Album Review: Twelve Foot Ninja – Vengeance (Volkanik)

With the release of their long-anticipated third album, Vengeance, Australia’s maniacal rock-fusioneers Twelve Foot Ninja have just pulled something off that no other musical act in history ever has before. Aside from the genre-busting nature of the album itself and its swag of killer video clips, they’ve also released a computer game, comic book, and a decidedly grim yet literary fantasy novel.

Guitarist/producer/polymath Stevic Mackay sums up the strange beast that Vengeance is:

There are definitely some 80’s inspired permeations in the genre permutations, but I think more than alliterating p-words, we became clearer on the distinction between ‘songs’ and ‘riffs’; there’s a clear harmonic bone-structure carrying all of the songs vs. bing-bong riffs that only give musos stiffies.

Vengeance, the third album by Twelve Foot Ninja, is scheduled for release on the 15th October 2021 on Volkanik Music.

That weird instrument you just can’t place at the beginning of Start the Fire? It’s a Tibetan kangling (a horn made out of a human femur). Yep, if that doesn’t tell you everything you need to know in regards to the eclectic nature of this record, well, just listen on. As the opener kicks it up a notch with bassy heaviness, eerie synth and a killer riff.

It just gets better though… and weirder, as Long Way Home has a progressive rock jerkiness and hyperactivity that will get you dancing. The title track is a massive shift in sound though as we hit industrial fuzz and a seriously synthy patter. Before IDK takes a groovy approach for something more mellow but with these insane bursts of intense heaviness.

Shock to the System might take gold for being the wackiest and fun track on the album. Where an anthemic chorus meets a spoken-word pantomime segment for something baffling but something simply brilliant.

Gone has the disco ball dropping for some 70’s fun, Culture War is Twelve Foot Ninja digging deeply for a really heavy offering (watch out for the mariachi bit) and Dead End goes really bassy. Before Jinjer’s Tatiana Shmayluk joins the band on Over and Out. A heavyweight single with one hell of a chorus.

Twelve Foot Ninja then wrap up their new album with another surprise. A cinematic melodrama in the form of Tangled. A unique track on an album brimming with them.

Twelve Foot Ninja – Vengeance Full Track Listing:

1. Start The Fire
2. Long Way Home
3. Vengeance
4. IDK
5. Shock To the System
6. Gone
7. Culture War
8. Dead End
9. Over And Out (feat. Tatiana Shmayluk)
10. Tangled

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