We are all Ned Flanders: Meet heavy metal band Okilly Dokilly
Leftorium proprietor inspires alternative act.
It’s fair to say that sudden fame and rock ’n’ roll relevance have come as a bit of a surprise for Head Ned.
That shouldn’t come as a surprise — forming a thrash metal band called Okilly Dokilly, with all five members dressed up in pink polo shirts and green sweaters to evoke the eternally goodspirited cartoon character Ned Flanders from “The Simpsons,” seems like an almost certain plan to avoid any kind of success in the music business.
But the band’s lead singer said what started as a side project goof for the five friends from Phoenix took off unexpectedly and has launched them into a new career of sorts. It’s an adventure made all the more humorous by the fact that none of the members were in heavy metal bands or were very much fans of the genre.
“We were into more indie and alternative bands where I guess Weezer is the closest comparison, so nothing that was definitively metal,” Head Ned — his and the other members’ birth names are closely guarded secrets — said by phone from a tour stop in Salem, Ore. “This has made for an interesting chance to step into a new genre and do something completely different. We didn’t feel like we had anything to prove with this, just be heavy and simple and let the music be interesting in its own way.”
The cartoon facade does the heavy lifting for the group, with titles like “Flanderdoodles” and “Vegetables” featuring plenty of in-jokes and references to the long-running television show that are rarely lost on the longtime “Simpsons” fans who have quickly latched on.
“You meet lots of really big ‘Simpsons’ fans who are die-