History Trivia / TheyMightBeGiants

** A somewhat straighter example is "Stuff Is Way" becoming a viral hit on YouTube and TikTok, after its usage in an animation meme catapulted it to being one of the band's most streamed songs. While not hated or anything, very few TMBG fans will cite it as one of their favorites, and it's not ranked especially highly on the wiki.

* CreatorBacklash: They're noted for digging deep into their catalog in live shows, but they haven't played "I've Got a Match" since 1989, a few months after its parent album ''Lincoln'' was released. They've even skipped it in more recent shows devoted to playing songs from ''Lincoln''. According to John Flansburgh, they just got burned out on playing the song and aren't eager to revisit it.

* NamesTheSame:
** The band has done two different songs with the name "She Was A Hotel Detective" that have nothing to do with each other except the title and being TMBG songs. The version on the first album is "(She Was A) Hotel Detective" and the version on the ''Back To Skull'' EP is "She Was a Hotel Detective" (note the lack of parentheses). They also did a third song with a callback title, "She Was a Hotel Detective in the Future."
** They also have the occasional song that has the same title as a song by another artist. Sometimes this has been deliberate ([[Music/GunsNRoses "Welcome to the Jungle"]], "Sapphire Bullets of Pure Love"--previously used by Mahavishnu Orchestra). Other times it's been accidental. They weren't aware that Music/TheBeachBoys had already done a song called [[Music/TheBeachBoysChristmasAlbum "Santa's Beard"]] when they wrote and recorded theirs.

* AffectionateParody / ShoutOut: They were parodied in ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' as with the dwarfish group "We're Certainly Dwarfs". They were also partially responsible for Foul Ole Ron's {{Catchphrase}} "Millennium hand and shrimp" in the same setting, by way of Terry Pratchett dumping a Chinese restaurant menu and the lyrics sheet for ''Particle Man'' into a [[http://bensonofjohn.co.uk/poetry/tools/travesty_generator.php travesty generator.]] Pratchett was a fan of the band.

* FanNickname:
** Fans tend to capitalize "They" when the pronoun is used in reference to the band.
** "Flans" or "Flansy" for John Flansburgh, which the band seem to have embraced: Flansburgh has referred to himself as such in interviews, and [[Music/SoulCoughing Mike Doughty's]] WordSaladLyrics to "Mr. Xcitement" include a reference to "Flansy in a soda can".
** Their [[SelfTitledAlbum self-titled]] debut album ''Music/TheyMightBeGiantsAlbum'' is known as "The Pink Album" or "The Big Blue Dog Album", because of the cover art by Rodney Greenblat that features a pink sky background, with a big blue dog walking in some kind of parade.
* HollywoodNewEngland: Both Johns are originally from outside of Boston, so they both will slip into the accent on occasion in songs. Linnell most blatantly does it in "A Self Called Nowhere" and "Wicked Little Critta."

** Subverted when the puppets made for ''Here Comes the [=ABCs=]'' and ''[=123s=]'' were used for a video of their cover of "The Long Grift" from ''Theatre/HedwigAndTheAngryInch''. The puppets have also been used for a ''very'' child-unfriendly song in a few live performances. The title? "''Puppet's Gonna Fuck You Up''".

* QuoteSource: They provide the QuoteSource for the following;
** AmnesiacDissonance
** {{Beachcombing}}
** BigApplesauce
** {{Expy}}
** ''Music/{{Flood|TheyMightBeGiants}}''
** {{Heliotropes}}
** ''Music/ILikeFun''
** ''Music/JohnHenry''
** JustJokingJustification
** TheNightThatNeverEnds
** PlatonicCave
** RubberForeheadAliens
** RunawayBride
** SomethingPerson
** ''Music/TheyMightBeGiantsAlbum''
** WhiteMaskOfDoom

** ''Music/{{Flood}}''

* ScrewedByTheNetwork: After a strong debut on Elektra Records with ''Music/{{Flood}}'' and ''Apollo 18'', their relationship with the label quickly went downhill. This started when A&R rep Sue Drew left the label in 1993; Drew had signed the band to the label and represented them and other quirky alt-rock bands on the roster like Music/{{Ween}} and Music/{{Phish}}. Her departure robbed the band of their biggest advocate at Elektra, though label president Bob Krasnow, a respected industry vet, also was sympathetic to them.[[note]]Krasnow had a long track record of championing non-mainstream acts, most notably signing Music/CaptainBeefheart to his first recording contract.[[/note]] Then, on the eve of the release of ''Music/JohnHenry'', Krasnow abruptly quit, as part of a massive leadership shakeup at Warner Music Group. After that, there was no one left at the label who really understood what They Might Be Giants were about or how to market them. The growing rift between band and label came to a head during their 1995 tour of Japan, when Elektra asked the band to play an impromptu gig at a coffee house on one of their days off, but they declined in order to take some much needed downtime. When they got off their train, they were met by an Elektra representative who was there to take them to the coffee shop: The label had went ahead and booked the show anyway without their permission. The Johns refused to play. Elektra did almost zero promotion for ''Factory Showroom'' in 1996, despite it being the band's most mainstream-sounding album to date, so they asked to be released from their contract, which Elektra agreed to.

* BlackSheepHit: Thoroughly {{averted|Trope}}. The band's biggest mainstream hits ("Birdhouse in Your Soul" and "Istanbul" (from ''Music/{{Flood}}''), "Boss of Me") remain fan favorites.

** After winning a Grammy for the Malcolm in the Middle theme, FOX commissioned them to make a new theme song for ''Series/AmericasMostWanted''. They rejected it, and it remains unreleased. According to an NPR interview, the theme was "styled as an update on the 'crime jazz' sound of 50's TV themes with a pretty wild electronic rhythm track"

** They were one of several groups contacted to write and record demos for a title song for ''Film/ThatThingYouDo''. Their demo eventually leaked - while still sounding like something from a 60s one hit wonder, their take on the idea was more indebted to American GarageRock than the early Beatles, which was actually closer to what the original pitch called for than the [[Music/FountainsOfWayne Adam Schlesinger-penned]]"That Thing You Do" that ended up in the movie.

* BreakupBreakout:
** The band itself, for John Linnell. In the years prior, he was part of a Rhode Island group called The Mundanes, a Music/NewWave group in the Music/{{Blondie}}/Motels/Waitresses mold. They built a local following, tried and failed to get a major record deal, and then broke up in 1983.

* MissingEpisode: One of the first music videos that the band made was a video for the song "Rabid Child" that was never released to the public, except for a clip in ''Gigantic: A Tale of Two Johns'' years later.
** The band actually has a few pieces of lost media attached (perhaps unsurprising, given the sheer volume of their output). One particularly prominent example is ''the first recording the Johns made together''—a cover of “Don't Worry Kyoko (Mummy's Only Looking For A Hand In The Snow)” by Music/YokoOno recorded during their teenage years, well before the actual formation of TMBG, which was apparently performed by the Johns doing Creator/RodSerling impersonations. As of 2020, Flansburgh has confirmed that the tape still exists; however, it remains uncertain as to whether it will ever see the light of day, primarily due to the quality of tapes in the 1970s (and self-admitted improper storage practices) making it sadly quite possible that it’s degraded too badly to bother releasing.

** The band actually has a few pieces of lost media attached (perhaps unsurprising, given the sheer volume of their output). One particularly prominent example is ''the first recording the Johns made together''—a cover of “Don't Worry Kyoko (Mummy's Only Looking For A Hand In The Snow)” by YokoOno recorded during their teenage years, well before the actual formation of TMBG, which was apparently performed by the Johns doing RodSerling impersonations. As of 2020, Flansburgh has confirmed that the tape still exists; however, it remains uncertain as to whether it will ever see the light of day, primarily due to the quality of tapes in the 1970s (and self-admitted improper storage practices) making it sadly quite possible that it’s degraded too badly to bother releasing.

* {{Defictionalization}}: [[http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/lights/e791/ Blue canary in the outlet by the light switch.]] They also sold blue nightlights as promotional material for Flood, but they didn't really look like canaries.

* ScienceMarchesOn: Scientists used to think that the sun was a mass of incandescent gas (as in "Why Does the Sun Shine?"), but now scientists believe that it's better described as a miasma of incandescent plasma. So just to be safe, TMBG wrote another song, called "Why Does the Sun Really Shine?"
* ScrewedByTheNetwork: After a strong debut on Elektra Records with ''Music/{{Flood}}'' and ''Apollo 18'', their relationship with the label quickly went downhill. This started when A&R rep Sue Drew left the label in 1993; Drew had signed the band to the label and represented them and other quirky alt-rock bands on the roster like Music/{{Ween}} and Music/{{Phish}}. Her departure robbed the band of their biggest advocate at Elektra, though label president Bob Krasnow, a respected industry vet, also was sympathetic to them.[[note]]Krasnow had a long track record of championing non-mainstream acts, most notably signing Music/CaptainBeefheart to his first recording contract[[/note]] Then, on the eve of the release of ''Music/JohnHenry'', Krasnow abruptly quit, as part of a massive leadership shakeup at Warner Music Group. After that, there was no one left at the label who really understood what They Might Be Giants were about or how to market them. The growing rift between band and label came to a head during their 1995 tour of Japan, when Elektra asked the band to play an impromptu gig at a coffee house on one of their days off, but they declined in order to take some much needed downtime. When they got off their train, they were met by an Elektra representative who was there to take them to the coffee shop: The label had went ahead and booked the show anyway without their permission. The Johns refused to play. Elektra did almost zero promotion for ''Factory Showroom'' in 1996, despite it being the band's most mainstream-sounding album to date, so they asked to be released from their contract, which Elektra agreed to.

* ShrugOfGod: The band doesn't often confirm or deny theories about a given song. An example: when asked what their first single "Don't Let's Start" was about, they responded that it was "about not let's starting". In 2015 Linnell admitted he doesn't remember what he was trying to get across at the time.

* JustJokingJustification

* RealLifeWritesThePlot: [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools An attempt to]] politely {{avert|edTrope}} it. As they were coming up on the end of filming the documentary ''Gigantic: A Tale of Two Johns'' one of the last scenes was a release party for their new album, ''Mink Car'', which was held at 11:30pm on September 10th, 2001 in New York City. On the DVDCommentary they say they had a rough time figuring out what to do - [=9/11=] wasn't important to the story, so to mention it would be "cashing in" on it, but to not mention it when it affected the lives of those present[[note]]one attendee actually stayed near the World Trade Center and was evacuated from their hotel room the next morning. They were uninjured, but they lost all their belongings from the room[[/note]] would also be rude. A compromise was made to simply have a TitleCard listing the date, letting astute viewers make the connection, but leaving [=9/11=] intentionally OutOfFocus.

** A compilation called ''Superfueled Freaksickle'' [[note]]or ''Superfueled Freaksicle'', or even ''Superfueled Freakcicle'' - official sources varied on the intended spelling[[/note]] was first announced in 1994: First mentioned as a DVD/VHS music video compilation, it somehow turned into a second BSide album (following up ''Miscellaneous T''). The release was officially canceled in 1997, in part because its intended release date was right around the time TMBG were releasing ''another'' compilation, ''Then: The Earlier Years''... [[http://tmbw.net/wiki/Superfueled_Freaksickle So fans started coming up with their own track-listings and album artwork instead]].

** A compilation called ''Superfueled Freaksickle'' [[note]]or ''Superfueled Freaksicle'', or even ''Superfueled Freakcicle'' - official sources varied on the intended spelling[[/note]] was first mentioned in 1994: First mentioned as a DVD/VHS music video compilation, it somehow evolved into a second BSide album (following up ''Miscellaneous T''). The release was officially canceled in 1997, in part because its intended release date was right around the time TMBG were releasing ''another'' compilation, ''Then: The Earlier Years''... [[http://tmbw.net/wiki/Superfueled_Freaksickle So fans started coming up with their own track-listings and album artwork instead]].

* FanNickname: Fans tend to capitalize "They" when the pronoun is used in reference to the band.

* AffectionateParody / ShoutOut: They were parodied in ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' as with the dwarfish group "We're Certainly Dwarfs".

* RealLifeWritesThePlot: [[TropesAreTools An attempt to]] politely {{avert|edTrope}} it. As they were coming up on the end of filming the documentary ''Gigantic: A Tale of Two Johns'' one of the last scenes was a release party for their new album, ''Mink Car'', which was held at 11:30pm on September 10th, 2001 in New York City. On the DVDCommentary they say they had a rough time figuring out what to do - [=9/11=] wasn't important to the story, so to mention it would be "cashing in" on it, but to not mention it when it affected the lives of those present[[note]]one attendee actually stayed near the World Trade Center and was evacuated from their hotel room the next morning. They were uninjured, but they lost all their belongings from the room[[/note]] would also be rude. A compromise was made to simply have a TitleCard listing the date, letting astute viewers make the connection, but leaving [=9/11=] intentionally OutOfFocus.

* AffectionateParody: They were parodied in ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' as with the dwarfish group "We're Certainly Dwarfs".