Prior to becoming Stiff Little Fingers, Jake Burns, vocals and guitar, Henry Cluney, guitar, Gordon Blair, bass, and Brian Falloon, drums, were playing in a cover band, Highway Star, in Belfast. Upon the departure of Gordon Blair (who went on to play with another Belfast group, Rudi), Ali McMordie took over the duties on Bass.
Cluney had by this time discovered punk, and introduced the rest of the band to it. They decided that Highway Star wasn't a punky enough name, and after a brief flirtation with the name The Fast, decided to call themselves Stiff Little Fingers, Jake taking the name from a Vibrators track.

It was while they were doing a gig at the Glenmachin Hotel that they met up with Gordon Ogilvie, who was a journalist with the Daily Express newspaper, invited along for the evening by Colin McClelland, another journalist, with whom Jake had been corresponding.

Ogilvie suggested they play material based upon their experience of the troubles. McClelland arranged to get the band some recording time at a local radio station, and in the studio normally used to record jingles, they recorded "Suspect Device". The single was packaged in the form of a cassette, with a cover depicting a cassette bomb, apparently causing great hilarity in the group, when one record company phoned them and asked for another copy, as they'd thrown the first one in a bucket of water for fear that it was a real bomb.

A copy of the single was sent to John Peel. He played it repeatedly leading to a distribution deal through Rough Trade. This was a tactic Peel had used before in promoting another famous Northern Irish band, The Undertones. There were a number of well-publicised arguments between the two bands; the Undertones accused Stiff Little Fingers of sensationalising the Northern Ireland conflict, while they retorted that The Undertones ignored it.