In Arbroath, Scotland, two artists have found a way to make bats sound like they were born for the dance floor.
Hanna Tuulikki and Tommy Perman spent years translating the ultrasonic echolocation calls of bats into electronic music — and the results are surprisingly groove-worthy. Their album "Echo in the Dark" transforms the clicks, buzzes, and warbles of eight bat species into beats and melodies that listeners can actually hear, even though bats normally call at frequencies far beyond human ears. Their secret weapon? A tool called a bat detector, which shifts those high-pitched sounds down into a range our ears can enjoy.
The project began in 2022 when Hospitalfield, an arts venue in Arbroath, invited Tuulikki to create something inspired by bats after the venue ran community bat walks during the Covid lockdowns. Tuulikki proposed making dance music from bat sounds and brought in Perman, a musician already known for blending natural noises with electronic instruments. "It was an easy yes from me," Perman told Positive News. "Clicks, buzzes, rhythms and warbles that could easily be mistaken for samples from electronic dance music. That realisation felt like an invitation we couldn't ignore."
The artists gathered recordings from their own outings, put out an open call for more, and partnered with the Tayside Bat Group. In the end, they collected sounds from 13 of the UK's 18 bat species, using eight on the finished album. Tuulikki's voice weaves through the tracks too, creating what the pair describe as a human-bat hybrid sound world.
Perman said he expected the bat species to sound similar to each other. He was wrong. "The lesser horseshoe bat produces the most beautiful rippling calls that wouldn't be out of place on a dub record, while the Daubenton's bat creates amazing syncopated rhythms that sound like a jazz drummer," he explained. "The variety was astounding."
Before the album, audiences experienced the music at outdoor "silent bat raves," where people danced with headphones while bats flew overhead at dusk. Now the reworked full album has been released on vinyl and digitally through Glasgow independent label KIN-TU.
The artists hope the record can shift how people feel about bats, which play vital roles in ecosystems but often face fear and superstition. A recent Bat Conservation Trust survey found that 46% of people in the UK hold negative feelings about bats. "Dance music has always been a space where people can come together, lose themselves in the moment, and feel part of something bigger," Perman said. "We hope the album can use that power to nurture a different kind of relationship with the more-than-human world — one rooted in curiosity and care rather than fear."
The dream, he said, is simple: for someone who has never given bats much thought to put on the record and come away feeling differently. "If it sends even a handful of listeners out into the night to listen for bats, or to support bat conservation, that feels like a genuinely positive outcome."