Injured Ninja are BACK in Australia after spending the last 3 weeks travelling across the USA playing shows.

The debut Injured Ninja album VS SKYLAZER is available in select shops, iTunes and the HRP webshop. The band took time to answer a few quick questions:

1: Tell us a bit about the ‘concept’/title VS SKYLAZER?

Skylazer is the ungodly heavenly justice that reigns down upon Earth to right the wrongs of humanity. It is the ultimate weapon of the forces above, which power is insurmountable. The Injured Ninja is the only one that can bring together the forces of the planet and stand against the incredible might of SKYLAZER.

2: What was it like recording in LOOP studio?

LOOP is an incredible state of the art recording environment. We were privileged to craft an album there with the assistance of a highly talented engineer named Kieran Kenderessy. The facilities, equipment and expertise we had behind us were an immense help and we think the results are obvious. We are very happy with how the album sounds.

3: It seems that the wild improv/experimentation of the early days has been reigned in, was there a more conscious effort to focus on ‘songwriting’ for the album?

The limitations of recording time and format definitley seemed to instill some more traditional structures into our music. In the future we hope to move away from these more traditional methods and expand our style further into more improvisational territory. This will most likely require more intense studio time then what we did with this record, though. We think our palette of sounds allows us to create any style of music we want and for our first LP we thought it would be best to create a “standard” 10 track album that was showed the array of styles and sounds we had been exploring up until this point. Now that we have released our first record and put to rest those initial songs, we are now more free to explore new sonic territories.

4: You have re-recorded 2 tracks from the ‘circuitboard’ ep, why these tracks?

The circuitboard EP was created very early in our lifespan, as we needed a put a record out quickly at that point to tour on. Those 5 tracks were still very infantile at the time, and since having been recorded have grown and changed quite significantly. These two in particular remained live favourites of ours. The Circuitboard EP was completed in a living room studio and recorded in only a few hours, mixed by ourselves. We considered them worth recording again as they had not been done adequate justice the first time around.

5: You’ve supported/played alongside some upper tier bands such as My Disco, Health and Nadja… What were these experiences like, any stories to share?

It is always facinating to play with internationally experienced artists. For the most part we had good opportunities to pick their brains about touring the world - which has been very helpful in helping us find contacts for other countries and accommodation for our US tour. For example, we plan to sleep on the floor of Health’s rehearsal room when we are in LA for four days in March.

6: Tell us a bit about the SXSW showcase?
We have been invited to play at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas in 2011. For those of you unaware it is quite possible the biggest music media festival on the planet. Upwards of 1500 bands play this every March. It is a industry driven event and we will be playing several showcases during the five days of the festival. We are keen to go and meet like minded musicians and music industry types who are focused on new and experimental music, while also seeing some of our favourite bands we don’t normally get to see in Perth and generally party the fuck out.