Growing old with Weezer … and some stuff about trademarks

A long time ago, before kids entered into the equation, my wife and I were frequent concertgoers. We both worked in downtown Nashville, and we were within easy walking distance of several venues.

One of the first after-work concerts we attended was Weezer’s show at Municipal Auditorium in 2002. We didn’t have time to change out of our work clothes. So we looked ridiculous in our suits. Also, we couldn’t figure out where section “GA” was on our tickets. We wandered around until we found Section G, where we found a group of similarly confused working stiffs. That’s when we realized that “GA” meant “general admission”. Clearly, we were well on our way to getting old and uncool.

We saw Weezer again at the Ryman in 2014, at a show that was likely filled with our brethren from Section G. And last night, we completed the Weezer circle of life by seeing them with our kids at Bridgestone Arena. Dinosaur Jr. and the Flaming Lips opened, which should conjure up some music memories for you GenX-ers.

This blog is about trademarks, so let’s take a gander at the federal trademark registrations owned by these alternative music icons:

An interesting factoid about the WEEZER marks is that they are owned by Rivers Cuomo rather than the band. Cuomo is not only the band’s lead vocalist and guitarist, but he appears to be in charge of their business interests as well.

Also noteworthy is that the band’s “Flying W” logo is not registered. For GenX-ers, the logo is instantly recognizable and strongly associated with Weezer’s brand, much like the Rolling Stones tongue logo or Metallica’s lightning logo.

Unlike the WEEZER ownership structure, the DINOSAUR JR. trademark registration is owned by the band’s company, Dinosaur Jr., Inc. An unusual aspect of the DINOSAUR JR. registration is that it’s registered with a claim of acquired distinctiveness. During the prosecution of the trademark application, the Examining Attorney at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office refused registration because of deceptive misdescriptiveness. Clearly not a music fan, the Examining Attorney noted in an Office Action that “the applicant has indicated the goods and services do not contain or include a dinosaur-theme or the subject matter of dinosaurs and neither are the goods for children or young people.” Rather than argue with the Examining Attorney, the band asserted a claim of acquired distinctiveness to overcome the refusal.

Finally, you have the Flaming Lips, which only have a pending trademark application for YOSHIMI BATTLES THE PINK ROBOTS. Here’s a photo of the pink robots from the concert:

Obviously, the band can rely on their unregistered trademark rights to protect the FLAMING LIPS trademark, but it’s somewhat surprising that they don’t have a federal trademark registration. After all, they are considered to be one of the most innovative and forward-thinking bands of their time. I suppose this doesn’t extend to trademark protection.