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Music

Zebra Katz Is a Charismatic Cult Leader in the Video for "Nu Renegade"

The director told THUMP about getting attacked by "Austrian rednecks in lederhosen" while filming this bad boy.

Zebra Katz doesn't just make music videos. He makes 12-minute avant-garde art films, as you can see above. The New York rapper's latest—"Nu Renegade," featuring Leila, directed by Florian Pochlatko, Randy Sterling and Katz himself—was shot in Vienna, and funded by a grant from the Austrian government. The shoot itself was something of an emotional roller-coaster, Pochlatko told THUMP, involving visits to the emergency room and a minor nervous breakdown.

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"On one hand it was the most difficult shooting process I ever had, with so many logistics involved, and so much going on, all run by just a small bunch of people," he said. "On the other hand, that's where the magic happens, when you slightly get the feeling that things are out of control."

At one point the crew was even attacked by "Austrian countryside rednecks in lederhosen" because they thought they were "crazy burglars"—which isn't hard to imagine given the video's psycho cult vibe. "We had to skip the whole shooting day and some crew-members had to go to the hospital," he explained. "The next day one of the other crew-members freaked out because of mental health issues. So that kind of describes the energy of the shoot."

Appearing alongside Zebra Katz' Ojay Morgan is dancer Ernesto Edivaldo, and production credits for all three of the tracks included in the video go to Iranian artist Leila Arab. They're off of Morgan's 2015 EP, New Renegade, out via his own label ZFK.

Zebra Katz is on Facebook | Soundcloud