The Band Name John Bonham Wished Led Zeppelin To Use

Have you ever wondered what your favorite band would sound like with another name? It would probably be pretty strange to call them differently as their names partially identify them. However, many bands’ current names weren’t the first choice in their minds. For instance, Dream Theater would’ve been called ‘Majesty’ as they first decided on that name when Mike Portnoy described the ending of Rush’s ‘Bastille Day’ as majestic.

Van Halen, on the other hand, was once called Mammoth. They performed under the name Genesis before deciding on Mammoth, but this would cause issues with Phil Collins’ Genesis. When they discovered that there was also a band with the same name, Eddie Van Halen suggested the name Rat Salad. Thankfully, David Lee Roth stepped in and convinced his bandmates to use the name ‘Van Halen.’

There are many other examples — we could’ve known Aerosmith as the Jam Band, Journey as Golden Gate Rhythm Section, KISS as Wicked Lester, or Foreigner as Trigger. As it turns out, Led Zeppelin also had another name — but it was only for one show. However, John Bonham was so fond of this name that he hoped Led Zeppelin would use it for the remainder of their career.

When Led Zeppelin was to perform at K.B. Hallen in Copenhagen, Denmark, in 1970, they came across a very bizarre obstacle — a woman named Eva Von Zeppelin was offended that they used her family’s name. She even called them a band that sounded like ‘shrieking monkeys’ when Zeppelin was a guest at a Danish television show a year before. Although this was a weird coincidence, Led Zeppelin was actually facing the threat of being sued by Von Zeppelin.

To solve this issue, Led Zeppelin came up with a brilliant idea — performing under another band name. “Then we shall call ourselves the Nobs when we go to Copenhagen,” Jimmy Page told Melody Maker in an interview. “The whole thing is absurd. The first time we played, we invited her backstage to meet us to see how we were nice young lads. We calmed her down, but on leaving the studio, she saw our LP cover of an airship in flames, and she exploded! I had to run and hide. She just blew her top.”

Although the band performed under the name the Nobs only on one occasion, it seems like John Bonham liked the idea. According to the author Roy Carr, who wrote ‘Thirty Years Gone: Remembering John Bonham,’ the drummer told him he hoped to keep the name. “Personally speaking,” Bonham had said, “We should have continued as the Nobs. Just think what our album covers could have looked like!”

So, John Bonham wanted Led Zeppelin to keep performing as the Nobs after the Copenhagen Show. However, this was a one-time incident that remained in the dusty pages of rock history. One thing is sure, though; calling the Zeppelin icons the Nobs would sound quite weird and out of place today, which was also probably the case back then as they had already released their debut as Led Zeppelin.