The band was formed in December 1979 in Bristol, England, through an advertisement published in a local newspaper by Jeff Cox and Garry Pepperd looking for a drummer. The original line-up consisted of Garry Pepperd (guitar), Jeff Cox (bass, vocals) and Chris Lovell (drums). The same year they went straight into Sound Conception Studios to record their first demo, which was finished on 22 March 1980. The songs recorded on their first demo were "Feel the Heat", "Battle Cry" and "Piledriver". In April 1980, they put out another advertisement for a vocalist, to which Rob Reiss answered joining the band. In December 1980, the band went into another studio, Studio 34, and recorded another demo, which they later put together with the previous demo tracks. The band added now three new demo tracks to the previous ones. The new tracks were "Stormchild", "Ain't no Fantasy" and "War Machine".