racer x on "Query Posts by php the_title - How can I make this work?"

You don't want to do it that way. Wordpress already has a method for querying by tag or many other things.

http://codex.wordpress.org/Class_Reference/WP_Query#Tag_Parameters

Also, never assign a variable using a function that outputs data such as $band = the_title(). Always use the get version such as get_the_title().