Cinema has produced many great musical acts over the years, from Stillwater (Almost Famous) to The Rutles (All You Need Is Cash). Some of these acts begin and end with their film, while others transcended cinema, lodging themselves in our hearts and minds. Here are just three of the all-time greatest fictional bands.
Wyld Stallyns
Bill S. Preston Esq. and Ted Theodore Logan are up on the list of cinema’s cult double acts — Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure and its sequel Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey are ingrained in popular culture. The films follow a pair of air-headed, rock obsessed no-hopers who stumble into time-traveling escapades, rescuing various historical luminaries for their school history report (Excellent Adventure) and outwitting and out melvin-ing the Grim Reaper (Bogus Journey). Central to their relationship is their band — Wyld Stallyns — introduced as a totally inept duo making a din in their garage, but later apparently a conduit for a philosophy that, millennia in the future, will define every aspect of society.
Bill and Ted became a sensation when it was released in 1989, and beyond the movies it has manifested itself in many other ways — breakfast cereal, an animated spin-off show, and even casino entertainment — Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure features among slots and games on many gambling sites, alongside other pop culture phenomena from Downtown Abbey to Beavis and Butthead. While you’re unlikely to find Wyld Stallyns on tour anytime soon, they deserve a place on this list for the inspiration they give to wider pop culture, as well as the utopian civilisation in the year 2688.
Spinal Tap
Arguably the greatest of all fictional bands (although they have made forays into non-fiction at various times), the ‘Tap are rock legends, traversing the genre from the ‘tube station skiffle’ of the early 60s to the high-octane world of 1980s hair metal — with a pit-stop in Summer of Love flavoured psychedelia. The 1984 classic This Is Spinal Tap picks up David St. Hubbins, Nigel Tufnel, Derek Smalls (played by Michael McKean, Christoper Guest and Harry Shearer, respectively), along with a rotating stool of ill-fated drummers, as they navigate album cover censorship, negative reviews, and ever-dwindling attendances on tour to support their new album Smell the Glove.
The film’s massive impact on popular culture — take the phrase “up to eleven”, for example — plus the several subsequent albums, tours, and television appearances by the trio, have cemented Spinal Tap as one of music’s most iconic fictional rock bands.
Blues Brothers
It’s easy to overuse the word ‘iconic’, but there is no other way to describe John Belushi and Dan Ackroyd as Jake and Elwood Blues, a pair of blood brothers who lead their eponymous band through various law-ignoring adventures in the classic 1980 film.
Driving their heavily conspicuous Bluesmobile — a battered, decommissioned 1974 police car — and facing threats from a literal army of law enforcement and much more besides, the brothers must find enough money to save their orphanage from closure. They decide to do this by staging a concert with their ex-backing band, now engaged in steadier jobs as cooks, maitre d’s, and Holiday Inn lounge entertainers, inspired on their ‘mission from God’ by a gospel preacher.
Despite plenty of production difficulties, the film was a box office smash. It was well received by critics for its impressive all star lineup of musicians — Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Ray Charles and John Lee Hooker appear, amongst many others from the world of soul and rhythm and blues, from which classic rock styles have evolved. Despite Belushi’s death three years later, the band continues to tour with a rotating lineup, blurring the line between fiction and non-fiction.
Fans of fictional bands can find no shortage of them on the big and small screen. But these three tower above the rest, and prove that rock’n roll and reality don’t always go hand-in-hand.
