Six Ice Pops

 

In 1961, three teenage boys in Hertfordshire – Rod Argent, Paul Atkinson and Hugh Grundy – decided to form a band. They were actually choirboys, but they wanted to rock out. They added a couple more members – Paul Arnold and Colin Blunstone – and started rehearsing with borrowed instruments. At first, they called themselves the Mustangs, because they thought the name sounded really cool. But there were already several other groups using that name. Paul suggested they call themselves The Zombies, and the rest agreed, even though they really didn’t know what zombies were. The Zombies had a few big hits, like She’s Not There and Time of the Season, before they broke up in 1968. Shortly after the break-up, their music became insanely popular in the U.S. Several bands tried to capitalize on their success by “borrowing” their name. Two members of one of these “fake Zombie” bands, bassist Dusty Hill and drummer Frank Beard, would later become members of ZZ Top.