Mistletone
The Bats (NZ) plus special guests
Marrickville Bowling Club (Marrickville, NSW)
Monday, 8 June 2026 4:00 pm
Mistletone proudly presents the return of Aotearoa indie legends, THE BATS. Fresh from a triumphant, room-rammed NZ tour, The Bats are finally heading across the pond to deliver the live accompaniment to their much-loved 2025 album, Corner Coming Up, alongside treasured picks from their four-decades-deep knockout catalogue. Corner Coming Up, the band’s eleventh album, was recorded with Tex Houston at Chicks Studio in Port Chalmers and charted at #1 on the IMNZ chart & #2 on the Aotearoa Music Charts. The album shows The Bats at their shimmering, melodic best; full of bright guitar lines, warm harmonies, and the band’s unmistakable Bats-ey “psych pop” mystique.
A beloved part of the Flying Nun story, the band have maintained the same lineup since they played their first gig on New Year’s Eve 1982 in Dunedin, quietly (and loudly) enduring as one of New Zealand’s most loved pop bands. Alongside friends/contemporaries The Clean and The Chills, The Bats quickly developed a sound all of their own: chiming guitars, melodic bass lines, and songs that unassume while are instantly memorable. With the longest unchanged band line-up in NZ history (Robert Scott, Kaye Woodward, Paul Kean, and Malcolm Grant), their chemistry is unmistakable. Albums like Daddy’s Highway, Fear of God, Silver-beet, Free All The Monsters and so many more, The Bats have cemented their legendary status at home and abroad, earning them a devoted, generation-spanning following.
“The weight of their catalog has grown to the point where they come across like wise tribal elders” – ALL MUSIC
“Sublimely crafted deadpan pop... They’re basically the AC/DC of melancholy Kiwi indie pop” – UNCUT ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆
A beloved part of the Flying Nun story, the band have maintained the same lineup since they played their first gig on New Year’s Eve 1982 in Dunedin, quietly (and loudly) enduring as one of New Zealand’s most loved pop bands. Alongside friends/contemporaries The Clean and The Chills, The Bats quickly developed a sound all of their own: chiming guitars, melodic bass lines, and songs that unassume while are instantly memorable. With the longest unchanged band line-up in NZ history (Robert Scott, Kaye Woodward, Paul Kean, and Malcolm Grant), their chemistry is unmistakable. Albums like Daddy’s Highway, Fear of God, Silver-beet, Free All The Monsters and so many more, The Bats have cemented their legendary status at home and abroad, earning them a devoted, generation-spanning following.
“The weight of their catalog has grown to the point where they come across like wise tribal elders” – ALL MUSIC
“Sublimely crafted deadpan pop... They’re basically the AC/DC of melancholy Kiwi indie pop” – UNCUT ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆