Killer Lovers vs Little Monsters: know your pop-fan nicknames

Lady Gaga at the Grammys earlier this month (Getty Images)

When former Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger performed a solo show in London last week, possibly even more surprising than her managing to fill the Hammersmith Apollo was the discovery that her fans have their own name: Killer Lovers (a play on the title of her album, Killer Love).

If you're a global pop phenomenon, having a fanbase with their own moniker is the new having your own clothing line: it means you're rolling with the big boys; more Justin Bieber than Olly Murs.

Others include Lady Gaga's Little Monsters, Rihanna's Navy, Katy Perry's Katy Kats, One Direction's Directioners and Cheryl Cole's Little Soldiers (although some of them must surely be starting to go awol). In the age of the internet, fans wield such power that they are even acknowledged come award season. The MTV O Music Awards (the O stands for online) includes a category for "best fan army", which presumably decides whose fans are the most deranged.

I suspect that Scherzinger probably inflicted the name on her fanbase, in an attempt to seem more popular than she actually is, much in the same way that the X Factor's Katie Waissel tried to start a movement by christening her fans Waissel's Warriors. She was last seen performing in Butlins in Minehead. Ouch.