 After leaving Bruce Cockburn’s group, The Flying Circus in March 1968, Neil Lillie (born in Winnipeg on December 27, 1945) reunited with keyboard player Ed Roth (born in Toronto on February 16, 1947) and singer Jimmy Livingstone (born in Toronto on February 28, 1938) to form a new band.They had worked together previously in The Just Us, The Tripp and Livingstone’s Tripp (which Roth and Livingston had renamed Livingstone’s Journey following Lillie's departure to join Rick James briefly in the final version of The Mynah Byrds in May 1967).Adding guitarist David Kindred and drummer Gary Hall, the new group, initially called New King Boiler, began rehearsing in Lillie’s grandmother’s basement in May 1968.