Those who believe the "Jesus Movement" was an exclusively West-coast phenomenon have missed much of what God was doing throughout the nation in the last half of the 1960's. Simultaneous to the ground-breaking work of the Lonnie Frisbee's and Agapes of California, the All Saved Freak Band was born of a collaboration between co-founders Larry Hill and Joe Markko in 1968. The two met in Chicago six years earlier when Larry, then a street worker for Dave Wilkerson's Teen Challenge Ministry, led 15 year old Joe Markko to Christ. One year before Larry Norman's first album was released, the two had been writing music for many  months when bass player, Randy Markko came on board. During the earliest years, next door neighbor Dana Vandernich, who played as a jazz drummer between Cleveland and Ashtabula, Ohio, played with the band for a short period of time. Calling themselves Preacher and the Witness, Larry wore a broad-brimmed, Amish hat and a long, black priest's habit during concerts. This changed soon after the arrival of Glenn Schwartz in 1970.

Larry first met Glenn when the latter was on tour in Buffalo with Pacific Gas and Electric one year after their song, 'Are You Ready?,' hit America's top-10 music charts. The original guitarist for the James Gang, Glenn was voted one of the top guitarists in the country by trade magazines of the day. Labeled "the white Hendrix" by the California media he would also be identified as the "Blue Messiah" by Cleveland's Free Times Newspaper [ i ]. Recruited from the Backroom of Faragher's bar on Taylor Road in Cleveland Heights, Glenn's presence brought instant credibility to ASFB. His family, unable to comprehend Glenn's complete commitment to Christ, had him kidnapped by "Black Lightening," famed cult deprogrammer, Ted Patrick but Glenn's faith held strong.

Following the death of four students at Kent State University Glenn, Larry, Joe and Randy started to reach out to the Kent college community through concerts in the Student Union building at Kent State as well as Sunday church services held at J.B.'s bar on Water Street. During this period of time Glenn was hospitalized and a guitarist by the name of Phil Keaggy filled in for him on Sunday afternoons. Phil, a new convert to Christ, played with a band known as Glass Harp in the downstairs bar of J.B.'s and had not yet separated himself from the college "bar scene." Taking advantage of an offer from the Kent Community Store, the band moved operations to the old Jaycees Hall above Butcher Boy Meats on Water Street. Soon after, the first of three band mates died when Brett Hill, percussionist with ASFB, was killed on the way home from a New Year's Eve service in Kent, 1971-72.

Starting the Kent New Generation Church, the band added several musicians from the Kent area including the Massmann sisters, Morgan and Carole King, Norris McClure and Dave Bechler. Dave played with the band for less than a year in 1971-72. Playing a very fluid lead-guitar, reminiscent of Phil Keaggy, he left the band prior to their first recording and was later replaced by Ed Durkos. Tom "Aquinas" Miller also began to play some piano and provide backup vocals with the band. Tom was an anti-war activist in Kent, heavily involved in the local SDS chapter and a defendant in the trial of the "Kent 25." Tom was pictured in a staged photo in Life magazine, "waving an anarchist flag and jumping in a pool of black blood," as Michener described it in his book on the subject. Tom Miller and Randy Markko never recorded with the band due to their untimely deaths in an auto accident while enroute to witness and testify at an outdoor rock festival in Illinois. The band's first album, My Poor Generation, was dedicated to them. Drummer Tom Eritano was added to the mix halfway through the band's recording of their Brainwashed album. Band members met Tom while he was drummer with the Leftovers, house band for the nationally known Tangier's night club in Akron.