The first band the young Stuart Goddard joined was Bazooka Joe, in which he played bass. It was at a gig at St. Martin's College, London, in November 1975 that Stuart was witness to the first-ever public performance of the Sex Pistols, who were billed as Bazooka Joe's support act.

After leaving Bazooka Joe and forming a group called the B-Sides, which never gigged, Stuart married a fellow Hornsey student named Carol, with whom he lived at her parents' residence in Muswell Hill. Shortly after, he suffered a nervous breakdown which led to a suicide attempt and hospitalization.

Upon his discharge from the hospital, Stuart Goddard renamed himself Adam Ant. He formed the Ants in 1977 after seeing Siouxsie and the Banshees perform at the Vortex club in London's Covent Garden.

Adam and the Ants then became part of the burgeoning punk rock movement. He later acted in Derek Jarman's "punk" film Jubilee in 1977 as the Ants were beginning to gig around London with manager Jordan from the Sex boutique on Kings Road.

His debut as a recording artist was the song "Deutscher Girls", which featured on the film's soundtrack, along with "Plastic Surgery" which was performed in the film itself, and was re-released as a single in 1982.

The band made their radio debut on the John Peel show on January 23, 1978. The following day they recorded Deutscher Girls and Plastic Surgery for the Jubilee soundtrack. Touring extensively around the UK, often with Siouxsie and the Banshees, they proved to be unpopular with much of the British music press who disliked their fetishistic lyrics and imagery.

The band struggled to find success or even a record deal until 1978 when they were signed to Decca and released their first single "Young Parisians" to confused reviews and little success. Apparently unable to satisfactorily market the band, the label soon let them go. Many of their early recordings and demos would eventually surface on bootleg records.

Lester Square left the band to form The Monochrome Set. The Ants went through several lineup changes before eventually settling on the semi-stable lineup of Adam Ant (vocals and guitar), Matthew Ashman (guitar), Andy Warren (bass guitar) and Dave Barbarossa (Drums), before Warren also left to join Square in The Monochrome Set. It would be this lineup that recorded their debut album Dirk Wears White Sox. They also recorded three John Peel Sessions between 1978 and 1979 which were released in 2001 on The Complete Radio 1 Sessions.

Late 1979 saw the release of their debut album Dirk Wears White Sox (1979, Do It Records). The title references Dirk Bogarde. The album was somewhat dark, with post-punk riffs and some vestiges of glam rock, as well as attempts to fuse this sound with funk and soul. Lyrically it attempted to address subjects such as fetishism, historical figures like Adolf Hitler, John F. Kennedy and Cleopatra as well as art history, particularly the Futurism movement. In January of 1980, Dirk Wears White Sox made history by being the first ever number one album on the first ever U.K. independent labels chart. Its success was based more upon a cult following, rather than commercial success.

The band felt the need to rework their image. The frustrated Ant hired Malcolm McLaren, the manager of the Sex Pistols, to help redefine their image. Together, Adam and McLaren cultivated "Antmusic for Sex People" by dressing the band in pirate outfits and suggested a more accessible and pop-oriented, rhythmic variation on punk. Adam and the Ants moved forward in this direction preparing material for a new album. However, in January 1980 McLaren persuaded all of the Ants to leave Adam, using them as the core members of Bow Wow Wow.

A new version of the Ants was formed with Marco Pirroni (an ex-member - for short time - of Siouxsie and The Banshees, The Models, Rema Rema and Cowboys International) (guitar), Kevin Mooney (bass guitar), and two drummers, Terry Lee Miall and Chris Hughes (ex-Dalek I Love You), called also Merrick. Pirroni would become an influential member of the group, co-writing many of their songs with Adam.

The band signed a major label deal with CBS Records and began recording Kings of the Wild Frontier. That album was an enormous hit in the United Kingdom and the "Antmania" that ensued put the band at the forefront of the New Romantic movement. The album reached #1 on the UK album charts on January 24, 1981.

There were several hit singles from this LP, including "Dog Eat Dog" (reaching #4 on the UK singles charts in October 1980), "Antmusic" (#2 in January 1981), which was only held off of #1 due to the re-release of "Imagine" after the death of John Lennon, and "Kings of the Wild Frontier" (#2 in March 1981)[citation needed]. In addition, "Antmusic" made it to #1 in Australia for five weeks.[citation needed]

Bassist Kevin Mooney left the band in 1981, and was replaced with Gary Tibbs who joined just in time to record the hit single "Stand & Deliver".

In November 1981, Adam & the Ants released another highly successful album, Prince Charming. The band had two United Kingdom #1 singles. "Stand and Deliver" was the #1 single in the UK for 5 weeks in May 1981, followed by "Prince Charming", which topped the UK charts, for 4 weeks in September 1981. "Ant Rap" reached #3 in January 1982.