The Bats - Biography
The Bats are a folk-pop band from Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand with a worldwide cult following. The Bats’ lead singer and main songwriter, Robert Scott, had started playing in 1977 in the band Electric Blood, and Scott subsequently became the bassist of the great Dunedin trio the Clean in 1980. After the Clean broke up in 1982, Scott formed his own band with guitarist and singer Kaye Woodward, bassist and singer Paul Kean and drummer Malcolm Grant. (Kean had previously played in Toy Love, a short-lived band of Kiwis that moved to Australia.) The Bats played their first show in Dunedin on December 31, 1982.
The Bats released a series of 12-inch EPs on the Clean’s former label, the beloved New Zealand independent Flying Nun: By Night (1984 Flying Nun), “and here is ‘Music for the Fireside’.” (1985 Flying Nun), and Made Up In Blue (1986 Flying Nun). The band toured New Zealand and Australia in 1984 and 1985 and toured the United Kingdom for the first time in 1986. During the UK tour, they recorded part of their first album, Daddy’s Highway (1987 Flying Nun), in the Glasgow home studio of Callum McLean. Long before the Clean’s records were available in North America, the Communion Label released the Bats’ debut LP in the United States, as well as their second album The Law of Things (1988 Flying Nun) and Compiletely Bats [sic] (1990 Flying Nun), which collects the first three EPs.
The Clean reunited in 1988 and Woodward had her first child, so the Bats took a break until Fear Of God (Flying Nun 1991), their first album for Mammoth Records in the US. The Bats toured France with Television and the Wedding Present in 1992. The following year they went on tour in North America with Radiohead and Belly to promote their fourth album Silverbeet (1993 Flying Nun). Superchunk’s label released the 7-inch single Live at WFMU (1994 Merge).
Couchmaster (1995 Flying Nun) was the Bats’ final release on Mammoth and their last release for some time, though they continued to perform in New Zealand. Woodward, Kean and Grant formed a new band, Minisnap, in which Woodward is the primary songwriter. Scott continued to play in the Clean; he also formed the Magick Heads and released the solo albums The Creeping Unknown (2000 Flying Nun) and Songs of Otago’s Past (2004 Powertool), the latter a collection of New Zealand folk songs.
In 2003, the Bats returned to the studio—namely the National Grid in Christchurch—to record their sixth album, At The National Grid (2005 Magic Marker). They toured the US in March 2006. The band toured Europe in May and June of 2009, following the release of The Guilty Office (2009 Hidden Agenda/Parasol).