The Crow's Nest

With vampires all the rage these days, you may be thinking to yourself, “Oh no, more sparkly men waiting to prey on young girls.” You are wrong. Blood Bats are neither bats nor bloody. They are simply a local two-man group who “needed a hobby after the Death Star exploded.”

What started as a joke about a year ago became something much more for Jarrod Lovett and D.J. Larson. Now this electro/indie twosome mixes popular songs from artists such as Taylor Swift and Kanye West (rightly named “VMA KanyeWesyVs.TaylorSwift Remix”) to create an insane medley of fun and dance. While they don’t claim the title of dubstep, they do dabble in the genre.

“Why just be dub,” Lovett said. “Why do just one? We do everything from 8-bit to gameboy/hard electro.”

Influences such as Yoda, Justice, a splash of Dr. Dre and Deadmaus have helped mold the band’s sound to what it is now. When picking songs, they tend to get what they can take.

“If all the girls are dancing, we need to play it,” Larson said.

Larson, who attends MTI, plays the chello, guitar and keyboard and has tried his hand at Circuit bending (taking apart old toys and short circuiting them to use their sound).

“My sodding wouldn’t last and then friends started giving me a bunch of their old toys, I didn’t want to be that guy,” he said.

Lovett is a student in the USF business program and learned how to play the bass after he decided six-string was too much for him.

The duo Blood Bats has made a few stops around the state of Florida including Past Times in Sarasota, The Burrow Bar in Jacksonville, a handful of house shows, a wedding and most recently an event for the USF Graphic Design program. Their next get-down will be Dec. 15 at Sarasota’s Cock & Bull and another Jan. 28 at The Blue Owl.

Take a listen at www.soundcloud.com/bloodbats.

Tags: blood bats, kanye west, remix, st. petersburg, taylor swift, usf graphic design