. The real transit company objected, so the band dropped the last two words.
Q 17Which band did guitarist Peter Green name after the drummer and bass player he wanted in it?
Fleetwood Mac
Fleetwood Mac joins Mick Fleetwood's surname to "Mac" for John McVie. The name was bait: McVie at first stayed with John Mayall's band for the steady income.
Q 18Which hard rock band was formed in Los Angeles in 1985 from two groups, combining both their names?
Guns N' Roses
Guns N' Roses came out of L.A. Guns and Hollywood Rose, the earlier bands of guitarist Tracii Guns and singer Axl Rose. Guns soon left, and Slash took his place.
Q 19Which New York punk band took its name from an alias once used by Paul McCartney?
Ramones
Ramones members were not related: bassist Douglas Colvin became Dee Dee Ramone first, copying McCartney's early stage name Paul Ramon, and his bandmates followed.
Q 20Which band rehearsed at school as On a Friday before renaming itself after a Talking Heads song?
Radiohead
Radiohead comes from "Radio Head", a track on the 1986 Talking Heads album True Stories. The record label EMI had asked the group to drop its old name.
One Direction's five members had each entered as soloists. Footage released in 2022 showed guest judge Nicole Scherzinger playing a significant part in putting them together.
Q 24Which girl group, first named Touch, was formed through an advert in the trade paper The Stage?
Spice Girls
The Spice Girls were chosen from singers who answered the 1994 advert for an all-female pop band. Their nicknames came later, from an article in Top of the Pops magazine.
Q 25Which girl group lost on Star Search as Girl's Tyme before taking a name from the Book of Isaiah?
Destiny's Child
Destiny's Child lost that talent show, Beyoncé believed, because the girls rapped instead of singing. They adopted the name that made them famous in 1996.
Q 26Which boy band's name is a play on the last letters of its original members' first names?
NSYNC
NSYNC was coined after Justin Timberlake's mother remarked how "in sync" the singers' voices were. Newcomer Lance Bass was nicknamed Lansten so that the letters still fit.
Q 27Which virtual band's four fictional members are 2-D, Murdoc Niccals, Noodle and Russel Hobbs?
Gorillaz
Gorillaz was created in 1998 by Blur's Damon Albarn and the comic artist Jamie Hewlett. Albarn himself provides the singing voice of 2-D.
Q 28Which band formed at Charterhouse School saw its drummer become lead singer after Peter Gabriel left?
Genesis
Genesis was named by pop impresario Jonathan King, a former Charterhouse pupil. Phil Collins took over the microphone when Gabriel quit after the tour for a 1974 concept album.
Q 29Which Atlanta girl group was named for the first initials of its three founding members?
TLC
TLC first stood for Tionne, Lisa and Crystal. When Rozonda Thomas replaced Crystal Jones, the three became T-Boz, Left Eye and Chilli so that the letters still fit.
Q 30Which band did Paul McCartney form in 1971 with wife Linda and Moody Blues guitarist Denny Laine?
Wings
Wings is said to have got its name in a hospital: McCartney was praying during the difficult birth of his daughter Stella when the image came to him.