“Who the fuck are these?”: The many names Suggs tried before settling on Madness
There’s a sort of tribalism that exists among generations and every single band that represents them.
While I, the modern-day music fan, will passionately pledge that contemporary artists are creating some of the most compelling music in history, my forefathers will sharply refute that, claiming that nothing has ever come close to the world of classic rock. But sometimes, there are bands that put an end to all of that nonsense and unify the generations in the middle of the dancefloor. Perhaps the very best of them all is Madness.
While they were the pioneers of popularising two-tone ska music in the 1980s, their music feels boundless to the limitations of eras. The almost primal simplicity of the compositions feels inherently joyous, and inevitably, their music binds communities together in the middle of the dancefloor, in the true name of pursuing madness.
It was the perfect band name for a band whose music has, in fact, been responsible for registering an earthquake with their live show. But there was a future whereby Suggs’ fearless band operated under a different name altogether, and had it not been for a famous London, it would have come to fruition.
During a 2024 interview with Far Out, Suggs recalled that Camden’s KOKO inspired the naming of the band. He said the venue was “called The Music Machine back in the day, it had a lot of resonance for us.”
Adding, “We were called The North London Invaders. Sort of ’77, ’78, then we found out there was another band called The Invaders. Whatever happened to them, who knows? But they had a record deal, and we didn’t, and they licensed the name. So, we turned up the Music Machine [now KOKO], and Mike, our keyboard player, had taken it upon himself to rename us ‘Morris and The Minors’. There was posters outside, and we was like, ‘Who the fuck are these?’”
Naturally, common sense prevailed, and Suggs called time on that roughly drafted name. Suggs explained, “I wasn’t mad on being Morris, and the rest weren’t too keen on being the Minors either.”
He continued, “So, we was just thinking, what we gunna call ourselves? We had a setlist of the songs we were doing at the time. It was like ‘One Step Beyond’, dunno, not bad, ‘My Girl’. Nah, that don’t work. Anyway, we were doing a cover of a Prince Buster song, ‘Madness’, and somebody just suggested Madness, and everyone agreed.”
Simply put, the name fit the band as easily as Cinderella’s glass slipper, and so Suggs and his fellow band of rag-tag party goers continued on to the ball.
While the music is undeniably important in crafting the legacy of Britain’s beloved band, it’s hard to truly picture them becoming the cult figures they are with a name like Morris and The Minors. The subtle jokes that lace the music would have become satire altogether with a name like that, and the narrative nuance may have been lost in their own parody. Thankfully, madness prevailed, and the band assumed their rightful place in the legacy of British culture.
