Name: Bats, Bats, Bats
Duration: 3 min 38 s
Channel: John R. Whitney
Description: This is a 2010 Band in a Box supported arrangement of my 1986 Halloween song, "Bats, Bats, Bats!"

Bats, Bats, Bats

John Robert Whitney

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This is a 2010 Band in a Box supported arrangement of my 1986 Halloween song, "Bats, Bats, Bats!"

folk singersongwriter multi instrumentalist songwriting band in a box

John Robert Whitney

John Robert Whitney is a singer/songwriter and professional conservationist from Western New York State (East Aurora/Buffalo).

Singer/Songwriter; multi-instrumentalist; folk, country, pop, blues, jazz, Gospel; professional conservationist

Song Info

Genre

Acoustic • Acoustic Folk

Charts

Peak #59

Peak in subgenre #8

Author

John R. Whitney

Rights

1986

Uploaded

October 31, 2010

Track Files

MP3

MP3 3.3 MB • 128 kbps • 3:38

Story behind the song

Too many people just plain don't like bats.  I think they are amazing creatures. This little song was written just before Halloween in 1986 as a reaction to hearing stories of how people "took care of" the bats that got into their homes.

Lyrics

Bats, Bats, Bats
  Dm                                          A 
Tennis rackets, baseball bats, brooms and shoes and guns and hats –
  A7                         Dm
 Oh, what a life we lead.
                                                           A
You say bats are ugly creatures but we’re no uglier than you are. 
A7                                   Dm
 I wish I could make you see
                C                                                G
That we have an important role to play in this old planet’s ecology
                G7                                        Dm
And you really don’t have anything to fear.
                  F                                                                                C                          Em
“The only good bat’s a dead bat” or so you think.  That’s why many of us will soon be extinct.
                  G          G7                C
But you’d miss us if we weren’t here.
	
                         Dm   C     Dm                                     A
Refrain		Bats, bats, bats.  Why do you hate us so?
		           A                                      A7                         Dm
We’ve no place else to go. The Earth is our home, too.
		 Dm    C     Dm                                  A
Bats, bats, bats. Why are we so despised?
		                                                 A7                   Dm
Please listen to our cries, and just leave us alone.

It’s true we sometimes live in caves, but that’s no excuse for how you behave.
Your ancestors were cavern dwellers, too.
Though one cousin does feed on blood, most of us eat only fruit or bugs.
We don’t mean any harm to you.
On membranous wings we sail the skies – the only mammal that can freely fly.
Maybe it comes down to jealousy.
We’ve got our ways and you’ve got yours. You’ve got your homes and we need ours.
All we ask is, please, just let us be!

Refrain



Unpublished work © 1986 John R. Whitney

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