Abandon All Ships was founded in 2006 in Toronto, Ontario, originally playing covers of Norma Jean songs. Most of the band members attended Dante Alighieri Catholic Secondary, including lead vocalist Angelo Aita, keyboardist Sebastian Cassisi-Nunez, and original guitarist David Stephens. The three just started the band to play gigs and their career escalated from there. By 2008, the band released four demo songs online, which were "Megawacko", "When Dreams Become Nightmares", "Brendon's Song" and "Pedestrians Is Another Word for Speedbump". After rising in the Toronto scene, the group eventually toured and opened for many larger bands in their same genre or home country such as Silverstein.
Abandon All Ships widely were thought to be a Christian band, but this is controversial due to the band's regular use of profanity and suggestive lyrics in their songs and eventually settled the debate that while a majority of the members are Christians, the band is not a Christian band.