 Elvin Jones and Bernard Purdie both drummed with the group at times.Bill Folwell, who had played with Albert Ayler (and later an original member of The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo), on bass and trumpet; as well as Warren Gardner on trumpet and clarinet, were part of the band by the time they recorded their second album.According to "The New York Times", the band took its name from William S. Burroughs's novel "Naked Lunch", detailing a race of giant insects bent on world domination.