Name Crush: The Motion Sick

So, I'm a huge music nerd and I enjoy pointless trivia. These two facts have converged in my curiousity over how bands arrive at their band names, and what they mean. Was it a series of coincidences that spawned the name, heated debate amongst band members, some special signifigance, or did it just arrive fully realized into a band members head?

I was so curious, that I went and asked some bands what it all means!

First up, we have The Motion Sick, who are playing this Saturday (08/08/09) on as part of Dave Virr's (host of New England Product on WFNX) birthday party: Hymns, The Shills, and The Everyday Visuals are also on this stellar bill. We'll have more about this, but for now, here is the facebook event.

From the mouth of Mike Epstein:
In college, I was involved with doing collage radio on WHRW Binghamton a la Negativland (or more specifically, Over the Edge ). I operated under the name M-Sli(c)k da ninjA. In many ways, I was a less good Girl Talk long before Girl Talk existed. In addition to remixing music, I collected audio oddities, mostly on cassette and vinyl. I would go to the goodwill and buy tapes from answering machines, hoping for some quality bits. I sent off for infomercial tapes about anti-parasite medication. I was subscribed to the tape sermon of the month club from some crazy Baptist preacher. My most favorite tape of all during that period was a long dialogue discussing the dangers and evils of playing Dungeons and Dragons.

In addition to cassettes containing wackjobs having conversations with lunatics, I also collected books on tape for remixing and playing snippets on the air out of context. The bookstore at the Oakdale Mall in Johnson City, NY had a large discount section full of poor-selling books on tape. One day, while digging through the piles, I came across a picture of a strapping, oily gent holding a sword. That fellow was Fabio. Not only was Fabio on the cover of the book (on tape), but its authorship had been attributed to him. I giggled with glee until experiencing slight disappointment after learning that Fabio himself did not read the book. No matter. I made my wise purchase of the 99 cent item and headed home.


(Sophia's note, yes it was the "sexiest man in the world" that brought you The Motion Sick!)

During a radio show several weeks later, I had put the tape in as one of many simultaneous sonic layers and became entranced with the story, titled Pirate The tale cast the modern main character, presumably Fabio, into a time-travel scenario resulting in encounters with the titular foes. As I ignored the increasingly duller and poorer sound layering that I was performing to listen to the Fabio-penned words (read by some random woman), I found myself most entranced by a section discussing stowaways aboard pirate ships. The dastardly buccaneers referred to them as "The Motion Sick."





Does your band have a great story behind your name? Let me know!