Kiwi-rock is difficult not to love. There is something about the gene pool of New Zealand's southern island that predisposes bands to longevity and likability. You look at pictures of bands like the Clean and the Chills and the Bats and the Verlaines taken throughout their intermittent multi-decade careers together and it's just evident that these are nice, honest people who love making music and would like for you to please listen to it if you have a sec. Thankfully, they've always made that easy as well.
At the National Grid, the Bats' sixth full-length in 23 years and first since 1995, is immediately inviting, opening with some barely comprehensible studio banter and slipping into the floating, percussion-less twee pop of "Western Isles" almost by accident. Robert Scott's guy-next-door vocals invite you in while bassist/guitarist Kaye Woodward sings little "doot-doo" backing vocals and Paul Kean's bass comes in to give the song a rhythmic nudge quite casually, as though it just stopped by for tea and decided to stay for a few songs. The album slips into its groove on "Horizon", a bouncy slice of jangling indie pop with some nice, subtly tricky stickwork by drummer Malcolm Grant.
From there the album endears through a mixture of acoustic/electric jangle and friendly jamming, the latter of which contributes the album's only real low points. The band's almost off-handed interplay is one of their major strong points, but fuzzy instrumentals like "Hubert" are just a bit too stretched-out and meandering to complement their more tightly composed brethren. It's a small concern given how many songs go in the complete opposite direction. "Things" rides a surging rhythm section, nudging Scott's melancholy vocal forcefully into your memory banks, while "Single File" is the Bats at their most psychedelic, with garage organ piping tinnily in behind the bubbling guitars and harmonies.
In the 10 years since we last heard them on Couchmaster, the Bats have kept themselves busy, with Scott keeping the highest profile in a couple of fruitful reunions of the Clean, but they don't really skip a beat on At the National Grid. If anything, the album has more in common with their ultra-loose early albums, unafraid to slip into a noisy rave-up as they do at the end of "Flowers & Trees" or just explore a jam for a few minutes. The approach doesn't make for a perfect album, but it's a lovely one nonetheless.
