Mental Floss

POP CULTURE









Queen's Roger Taylor, Freddie Mercury, Brian May, and John Deacon pose in London in 1973.

What's in a name? A lot if you're a popular music band. So imagine if Radiohead was still On A Friday? Or Ozzy Osbourne was still performing under the name of his mother’s favorite talcum powder? The stories behind these groups’ original names are curious

Erika Wolf
Julia Stiles at the Golden Globe Awards in 2011.

Columbia University, Manhattan's Ivy League institution, boasts Alexander Hamilton, Barack Obama, and even Alicia Keys (sort of) among its former students.

Ellen Gutoskey










Heather O'Rourke in Poltergeist (1982).

From 'The Wizard of Oz' to 'Poltergeist,' these movies were so troubled that they've developed a reputation for being cursed.

Michele Debczak




Steve McQueen drives a 1968 Ford Mustang Fastback in Bullitt (1968).

The car chase is a time-honored, frequently practiced piece of the language of action cinema, and the rise in digital wizardry in filmmaking has only helped to bolster its place on the big screen. Still, not all car chases are created equal; here are some

Matthew Jackson


Bob Dylan performs a concert at the Warfield in San Francisco, California, in 1979.

The phrase “ripped from the headlines” doesn’t just apply to 'Law & Order' episodes. Songwriters throughout the history of popular music have drawn inspiration from real-life tales of murder and mayhem.

Kenneth Partridge