Why did so many '80s band names consist of the same word twice?

Hot Hot Heat
Flaming Fire
Fiery Furnaces

Damn, that's a hat trick, and I've still got three elements to go. And what about Jean Grey's "Attack of the Attacking Things" EP? The Magic Magicians? C'mon, there's got to be at least another dozen of these floating around out there in Indierockville as we speak...

Boys Don't Cry
Curiosity Killed The Cat
Cats Can Fly
Johnny Hates Jazz
Grab Grab The Haddock (a personal favourite!)
Frankie Goes To Hollywood
Look Blue Go Purple (a complete sentence, however incomprehensible)
Sigue Sigue Sputnik ("Burn Burn Satellite" in Russian)
We've Got A Fuzzbox And We're Gonna Use It
...and I suppose Talk Talk qualifies too! (Likewise Push Push, whoever they were.)

Songwise, how about 'Doot Doot' by Freur?

-- Johnny Fever (johnny.feve...), August 23rd, 2004.

wow, that's brilliant, especially because that means by their 4th album they would have been Go Boi!!!!!!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082676/

A movie about foosball starring Leif Garrett!

Chin Chin, of Switzerland.
― OleM (OleM), Tuesday, August 24, 2004 10:08 AM (6 years ago)

Thought I was going to get to be the first one to mention these guys. Coming up next on my working-music stereo. Probably followed by the new Zun Zun Egui, in fact.

I think there is something intentionally childish about it. One of my siblings had an imaginary childhood friend named "Chair Chair." I think it's going for liberating primitive childish absurdity. It makes me think of "dada" too. What about the general importance of repetition in the 80s (especially thinking of minimalism and electronic dance, and perhaps disco)?

I'm not sure why then however.

Because to say the same word twice in a row tends to be to babble and not add content (give or take countless exceptions--like, doesn't repeating the same word in Chinese, for instance, sort of act as an intensifier? at least some of the time?).

kinda surprised there wasn't an art-damaged 80s band named Foot Foot

Well, it can act as an intensifier in other languages too - "very very good" is better than "very good" and "sehr sehr gut" is the same.

I'm not convinced about the childish thing, unless it's done with specifically childlike words - in fact, usually I'd say that more childlike would be similar and rhyming words (can't think of band names other than Oingo Boingo, but stuff like that and 'Mellow Yellow' etc). Repetition in band names does tend to be poeticism without meaning, though, which, to be honest, is pretty much what lyrics are.

xpost

Would totally be in a band called Foot Foot.

dada doesn't refer to the word/sound children tend to use...

xpost

Yeah, but it evokes that same primal/childish or child-like association. As for the "real" origin of "dada," there are contradictory accounts of how the word was adopted (surprise, surprise), but the Dadaists seemed to relish the potentially childish meanings (e.g., rocking horse).

Well, it can act as an intensifier in other languages too - "very very good" is better than "very good"

Good point.