Green Jellÿ

Green Jellÿ (pronounced "green jello") is a Grammy-nominated American comedy rock band formed in 1981. Originally named Green Jellö, the band changed its name due to legal pressure from the owners of the Jell-O trademark, Kraft Foods, who claimed that it was an infringement of their trademark. Despite the spelling difference, the new name and the old are pronounced identically. The name was chosen due to the band’s poor opinion of that flavor, and they decided that it also appropriately reflected the quality of their music. The band never attempted to be good, deciding instead to “disguise their lack of ability with stupid props,” as their liner notes put it. The group appeared on The Gong Show touting themselves as the world’s worst band, but the real turning point came when they met Gwar in 1988 and learned how to sculpt props and costumes with latex, papier-mache, chicken wire, and couch cushions. They attracted a small, curious following with their bizarre, cartoonish look and wound up signing with Zoo Records as a video-only band. Band members, who have exceeded 74 in number over the years, perform under aliases such as Marshall Staxx and Jesus Quisp. The band was able to sell records based on their visual weirdness for several years, doing fine up through the mid-’90s.