- Today, Brisbane three-piece Bugs share their new album, Cooties. The album is a raucous celebration of rock glory. Written, recorded, and produced by the band, it’s an examination of life in your twenties: the white-knuckle highs, the debilitating lows and the buzzing minutiae of the in-between.

The album’s opener and first single Old Youth Feeling landed in late 2020. Since then, the band have been dodging COVID to play sold out shows up and down the East Coast and delivered some of the best Australian indie rock of the past few years.

There’s slick guitar runs, razor sharp snare snaps and bone rattling bass lines aplenty on this album; standard fare for a band that has spent years refining their joyful brand of relatable pop-rock. The songs on Cooties sound more polished and bigger, testament to drummer Brock Weston’s evolution as their recording engineer. These production flourishes are most evident on a gleaming cut Coming to Get Me which winks at '90’s pop inspiration, or the irresistible sing-along energy of Bridge.

Thrilling dynamics shifts scatter the record. None is more obvious than between angsty cut What Goes On (In Your Head) and tender slow burner Mars & Venus. On the latter, vocalist Connor Brooker ruminates on the realities of the patriarchy, and its insidious effect on children’s lives while the track builds to a righteous guitar solo.

The timing of the trio’s third and most considered release feels particularly purposeful, with the recent return of big festivals, and the urgency of these songs, it's like they're begging to be experienced live. Bugs have crystallised and expanded on their best ideas for this record, further cementing themselves as Brisbane’s most lovable purveyors of indie pop. Go catch Cooties.

- Fiona Priddey.