There is a band called Opiate For The Nation. can i name my band Opiate of The Masses?

Opiate Of The Masses is a quote fom Karl Marx (source) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_of_the_people), and therefore it cant be copyrighted as a band name. or can it?

lol. yes. I know the quote well. I actually found a little Karl Marx finger puppet at a bookstore at Ohare that had that quote on the tag. Gave it to a girl i was dating at the time. as a joke. kinda wish i still had it.

As for your legal question i do not know. not my area to expertise. If i have some down time i'll research it. Someone will likely have an answer for you before then though.

The name shouldn't pose any legal difficulties, so long as you do not emulate any of their songs, stage acts, costumes, etc..

Look at it like this: Theres Mountain Dew and Dr. Pepper, right? Offbrand soda companies make shit like Mountain Lightening, and Dr. Thunder, with no penalties.

If you just stick to the name and nothing else, you'll be fine.

There are three bodies of law that are often confused with one another (as your post, as well as some replies demonstrate): Copyright law, Patent law and Trademark law.

Copyright law (as mentioned in your question) protects written works of literature, also musical recordings and other intellectual property such as computer programs. You cannot 'copyright' a band name or a product label; these fall under the jurisdiction of Trademark law.

Trademark law covers such things as product (or band) names, slogans and logos.

Patent law covers products and/or processes, generally related to the design or manufacture of a product.

Trademarks and Patents must both be registered. Part of the registration process involves a search of existing claims to ensure that there is no duplication of identical or 'similar' claims.

Since your question really relates to Trademark issues, lets focus there. The basic rule is that you cannot use a name, slogan or logo that would lead the consumer to mistake your product for a similar product having an identical (or very similar) name.

If there were a breakfast cereal on the market with a registered trade name of "Delicious Wheat Flakes" and you put together a band with that same name, you would most likely have no problem as no reasonable person would confuse breakfast food with a garage band.

As VA pointed out, though, the line gets pretty fuzzy on a lot of products. My guess is that they are able to get away with this by using similar product names, not identical, and also by avoiding using similar logos or slogans.

Hope that helps a wee bit?

copyrighting is a hobby of mine.
in my spare time i like to cut out watermark using photoshop..

am i sad? :(