Steer Clear

STEER CLEAR were an Northern Irish based Pop Punk/Rock act based in Belfast. They formed in 2004 out of the ashes of several other local bands. After 2 years of gigging/recording/promoting/practicing and working away STEER CLEAR signed a 3 album deal with Dublin based indie label Blastspace Records. They recorded and put out 'No You Hang Up' In Manor Park Studios with Neal Calderwood. 'Please Be My Girlfriend Again' Debuted at 30 in the Irish charts. In October 2007 the band were taken on by Charlie Arme of FromHereToThePier Management. His added input to the team behind Steer Clear helped them progress even further. The band in its time supported Paramore, Anti-Flag, Good Charlotte and Enter Shikari to name but a few. In March-April 2008 the band set out on a mini tour of Ireland and Wales, with Welsh band The Story So Far. On this tour they played a headline show in the Academy in Dublin having around 700 people attend the show. This set the bar for local Pop-punk bands in terms of attendance figures to a headline show, as Ireland had never really had a great successful Pop-punk band. In July 2008 the band did two dates in both Belfast and Dublin bringing over Kill The Arcade (now known as Wolf Am I) and Kobe for support. These shows were to mark the release of their single 'Comebacks aren't your thing' along with two other acoustic shows in Zavvi, Belfast and Tower Records, Dublin. These two July shows were very successful shows and led to the announcement of the band about to partake in The Lock In. The Lock In saw the band lock themselves away in a relatively unknown practice room in Dublin, where they streamed themselves on Stickam 24hrs a day for 14 days. They were joined by Mark Merch who organized the logistics of The Lock In and to keep the band company. In this time the band wrote a number of songs, the most predominate being Middle Park Road, which saw the band take a new level of maturity. Shortly after The Lock In, cracks started to appear in the band, and in August 2008 original guitarist and co-founder of the group Vinny Feeney, quit the band to concentrate on University. A new guitarist, Connor Ebbs was recruited from Dublin. The band did another 8 date tour of Ireland in late September of 2008, which was stated as being one of the bands most successful tours. Around this time, there was also problems with their relationship with Blastspace Records and the band were let go from there contract. Blastspace Records went into liquidation a few months later. The band split on November 9th 2008 because they 'always had the attitude that the band should be fun and the second it stopped being fun is the second we stop playing.' On December 11 2008 the band was voted No 5. Best Unsigned band by the readers of Kerrang Magazine, with The Blackout winning, and Saving Aimee and My Passion also in the list. STEER CLEAR played 2 final gigs in Dublin and Belfast in January 2009 to mark farewell to the band and their fans. Padraig (vocals and guitar) and Ebbs went on to form Dublin based band Jody Has A Hitlist Mark (drums) and Sib (bass) helped start Dublin based band I Fight Crime. Which Sib left shortly after. In September 2009, I Fight Crime split up. Simon (keyboards) moved to Paris. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.