Iced Earth

The band's main character is guitarist and composer Jon Schaffer, who briefly created the band under the name "The Rose" in 1984 and then "Purgatory" from January 1985. Line-up changes have been commonplace since that time, and only Jon Schaffer has remained a constant member. In 1988 the band took the name Iced Earth and recorded the demo Enter the Realm, which gained enough success to record a self-titled album on the label Century Media Records. Gene Adam, the singer, was originally supposed to be part of the band for the following album, Night of the Stormrider, but Schaffer worried that Gene could not handle certain vocal parts, and asked him to take singing lessons. As he refused, he was let go and replaced by John Greely.