Swear to God I saw Frank Black driving a truck on 14th street this morning.

Speaking of which, here's a question. Changing your name when you become an entertainer: pro or con? Oh, I know, the gut instinct is to say con, since it sounds so contrived and inauthentic and whatnot, but consider for a second, my friend, the luminaries that have done it. One is mentioned in the first paragraph, and I might also throw in the name "Zimmerman."

I'm not really talking about a Jake Shears/Ana Matronic kind of thing; that's obviously awesome. Same goes for, I dunno, Jelly Biafra, Blag Dahlia, Jay-Z, etc. Anything obviously fake. But how about Joss Stone? Is that her real name? If not, isn't it better that she changed it? And if someone is going to become an entertainer and has the sort of last name that would be used on for a lame high school student in a TV show (ending in -ski, say, or having a very plodding sound), wouldn't it be nice to have something more in the ballpark of a "Lou Reed" or something? Know what I'm saying?
posted by Mike B. at 11:14 AM 0 comments