Ninja Sex Party

Ninja Sex Party

Ninja Sex Party on the set of their music video "Next to You" in 2012, as Ninja Brian (left) and Danny Sexbang.
Background information
Origin New York City, New York
Genres Comedy rock, synthpop
Years active 2009–present
Associated acts Starbomb, Tupper Ware Remix Party, Steel Panther
Website http://www.ninjasexparty.com
Members Leigh Daniel Avidan
Brian Wecht

Ninja Sex Party (often shortened to NSP) is an American musical comedy duo consisting of singer Danny Y. Sexbang (Dan Avidan) and keyboardist Ninja Brian (Brian Wecht) created in 2009 in New York City and currently based in Los Angeles. They are also known as two thirds of the video game-based musical comedy trio Starbomb together with Arin Hanson, and as a part of the YouTube Let's Play webseries Game Grumps, also with Hanson.[1]

The work of Ninja Sex Party typically consists of synthpop or rock-oriented humorous songs, frequently on the topics of sex, seduction, love, or fantasy, with Avidan and Wecht portraying the characters of Danny Sexbang, an idiotic, exuberant, and strangely-dressed hypersexual, and Ninja Brian, an uncommunicative, homicidal ninja; however, their 2016 cover album, Under the Covers, saw them take on serious music for the first time. To date, NSP has released four studio albums, in addition to two albums as a part of Starbomb, while also releasing original, non-musical material on their YouTube channel.

Career

2009–2012: Formation and early career

Avidan, who previously sang in the bands The Northern Hues and Skyhill,[2][3] initially conceptualized the band. In need of a producer, Avidan was introduced to Wecht, who was musical director of a comedy troupe in New York,[4] by mutual friends at the Upright Citizen's Brigade Theatre. The band was formed in early 2009. Inspired by The Lonely Island and Flight of the Conchords, Ninja Sex Party is about "a Jewish superhero who wears a unitard, with his best friend who's a ninja, and together they sing songs about dicks, and try to hit [unsuccessfully] on women."[5]

They began performing together that summer, and since have acquired a large and loyal following from their live shows and music videos on YouTube. Their videos include animated contributions from popular YouTube and Newgrounds animators, such as Egoraptor, OneyNG, and RubberNinja. The band has appeared in many film festivals, including SXSW, Dragon Con, and the LACS.[6][7][8]

They have been awarded "Best Comedy Video" by Industry Power Play, as well as the "Trophy of Awesomeness" on Vimeo's video website.[9][10] They won "Best Comedy Video Short" and "Best Comedy Song" in Improvisation News' 2010 INNY Awards.[11] Their video "Sex Training" was also featured on the Comedy page of The Huffington Post.[12]

In 2011, they released their first album, NSFW, on iTunes. It includes many of their songs featured on YouTube.

2013–2014: Strawberries and Cream, Game Grumps, and Starbomb

The band released their second album, Strawberries and Cream, in April 2013. On the week of May 4, 2013, the album debuted at #9 on the Billboard Comedy Albums charts.[13]

In July of the same year, the band announced a new single, "Party of Three," to be included in their third album. The song featured an appearance from animator, voice actor, and costar of comedy Let's Play webseries Game Grumps, Arin Hanson. The music video for the song, released the following October, also featured Game Grumps editor Barry Kramer and animator Ross O'Donovan, amongst others.

In late June, Jon Jafari left Game Grumps, and was later replaced by Avidan. Soon after Jafari's replacement, a sister show to Game Grumps was created, called Steam Train, featuring Avidan and O'Donovan with guest appearances by Hanson.[14] After multiple videos featuring the trio, a sister show to Steam Train was announced, similarly named Steam Rolled, which featured Hanson, O'Donovan, Avidan, Kramer, and Suzy Berhow.

In December 2013, Ninja Sex Party's YouTube channel teased a collaboration with Hanson called Starbomb.[15] The video featured Hanson rapping and Avidan singing on a song titled "I Choose You to Die." Later that month, the Game Grumps YouTube channel advertised pre-orders for Starbomb's first album, eponymously named, with a video showing Hanson and Ninja Sex Party recording another song, "Crasher-Vania." Later that day, Ninja Sex Party's channel confirmed that the album would also be available for digital download in another video featuring Starbomb recording "Mega Marital Problems." Starbomb was released on December 17, 2013.

Ninja Sex Party contributed the ending song for Dick Figures: The Movie. On January 20, 2014, Mondo Media posted a video explaining fans could submit footage to make the song into a fan-made video. This music video was released on April 3, 2014.[16]

On the week of February 15, 2014, Starbomb would hold the #1 spot in Comedy Albums for 4 consecutive weeks.[17] Starbomb also reached #1 on the Billboard Top Heatseekers charts for 2 consecutive weeks, starting with the week of January 4, 2014.[18] In July, 2014, Ninja Sex Party performed a concert for San Diego Comic-Con International at Nerd HQ, Petco Park. During the concert, they released two new songs for their upcoming album, Attitude City. They played the audio accompanied with a lyric video for their unreleased song, "Road Trip." They also released the music video for "Why I Cry" during the concert.[19][20] On November 19, 2014, they released a music video for the song "Peppermint Creams."[21]

2015–present: Attitude City, Under the Covers, and collaborations

On January 12, 2015, Ninja Sex Party released a cover on their YouTube channel of "The Last Unicorn," the theme song to the 1982 animated film based on the Peter S. Beagle novel of the same name. The video also promotes Beagle's ongoing worldwide screening tour of The Last Unicorn. The band has made the cover downloadable for free at their Bandcamp page.[22][23] In the same year, two singles were released by the band Tupper Ware Remix Party, collaborating with Ninja Sex Party, titled "The Hit" and "Baby, NYC."[24][25]

After an announcement on June 17, 2015 stating the release date of their third album Attitude City, it was released on July 17, 2015 on iTunes and CD Baby.[26] It was one of the top 20 best-selling albums on Amazon.com, and peaked at #1 on Billboard's US Comedy Albums chart.[27]

An album of cover songs, called Under the Covers, was announced on July 28, 2015 in a Game Grumps episode.[28] This album also features Tupper Ware Remix Party on backing instruments.[29] The album was released on March 4, 2016, and as of March 1, 2016, two music videos have been released.

On August 3, 2015, Ninja Sex Party was invited by Steel Panther to perform with them at their House of Blues venue, singing "Party All Day."[30] The bands have collaborated on multiple occasions, with Steel Panther making a cameo in the "Road Trip" music video, and providing vocals for "6969."[31][32]

On October 7, 2015, Avidan released the single "Firefly" with Peter Lennox. The two had previously worked together as the atmospheric band Skyhill from 2006 to 2007. The song briefly became the #1 best-selling album on Amazon.com upon release.[33]

On February 23, 2016, a music video was released for their cover of "Take On Me"; the video for their cover of "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" was released one week later, on March 1, 2016.[34][35] On March 4, 2016, Under the Covers was released to the public.[36] The album debuted on the Billboard charts at #9 in Top Album Sales, #2 in Independent Albums, #3 in Rock Albums, and #17 in the Top 200 Albums.[37]

On March 8, 2016, the band announced an unnamed fifth album on Facebook, including the upcoming single "Eating Food In The Shower." Its release date is yet to be announced.[38]

On March 23, 2016, the band released a video on their YouTube channel thanking fans who pre-ordered Under the Covers. In this video, they announced that, in addition to working on their next comedy album, a second cover album is in production.[39]

Members

Band members
Session/touring members

Discography

Influence

Avidan appeared in the 2014 PC game Default Dan as a playable option.[40]

Avidan, and his co-hosts from Game Grumps, Hanson and O'Donovan, will be playable characters in the game Hex Heroes for the Wii U. Avidan will also be providing voiceover work for his character.[41]

References

  1. ↑ Milne, Gregory (2013-11-07). "Ninja Sex Party: Tales of Strawberries and Cream". Living Myth Media. Retrieved 2014-03-15.. Archived from the original
  2. ↑ "Skyhill's Biography". skyhillmusic.com. Retrieved 2014-07-12.
  3. ↑ Overview of Danny's life archived from the original. colinwolftales.com
  4. ↑ Ninja Sex Party Interview. 9 January 2013 – via YouTube.
  5. ↑ Ninja Sex Party Interview on Lydia Wants to Know. 24 May 2013 – via YouTube.
  6. ↑ "SXSW Lineup".
  7. ↑ "Music Videos".
  8. ↑ "Live Review: 3rd Annual L.A. Comedy Shorts Festival".
  9. ↑ "Ninja Sex Party Interview". Retrieved 2016-03-16.
  10. ↑ Ninja Sex Party's video "The Decision" on the "Trophy of Awesomeness" page. Archived from the original.
  11. ↑ "INNY Awards 2010".
  12. ↑ Hartsell, Carol (27 January 2011). "'Sex Training' with Ninja Sex Party". Huffington Post.
  13. ↑ Comedy Charts, Billboard. "Billboard Comedy Charts". Billboard.com. Retrieved 18 March 2014.
  14. ↑ Amini, Tina (2013-06-26). "Fans Are Upset Over YouTube Duo 'Game Grumps' Break-Up". Kotaku. Retrieved 2014-03-15.
  15. ↑ Napierski, Steve (2013-12-19). "Luigi's Ballad". Dueling Analogs. Retrieved 2014-03-15.
  16. ↑ Dick Figures - DFTM Fan Music Video feat. Ninja Sex Party (Ep #44). 3 April 2014 – via YouTube.
  17. ↑ Charts, Billboard. "Billboard Comedy Charts". Retrieved 18 March 2014.
  18. ↑ Heatseeker Charts, Billboard. "Billboard Heatseeker Chart". Billboard.com. Retrieved 18 March 2014.
  19. ↑ "Maker Studios to Make an Appearance at Comic-Con 2014". VideoInk.
  20. ↑ Maker Studios. "Ninja Sex Party Live at NerdHQ". Polaris.
  21. ↑ Peppermint Creams - NSP. 19 November 2014 – via YouTube.
  22. ↑ [The Last Unicorn (Cover) - Dan Avidan and Brian Wecht https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uF1Q56YAo0Q]
  23. ↑ "The Last Unicorn - Ninja Sex Party". Ninja Sex Party. 4 March 2016.
  24. ↑ TWRP (2015-01-23). "The Hit (feat Ninja Sex Party)". Bandcamp. Retrieved 2015-01-24.
  25. ↑ TWRP. "Baby, NYC (feat Ninja Sex Party)". Bandcamp. Retrieved 2016-03-16.
  26. ↑ "Ninja Sex Party on Twitter". Twitter.
  27. ↑ "Attitude City [Explicit]". Amazon. Retrieved 19 July 2015.
  28. ↑ Under the Covers announcement.
  29. ↑ "Sonic Adventure DX: Sorcery of Ehh - PART 10 - Game Grumps". YouTube. Retrieved 28 July 2015.
  30. ↑ Steel Panther 2015 08 03 West Hollywood, CA, USA House of Blues Webcast 720p. 4 August 2015 – via YouTube.
  31. ↑ Road Trip - NSP. 22 April 2015 – via YouTube.
  32. ↑ "Ninja Sex Party". AMA Highlights.
  33. ↑ "Firefly". Amazon. Retrieved 13 November 2015.
  34. ↑ Ninja Sex Party (2016-02-23), Take On Me - NSP, retrieved 2016-02-27
  35. ↑ Ninja Sex Party (2016-03-01), Everybody Wants to Rule the World - NSP, retrieved 2016-03-01
  36. ↑ "Under the Covers by Ninja Sex Party on iTunes". iTunes. Retrieved 2016-03-04.
  37. ↑ "Ninja Sex Party on Twitter". Twitter. Retrieved 2016-03-15.
  38. ↑ Ninja Sex Party (2016-03-08). "Eating Food in the Shower". Retrieved April 11, 2016 – via Facebook. On the set of our upcoming music video for the first song on our FIFTH ALBUM, "Eating Food In The Shower"!
  39. ↑ Ninja Sex Party. "Under The Covers update & thank you!" (Video). Retrieved 2016-03-28 – via YouTube.
  40. ↑ Kikiwik Games (2014-01-30). "Play as Default Danny!". Kickstarter. Retrieved 2014-03-15.
  41. ↑ Prismatic Games LLC (2014-09-04). "OUR GRUMPIEST ANNOUNCEMENT YET". Kickstarter. Retrieved 2014-12-04.

External links

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