The Stranglers
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40 free The Stranglers trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The Stranglers arrived with punk but never quite belonged to it. Older than their rivals and built around a growling bass and swirling keyboards, they went from pub stages to a long run of hit singles and albums, and they were still touring five decades on. This quiz covers the whole story: the early singles that upset broadcasters, the waltz-time ballad that became their biggest hit, the cover versions, the concept albums and their sleeves, the line-up changes after 1990, and the places the songs have turned up since in films, television and games. It is written for fans who know the albums, with plenty of easy ways in for anyone who only knows the big radio songs.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01What did Stranglers drummer Jet Black sell from the vans that became the band's first tour buses?
Ice cream
Ice cream made Jet Black a successful businessman before the Stranglers, and that security let him return to drumming in 1974 and assemble a band.
Q 02Which keyboard instrument plays the waltzing riff on the Stranglers' biggest hit, 'Golden Brown'?
Harpsichord
Harpsichord carries the tune, which grew from an unused keyboard part Dave Greenfield wrote while working on a song for the band's previous album.
Q 03Which band's 'Town Called Malice' kept the Stranglers' 'Golden Brown' off the UK number one spot?
The Jam
The Jam entered the chart at number one and stayed three weeks, and the Stranglers' label EMI complained that sales of two versions of the single had been counted together.
Q 04The Stranglers' 1988 top-ten cover of 'All Day and All of the Night' was first a hit for which band?
The Kinks
The Kinks took the song to number two in 1964, and the Stranglers' version reached number seven almost a quarter of a century later.
Q 05'Golden Brown' by the Stranglers plays on the soundtrack of which Guy Ritchie film?
Snatch
Snatch used the song in 2000, and it later turned up in the Black Mirror episode 'Metalhead'.
Q 06Which revolutionary is the first figure named in the Stranglers' song 'No More Heroes'?
Leon Trotsky
Leon Trotsky opens the song's roll call of vanished heroes, which goes on to name Lenny Bruce, Sancho Panza, Shakespeare and Nero.
Q 07Which TV chef used the Stranglers' instrumental 'Waltzinblack' as the theme for his BBC shows?
Keith Floyd
Keith Floyd was a big fan of the band, and an edited version of 'Peaches' closed many of his programmes too.
Q 08The Stranglers' cover of 'Walk On By' reworked a Bacharach and David song written for which singer?
Dionne Warwick
Dionne Warwick had the original hit, and the Stranglers first gave their version away on a free white vinyl single with early copies of the album 'Black and White'.
Q 09Stranglers bassist Jean-Jacques Burnel earned a seventh-degree black belt in which martial art?
Karate
Karate became a second career for Burnel, who rose to lead the UK branch of the Shidokan school while still playing bass for the band.
Q 10Which Surrey town, where the Stranglers' drummer ran an off-licence, was in the band's original name?
Guildford
Guildford gave the band its first name, the Guildford Stranglers, but the prefix was soon dropped and the shorter name was registered as a business in September 1974.
Q 11The Stranglers' 'Peaches' plays over the opening credits of which British crime film?
Sexy Beast
Sexy Beast was the feature debut of director Jonathan Glazer, and Ben Kingsley's turn in it as gangster Don Logan earned him an Oscar nomination.
Q 12Which animal, named in the Latin title of the Stranglers' debut album, became the band's trademark?
A rat
A rat fits the title 'Rattus Norvegicus', the scientific name of the brown rat. The album was going to be called 'Dead on Arrival' until a last-minute change.
Q 13Dave Greenfield's swirling organ on early Stranglers records drew frequent comparisons with which 1960s American band?
The Doors
Q 21Stranglers frontman Hugh Cornwell earned a degree in which science at the University of Bristol?
Biochemistry
Biochemistry took Cornwell on to postgraduate research abroad, where he formed Johnny Sox, the group that grew into the Stranglers.
Q 22Hugh Cornwell formed Johnny Sox, forerunner of the Stranglers, while a research student in which country?
Sweden
Sweden left its mark on the band: Cornwell studied at Lund University, and the Stranglers' first keyboard player, Hans Wärmling, came over from Gothenburg.
Q 23Dave Greenfield joined the Stranglers in 1975 after answering an advert in which music paper?
Melody Maker
Melody Maker delivered the organ sound that defined the band: Greenfield played his first gig with them in August 1975 and stayed for 45 years.
The Doors were barely known to Greenfield, who said he knew only a couple of their tracks and named Rick Wakeman and Jon Lord as his early influences.
Q 14Which punk band from Queens, New York, had the Stranglers open for its first British tour in 1976?
Ramones
Ramones dates and a support slot with Patti Smith linked the Stranglers to punk, even though the band had started out on the pub rock circuit.
Q 15The Stranglers' song 'Goodbye Toulouse' describes the French city's destruction as predicted by whom?
Nostradamus
Nostradamus suited a band with French roots: bassist Jean-Jacques Burnel was born in London to French parents and writes many of his songs in French.
Q 16For a 1984 album cover, the Stranglers posed in Trafalgar Square beside a 13-foot sculpture of which body part?
An ear
An ear built by artist John King gave 'Aural Sculpture' its cover image, and the band's photo session with it lasted six hours.
Q 17The title of the Stranglers' 1981 album 'La folie' translates from French as which English word?
Madness
Madness here meant the madness of love: the band said each song on the album explored a different kind of love, 'Golden Brown' among them.
Q 18The Stranglers' album 'Dreamtime' takes its title from a belief of which country's Indigenous peoples?
Australia
Australia's Aboriginal tradition named an album that also voiced environmental worries and carried the band's long-running radio favourite 'Always the Sun'.
Q 19The BBC banned the Stranglers' 'Duchess' video as blasphemous because the band dressed as what?
Choirboys
Choirboys were too much for the BBC, yet the single still reached number 14 and was the most successful release from the album 'The Raven'.
Q 20In which London prison did Stranglers frontman Hugh Cornwell serve time in 1980 for drug possession?
Pentonville
Pentonville held Cornwell in early 1980, and he turned the experience into a book, 'Inside Information', published the same year.
Q 24Which American singer covered the Stranglers' 'Strange Little Girl' as the title song of a 2001 album?
Tori Amos
Tori Amos revived a song with a long history: the Stranglers wrote it in 1974, saw the demo rejected by EMI, and only had a hit with it in 1982.
Q 25Which Britpop band settled after the Stranglers' publishers said 'Waking Up' copied 'No More Heroes'?
Elastica
Elastica agreed to credit the Stranglers as co-writers on all future releases of the 1995 single to settle the claim over its riff.
Q 26Which producer of Queen's hit albums was brought in for the Stranglers' 1990 album '10'?
Roy Thomas Baker
Roy Thomas Baker was the label's choice to aim the record at America, and its lead single, a cover of the 1966 hit '96 Tears', reached number 17 in the UK.
Q 27Which singer fronted the Stranglers from 1990 to 2006 after the departure of Hugh Cornwell?
Paul Roberts
Paul Roberts sang on five studio albums, and when he left the band went back to being a four-piece with its guitarist and bassist sharing lead vocals.
Q 28Which 2021 Stranglers album includes a tribute to keyboardist Dave Greenfield, who died the year before?
Dark Matters
Dark Matters entered the UK chart at number four, the band's highest placing for a studio album since 1983, with Greenfield playing on eight of its tracks.
Q 29Which 1984 single returned the Stranglers to the UK top 20 as the lead release from 'Aural Sculpture'?
Skin Deep
Skin Deep peaked at number 15 after the band's previous two singles had stalled outside the top 30, and its video ends with the band pulling off face masks.
Q 30The Stranglers' concept album 'The Gospel According to the Meninblack' ties Bible stories to what?
Alien visits
Alien visits and sinister government agents run through the whole record, a commercial low point that singer Hugh Cornwell nevertheless calls his favourite Stranglers album.