Frustration at playing as Kuma in Tekken 3.

We love playing live, but sadly we don't do it much any more.

Oh, it's great for bands like us. It frees musicians from the "all or nothing" nature of the industry, and allows us to record and gig without the indentured servitude of a record contract. Plus we get to keep our jobs.

No. Unless they threw like eight bajillion quid at us.

Idiot Bear are a kind of part time band consisting of Lynden Potter (bass), Ross Warwick (drums), Nick Rippin (guitar, keyboard, backing vocals) and Robert Armiger (singing, guitar, keyboard, cello). They were all born in either 1977 or 1978.

They met at Durham University in 1996. Bob had an amp, a guitar and a bass, while Nick and Lynden had a knackered classical guitar and a saxophone respectively. Bob and Nick decided on the basis of completely differing musical tastes to form a band, and bullied Lynden into playing bass, even though he couldn't.

After this auspicious start, the three proto-Bears advertised for a drummer. Ross was the first to reply. The band decided to call themselves "Fivemilesmile", and gigged under that name for nearly two years, progressing from very fast, distortion-heavy cover versions to their own songs.

In 1998, Fivemilesmile became Idiot Bear, at which point the band abandoned cover versions to concentrate solely on their own stuff. This led to a lot of gigs, some really good reviews, and a small fanbase. This in turn led to early IB song "Easter Island" getting a release on 25 Records. Then Bob and Lynden moved to London for work, where they met Andy Appleyard, who became Idiot Bear's fifth member, playing keyboards.

In 2003 Idiot Bear ceased trading, just after being signed to Seldom Records. No big falling out or anything - just hard to gig when three of you are in London, one is in Edinburgh and one is in Durham (that's a difference of about 500 miles, non-UK people).

They are all still friends and play together occasionally. There has been talk of a full band recording session, but in the meantime Bob records under the IB name on his own.

Best to describe each member's taste, as we tend to like really different things (NB: all of the descriptions below are Bob's, so if the others disagree, f*** 'em):

Lynden likes electro and girls with guitars. He is willing to overlook any musical deficiency if there's a cute girl singer with a guitar involved. He liked Shampoo and Crush. Nuff said. His love - LOOOOOVE - of "Generation Terrorists"-era Manics cannot be underestimated.

Nick likes British pop music, notably Pulp, David Bowie and similar. In recent years he has lost all quality control and thinks The Killers are acceptable. So does Lynden, for that matter. Sigh.

Ross likes rock music, and has recently got increasingly into what he calls "Accordion Rock" - Modest Mouse, Arcade Fire, Wolf Parade etc. He has also been known to dabble in hip hop, especially old-skool, but gets bored quite quickly.

Bob has the best musical taste in the world, which is actually very close to Ross's, except better. He's currently in the grip of a Hold Steady obsession.

Got to be Durham or Edinburgh.

Ohhhhohohoooo... now you're asking a dangerous question. Bob is a guitar and pedal nut and WILL bore you for hours on the subject.

However, with some restraint, we're going to say that we use electric and acoustic guitars, bass, piano, drums, the occasional synth, and the very occasional drum machine.