Die Antwoord – Ugly Boy
2014 · Directed by Ninja
1.5M Likes
Best comments
1.“These two are like the crackhead versions of the Joker and Harley Quinn, I swear.”
More comments
- 2.“Die Antwoord: *writes a song about finding unconventionally attractive people sexy*. Also Die Antwoord: *puts a world-renowned supermodel in the music video*.”
- 3.“I like how the shot of Ninja and Cara smoking weed is at exactly 4:20.”
The story
Die Antwoord's first US-made video looks like a fever dream at a very exclusive goth party. Ninja directed it himself and shot it in two days on a small budget at a Los Angeles soundstage, leaning on friends to fill the frame. And what friends. Jack Black, Marilyn Manson, Flea, Cara Delevingne, Dita Von Teese, model Charlotte Free and the ATL Twins all drop in, along with the duo's daughter Sixteen Jones. Ninja ends up drenched in blood, while Yo-Landi sits on a gothic throne in black angel wings.
Ninja hand-painted a lot of the wardrobe himself, including the ghostly white dancers' outfits and Cara Delevingne's shirtdress. A costumer from American Horror Story built the tracksuits. Then there's the masked figure everybody figured was Aphex Twin. It isn't. The stylists said the mask came from Chris Cunningham and was modeled on Aphex, and they wouldn't say who was underneath.
The Aphex link runs deeper than a mask. The track leans hard on a sample of his Ageispolis, from Selected Ambient Works 85–92. According to Ninja's own album notes, the song is about a Cape Town gangster Yo-Landi started seeing after the two of them split, which Dazed guessed made for some awkward studio sessions. Ugly Boy came from Donker Mag, their third album, and the video dropped on November 4, 2014.
