Brisbane indie quintet Cub Scouts are about to embark on a two month long tour to support their latest release, the Paradise EP, as national support for Jinja Safari, but they may have to reprint the promotional material after a legal dispute with Australia’s junior adventurers has forced them to change their band name.
Cub Scouts have been stung by a cease and desist order from Scouts Australia, who sent a legal letter to the Brisbane group last month stating that their name conflicted with the registered Cub Scout trademark, Perth Now reports.
The band’s frontman, Tim Nelson, says the moniker – which they have been using for over two years – was inspired by the “youthfulness” of their indie tunes, but Scouts Australia have concerns over avoiding any confusion between their activities and that of the Brisbane five-piece, who played for the Scouts in a live performance at their Jamboree in January.
“It was a stressful time for this to come up because we are right in the middle of releasing our Paradise EP,” says Neslon. “But as we are hoping to release [it] in the US and UK, the sooner we could sort something out the better.”
Nelson admits that it was easier to change their band name – henceforth known as Cub Sport – than enter into a costly, longwinded legal stoush over the use of Cub Scout, which could resurface with other Scouts bodies as they pursue their career internationally as their popularity grows, including being named as one of the Top 50 most played artists on Triple J Unearthed for 2012 and cracking the Top 20 of the influential American CMJ Top 200 chart.
“There wasn’t anything we could do about it, we have tried to stay positive and it could have been worse if it happened in a couple of years when we were releasing our debut album,” adds Nelson.
Despite the legal clash over their moniker, Nelson says Scouts Australia had been “nice” about the matter. “Some of the band cracked up laughing when our manager told us about the letter but I was just in shock because I don’t think we are a particularly offensive band,” he says.
Nelson explains that the band’s new name, Cub Sport, “wasn’t easy to come up with… we had a list of 50 that we got down to a shortlist of 10 and then decided we weren’t happy with what we decided on.” The new moniker has been given the tick of approval by Scouts Australia as they unveil the music video for the title track of their new EP today.
But Nelson is still slightly befuddled by the request. “I guess it’s because it has the word ‘scout’ in it but it’s not an uncommon word in band names,” says Nelson. Indeed fellow Brisbanites, Little Scout, are probably having their fingers crossed that they don’t draw the attention of Scouts Australia’s legal hounds.
Cub Sport Australian Tour 2013 Dates
Wednesday 11 Sept: BIGSOUND 2013, Brisbane
Thursday 12 Sept: Spotted Cow, Toowoomba*
Friday 13 Sept: The Hi-Fi, Brisbane*
Saturday 14 Sept: Coolangatta Hotel, Gold Coast*?
Wednesday 18 Sept: ANU, Canberra*?
Thursday 19 Sept: Uni Bar, Wollongong*
Friday 20 Sept: Cambridge, Newcastle*?
Saturday 21 Sept: The Metro, Sydney [ALL AGES]*
Wednesday 25 Sept: Loft, Warrnambool*
Thursday 26 Sept: Barwon Club, Geelong*
Friday 27 Sept: Forum, Melbourne*
Saturday 28 Sept: Karova, Ballarat*?
Thursday 3 Oct: Adelaide Uni Bar, Adelaide [ALL AGES]*
Friday 4 Oct: Settlers Tavern, Margaret River*
Saturday 5 Oct: The Astor, Perth [ALL AGES]*
Sunday 6 Oct: Prince Of Wales, Bunbury*
* Support for Jinja Safari on The Bay Of Firest Tour
