Cub Sport’s Camera Roll is a Journey through a Trans-Dimensional Realm of Suburban Bliss

Where some bands are content to describe themselves by stale genre tags, the Australian group Cub Sport prefers you to think of them as a “trans-dimensional, genre-queer family.” (Finally, a genre we’re intrigued by!) In nine years, the group, founded by singer Tim Nelson, has released three EPs and three studio albums. Their latest, the eponymous Cub Sport,  has been dubbed the first “great queer album” of 2019. In Cub Sport’s hands, themes of blissful queer romance are set over bubbling synth beats — and the source of the bliss is obvious after we spoke with the group’s frontman. Just recently, Nelson married the group’s keyboardist, Sam Netterfield, and the two now live together in Brisbane, along with their two golden retriever-poodles who Nelson refers to as their “daughters.” “Cub Sport exists in a world of love rather than one of fear,” he told Interview recently, days before the group is set to embark on an American tour, starting in Los Angeles. As the rain poured in the southern California, Nelson took us inside that world of love, giving us a camera roll glimpse of his and Nelson’s “suburban bliss in Brisbane” — a stream of gold records, enchanted forests, and fluffy friends. 

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“Crystals are something that we’ve gotten into over the last year, and now we bring a little pack with us on tour. We legitimately feel the effects of having them around, along with the good energies they bring. When we need guidance, we break out the tarot or angel cards. Consistently, it’s given us the guidance that we’ve needed.”

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“That was a photo shoot we did in our hometown, Brisbane. It was a couple of days after Christmas, on the one day before we headed off on a tour festival around Australia. We weren’t even sure what the photo shoot was going to be for when we did it, then it ended up being our Billboard feature, which was really cool. I got the leather pants from a vintage store in London and the top is a hand-dyed lace top with matching gloves by Sydney designer Gina Snodgrass.” CUT

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“The big dog is Missy and the little one is Evie. They’re like our daughters, and we’re like a family. Sam’s holding a gold record for our song ‘Come On, Mess Me Up‘. This is a pretty good summary of our suburban bliss in Brisbane while we’re home.”

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“When we’re at home, we DJ semi-regularly under name, Prom Queens, mostly from our vinyl collection. I usually drop some new demos that I’ve been working on in those sets as well, so our really dedicated fans often get to hear the music that I’ve been working on before it actually comes out, sometimes years before.”

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“Every time we pack for tour, we end up seeing a bunch of clothes that we’ve bought and haven’t actually worn. So it always turns into this dress up thing. Here, everything you see is something I’ve thrifted from around Brisbane.”

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“We live close to a really beautiful forest. There’s a song on our new album called ‘As Long As You’re Happy’ that has a field recording of that forest. There are so many beautiful birds, plus the breeze and the trees — everything is just so calming. The song is an attempt to explain the love that Sam and I share, which sometimes is beyond what I can put into words or really explain.”