Baptist is the son of a family of musicians. His mother is the violin teacher Renate Baptist, who sang in the Gerd Michaelis Choir before playing keyboards and violin with Frank Schöbel. His father is the trombonist Peter Baptist, band leader of the Peter Baptist Combo, with which artists such as Hartmut Schulze-Gerlach and Dieter Birr from the Puhdys began their careers. [1] He grew up near Dresden and received training as a bassoonist as a child and adolescent. At a young age he played in the symphony orchestra of the Grossenhain district .

In the early 1980s, Roger Baptist began experimental work with old keyboards, microphones, drums, a bass guitar and various tape recorders . Under the influence of the Leipzig band Die Art , he founded the band Kein Mitleid in 1987, which was mainly devoted to English-language music. In 1989 he joined the Dresden underground band Friends of the Italian Opera (FDIO) and, as co-author of Jänz Dittschlag and RJKKHänsch, created numerous songs for the band, which were published on the record Um Thron und Liebe and the CD Edle Einfalt Stille Größe, among others. After the Friends of Italian Opera broke up in 1992, Baptist founded the EBM and NDH band Automatic Noir, which existed until 1999. After the decline of the project followed several years of abstinence from music.