W.A.S.P.

While the first official line-up was Blackie Lawless, Randy Piper, Rik Fox andTony Richards, Fox left within the same year of the band's inception. Lawless himself took over bass duties and Holmes was brought in to handle guitar. With this line-up, the band set about stoking up a fearsome reputation in the Los Angeles club scene. The band's abbreviated nomenclature of W.A.S.P. also helped fuel the controversy (in the same manner that KISS was supposed to be an abbreviation of Knights In Satan's Service) as Lawless' publicity machine dropped hints that the act's real name was "We Are Sexual Perverts" or "We Are Sexual Predators". In one occation a reporter asked Blackie about the acronym to which he replied with "We Ain't Sure Pall".

Blackie Lawless disbanded W.A.S.P. twice: once at the end of 1989 and again at the end of 1993. He reformed the band in 1991, pressured by fans and promoters to release The Crimson Idol under the W.A.S.P. moniker. He reformed it again in early 1995 while working on Still Not Black Enough, as the songs sounded similar to W.A.S.P.'s sound and could follow-up on the previous album.