This is our second reissue and this time it comes from an act much closer to home. Back in the mid-90's Sunbear were touted as future kings but in the end it all came to naught. Wasn't for the lack of quality output however as their debut album remains an incandescent example of a young band pulling out all the stops to dramatise what was buzzing around their heads. 'Sunbear' was a remarkable achievement that pushed the boundaries in an already vibrant indie scene in Dublin at the time. Sadly a miniscule marketing budget didn't help and despite numerous replays of 'Notebook' on RTE's seminal 'No Disco' programme 'Sunbear' faded from view. Of course the boys from Sunbear went on to form the very much alive and thriving Ruby Tailights so who are we to rule out a one-off 'Sunbear' extravaganza. Many thanks to Paddy and Martin for their efforts in making the reissue of this important record possible. The album is selling for €3.50.

To give 'Sunbear' some context the band's vocalist Martin Kelly has kindly pieced the story of the album together for us.

"Well, way back in 1993 Sunbear made its first attempt at playing a couple of songs live in front of a somewhat bemused audience. Lyrics weren’t the problem, as I never saw the necessity to write too many of them in one song, but singing was a major issue! I never wanted to be a singer (I still don’t actually!), but we all gave it a go and it was decided that I would take the role and try my best to weave my mumblings somewhere between the distortion of all our crap instruments. The only reason being our uncontrollable desire to be in a band and play really loud music.

As well as smothering our ears in My Bloody Valentine, Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr, Swervedriver and Pale Saints amongst others, we were all so influenced and impressed by the amazing bands that played, what seemed like, every weekend in Dublin at that time (In Motion, The Idiots, Luggage, The Mexican Pets, Pet lamb). After a while we were lucky enough to share gigs with all of them.

We also played a lot with Whipping boy, and in time started to pull quite a few punters into the support gigs we were playing. It was all very shambolic if I remember correctly! Someone said once that the reason they liked seeing us live was our unpredictability – things could go to shit at any point and swing to a moment of sonic bliss the next. I’m not even sure if we ever really enjoyed it as we were never happy with the gigs and I seem to remember lots of arguments and drunken stupidity!

So after a year or so hauling our gear to every venue in the city, and playing as many gigs a week as we could, we decided to record an album. It was a kinda spur of the moment thing in a way. A conversation with Og Crudden, from Dead Elvis records, who were just about to put out the In Motion album “The language of everyday life” planted the seed in our minds. Dead Elvis were working with Marc Carolan, who was the main engineer and producer in a basement Studio in Parnell Street called Fuse. It had an 8 track machine and a live room and was producing some really great records, despite its impoverished surroundings, like the In Motion album and the Wormhole album. So we all saved £200 or so each (which was fucking hard seeing as myself and Moss were struggling in really shit paying jobs at the time!) and paid for a week in the studio & 1000 copies of the album. And away we went!

I think we set out to be as unconventional as we could (It doesn’t seem that way listening to it now I think) and wanted lots of mood and little interesting bits all over the place. I think we took things quite seriously. Marc was really great with us! We had done hardly any recording at that stage so he brought the ideas to life for us. We wanted all out fuzz-distortion on some songs and clear dream-pop melodies on others, and I think we got that. And I think all the influences are there, but I hope we still kept a feeling of originality. “Resin” and “Things to do” are fairly obvious indie rockers, but we loved loads of different kinds of music, so “Centre Page” was a really nice way to show that. It started out as a real dreamy sound-scape with delayed guitars and then Marc came in and started layering up sounds and we just kept going with it. The computer voice still sounds great even though people always say that we ripped off Radiohead! (They didn’t do it for another 3 years or so – Fuckers!!...only messing!)

The idea of having the two parts on the album (Opening notes and Closed book) came from our real want to bring out vinyl! But that never happened.

Anyway, nearly 15 years on we still love the album, and in a weird “not up our own ass” way, we’re all really proud of it. It’s a really lovely thing to think that other people do too! MP3Hugger has given us a great opportunity to get it to some fresh listeners. There were not huge numbers the first time around, maybe it can become an epidemic this time! It’s a strange little album with lots of flaws and production short-comings (Not Marc’s fault – we just didn’t have the fancy ass stuff folks have today!), but if you can look past these you might just get it….There’s 30 minutes of traffic noise at the end if you don’t!"

Listen to Sunbear in its entirety!





Press Quotes

‘One album that’s never mentioned in any top Irish albums of all time is without doubt one of the greatest. Way back in the early 90s a young Dublin band called Sunbear recorded a stunning debut album’

Totally Dublin Magazine, October 2006.

‘Sunbear is an album of exhilarating but mysterious guitar music’

Alan Corr, RTE Guide.

‘Sunbear wed that pure Byrds-like high intensity pop melody to wild and divergent surges of amped up craziness’

Hot Press, November 1994.

‘Sunbear have managed to create an enlightened, playful and powerful record’

Michael Ross, The Sunday Times, March 1995.

I spent the last day or so setting up an indiecater page on the newest thing called Bandcamp, a place where bands can upload their music for promotional and selling purposes. It’s a nifty tool for both the listener and the bands and for the moment it is completely free. Going to use it as a nice way to stream the indiecater compilations, test the waters as it were without getting your feet wet. If you feel they’re worth splashing out on then all you gotta do is come back here and within the click of a mouse you’ll be indie’d up and ready to go.

Released in the mid '90's Red Star Belgrade’s (yes, they were named after the football team) classic ‘Where The Sun Doesn’t Shine’ has been in hibernation for several years. But now thanks to RSB’s Bill Curry and indiecater it has been awoken from it’s slumber and you can buy it now in high quality mp3 for the grand price of €3.50.

Bill has been talking to us about the album giving a unique insight into how this great album was crafted.

I'll be honest with you: it always kind of broke my heart that Red Star Belgrade's records never reached a wider audience. I don't say that with any sense of self-pity, but it's true. (There I said it.) I'm certainly thankful for the 10-plus years that I spent playing music with my wife, Graham, and a cavalcade of friends, ne'er do wells, alcoholics, and manic depressives. I don't regret a moment, and I wouldn't change a thing. I just always believed that if more people could have heard our brand of despair-filled, self-loathing rock, they might have felt a little less alone.

If you'd have told me at the beginning that RSB would never be famous, I would have just given you a wry smile and went right back to my guitar. Although I never wanted to be famous in a "rock star" sense, I did want our music to be heard. I really thought we had something unique to say. I still do. Graham was a great drummer and we did everything with passion and a whole lot of heart. There were bands that could play circles around us (and my voice was never the most pleasing one on the planet), but we meant every word we said. I thought that was all that really mattered. I guess I was naïve—but then again, it takes a certain naiveté to start a band.

Red Star Belgrade was never an alt-country band—our music incorporated everything from pop to indie, rock and beyond—but somehow we ended up mostly playing on bills with other "No Depression" acts—some great (like The Ass Ponys and The Silos), others gutless poseurs (like Ryan Adams). There was nothing more rewarding than playing on a bill with a prima donna like Adams (complete with his expensive Keith Richards coiffe) and watching his crowd shit their collective pants as Red Star Belgrade's sonic onslaught began. Sometimes just terrifying an audience is its own reward.

Unlike Adams, we weren't there to entertain anyone (I never even opened my eyes while I sang). We were usually so hungover from the night before, we could barely stand. I was angry and drunk and filled with despair, but Red Star Belgrade kicked ass in a way that Adams can only dream about. The bewildered looks we got from Adams' A&R people after the show was worth it. Fuck 'em—they're all probably working in the film industry now, putting together another Jerry Bruckheimer production starring Nicholas Cage.

So here it is, our first full-length CD, "Where the Sun Doesn't Shine." After two critically acclaimed 7" EPs ("Lose Your Temper, Gain an Injury" and "Union, SC") and a 7" single ("Polpot"), we recorded this CD for a small Florida label called Put It On a Cracker (run by our longtime friend, Bill Bryson). Looking back, "Where the Sun" set the stage for RSB records that would follow. Themes of anger, betrayal, resentment, depression, loneliness, despair and disappointment permeate the record. I wonder why we never made it on the radio.

Released in 1994 or '95, "Where the Sun" was recorded on a digital 8-track at our then home in Pittsboro, North Carolina. A lot of the credit for this record goes to producer/engineer Tim Harper (who recorded a few gold records for The Connells). Tim's bass line for "Saddest Girl" made the song a real classic and his aggressive production and mastering really made the record jump out at you. We can never thank him enough.

Thanks now go out to Kevin and MP3 Hugger. Hopefully he'll turn a whole new generation on to Red Star Belgrade.

So pay your damn money and download the record already. And when you're done listening, buy a guitar and start your own band. And if you're not in it for the fame, it'll be worth every moment. That much I'll guarantee you.

--Bill Curry

Listen to the album in its entirety!






Press Quotes:

Allmusic ‘it's gritty, emotional, and occasionally unsettling material has an unimpeachable sense of musical (and cultural) purity’.

Puncture ‘Where The Sun Doesn't Shine recalls Neil Young at his most determined: if Young's voice betrays vulnerability and tenderness; Curry's voice cracks when he tears open an old wound’

Boston Globe ‘The simplicity of RSB's music underscores the first take feel of this indispensable music.’

Chicago Tribune ‘Red Star Belgrade's mournful and literate country defies comparison…’

Option Magazine ‘Consistently thrilling...the kind of richly detailed writing you'd equate with a Southern author...brimming with homespun witticisms and accented guitar rock’

And our very own eulogy via mp3hugger from 2006.

Christmas comes earlier every year. Hooray is what I say. At this rate of progress Christmas will only have ended and the next one will swing into action. So it being late September don’t be giving out because I’ve mentioned it. I’m not trying to sell hampers you see, it’s much cooler than that, I’m trying to gather a collection of the coolest indie Christmas tunes together for the festive version of indiecater. There are some stellar tinsel flecked ditties lined up already but there are still some gaps. So if you/your band would like to submit a seasonal number for consideration please get in touch. The normal indiecater rules apply and the income from the compilation goes straight back to the contributing artists. So close the blinds, stick on the blinking fairy lights and record something that'll be take Cliff's place this yuletide.

A slight departure for indiecater but a change of direction that will pay dividends for your ears I promise. It all started out as a result of a random conversation but has since sprouted Bolt like powered legs. So in a short while you’ll be able to start buying albums that have been lost to the mists of time. Album’s that deserve to flood the internet byways with their unwavering genius. And as is customary ‘round these parts the presentation will be cheap and cheerful which means that you’ll have a brand new digital copy of a classic indie album on your music player within seconds and all for the slimline price of €3.50. It’s all very exciting for us and if you’ve liked the indiecater compilations thusfar we hope it will be just as smile inducing for you too. Of course all of this is not going to disrupt the main thrust of this adventure and Indiecater Volume 3 will be along as promised in late October. And putting December’s Christmas compilation together in September is making us all feel very seasonal well before even the dastardly shops contemplate that first out of place tarted up tree.

That difficult second album eh! Volume 2 comes a couple of months after the indiecater series was hatched and will hopefully go some way to proving again what amazing talent is bubbling just beneath the surface. This can be your starting point for discovering each of the 10 talented artists on this compilation. Buy their albums, go to their shows and wear their t-shirts.

Here is the track listing:

1) Montag - Going Places (Montreal)
2) Ned Collette - The Country With A Smile (Melbourne)
3) The Spook of the Thirteenth Lock - In Country Dark (Dublin)
4) Mumblin' Deaf Ro - What's To Be Done With El Salvador (Dublin)
5) AM Syndicate - To The Peasants Of The Emperor (Austin)
6) Eagle Seagull - I'm Sorry But I'm Beginning To Hate Your Face (Nebraska)
7) The Van Allen Belt - The Status Quo (A Line Dance) (Pittsburgh)
8) The Very Most - Good Fight Fighting (Boise)
9) Venice Is Sinking - Pulaski Heights (Athens, Georgia)
10) The Ruby Suns - There Are Birds (Auckland)

All this including some unique artwork for just €4.50!

If you'd like to listen to the compilation before you purchase click here.

If you don't have a paypal account or credit card just email me and we can sort something out.

Please remember you will need to use Winrar to extract the mp3s, information sheet and artwork from the file you have purchased. If you don't have Winrar you can download it for free from the Winrar website.

If you are having any problems purchasing or downloading the compilation please give me a shout.

But that’s all you gotta wait until Volume 2 is unveiled. The shackles have come off a bit with this one in that the tracks won’t be confined to unreleased material. The reason being that it is quite a task trying to raid the archives and come back with something quality. I mean why would a band keep its jewels locked away in a dusty cupboard when the world could be trying them on? Choosing this path has inevitably led to more complicated arrangements with labels/bands because except for 1 track all the material has been previously released in some form. Despite the hurdles such was the rush of inspired music that flooded my inbox I already have enough tracks for a third release in October. That clears the way for what I am looking forward to most, namely an indie Christmas album! This will be a free gift to all those who have bought Volume’s 1 to 3 so start snapping up indiecater in an effort to make this December the most festive ever.