Ninja: I didnât know she was Afrikaans (at first) because she was hiding her accent because she was embarrassed about it. So Yo-landi really influenced your zef aesthetic from the word go? We just wanted to do something that was violently South African and not be mistaken for fucking anything. And all the rappers with American accents, everyone sounds like theyâre from the 90s, everyone sounds like the fucking Wu-Tang-Clan. South Africa is trying to do shit that looks like overseas shit. We just wanted to be as extreme and as âfuck youâ as possible because South Africa is⌠youâre not getting out of there. Ninja: It was just us being punk and stupid, a lot of it was joking about. Well, if zef is looked down on and youâre owning that⌠Why did you guys want to become a mouthpiece for outsiders? Ninja: Itâs the blackest joke, Yo-landi just being like, âLetâs be zef.â She started telling me all this zef slang and Iâm like, âJesus, they swear so bad.â She started swearing and swearing and saying âwe zefâ, which is like saying âIâm a piece-of-shit scumbag, Iâm that person you hate, Iâm that thing youâre embarrassed about.â Itâs a word made up by non-zef people, Afrikaans people talking shit about their dress: âEurgh that dress is so zef, itâs disgusting.âīut thatâs interesting, because in your early videos like â Zef Sideâ you make zef look enviable. It was an insult, itâs like eurghh, talking shit about people. Zef is like dirt, itâs like scum, there was no zef movement before we came along. So you werenât part of zef culture before Yo-landi? Yo-landi started teaching me all about all this zef slang. Afrikaans culture is very right-wing and conservative, very proper, and you get this hidden underbelly, the zef side of Afrikaans which no one knows about. Her dadâs a priest â heâs high up in one of the churches and heâs a sweetheart â but sheâs, like, fucking rebellious. Ninja: We were doing other music and she just started swearing on this one track. What were your early collaborations with Yo-landi like? Someone told me that overthinking kills fun, and weâre a lot more fun now. I donât even remember who I was before. It flipped both of us, we transformed into these new, hyper, upgraded versions of our old selves. And then, as time went past, I was enjoying this shit so much that I was like, âThis is more me than me.â We worked on each other, but we didnât know we were being autobiographical. Ninja was my shadow self and Yo-landi was Yo-landiâs shadow self. I just started taking my filters away and saying anything and whatever the fuck I thought. We did it by accident, we tapped into that shadow-self shit â all that shit that I was too scared to say. Bam! Thatâs both of us when we are fucking with Die Antwoord. Youâve got your two sides of the brain: your conscious mind thatâs actually here speaking to me, and then you got your subconscious â all your fears and desires and dreamsâŚĪnd all the fucked-up shit that you never say. Ninja: I was hanging with Money Mark from the Beastie Boys, âcos weâre homies, and he said a weird bunch of shit to me about Jung and the shadow self. Youâre walking around the streets like youâre that person. In your mind youâre a superstar before you are a superstar, this hyper motherfucker who is on camera and on stage. I was always flipping through characters. Thatâs kind of what we have done with Die Antwoord, playing with characters. Do you know Method Manâs real name? Or Elton John, Marylin Monroe? You make up this character. A rap dude has his rap persona, his hyper version of himself. Yo-landi said that she really became âYo-landi Visserâ when you cut her hair into its signature mohawk for â Enter the Ninjaâ. Eyes glistening like a werewolf, he lets us into his and Visserâs hive mind. Now heâs tearing up the multiplexes with Chappie. Get tickets here.Taken from the spring 2015 issue of Dazed. Read our interview with Yo-landi Visser hereįrom his early days in horrorcore outfit The Constructus Corporation to his current helming of rap-rave crew Die Antwoord, Ninja has dragged listeners to hell and back with his psychotic verses and intense stage presence. MusicfestNW presents Project Pabst is Aug. Some other stuff happens and then you realize it was all a dream.Īnalysis: It's basically Coraline. Memorable moment: Tommy follows Yolandi to her rat lair where Jack Black, the King Rat, awaits, along with writhing clusters of shirtless men in animal masks. In a restless midnight hour, the Fairy Rat Mother (Yolandi) arrives at his bedside and invites him to a rat paradise of "boobies," "freaks" and "homosexuals." Synopsis: Tommy can't sleep because rats are living in his bedroom walls.