Kollegah

1984–2007: Early life, Reimliga Battle Arena, Zuhältertape and Alphagene

Felix Blume was born on 3 August 1984 in Friedberg, Hesse, to a Canadian father and a German mother. His parents divorced during his childhood. After the divorce, he moved with his mother to Simmern in Rhineland-Palatinate. He attended the Herzog-Johann-Gymnasium, where he passed his Abitur exam in 2005. Through his Algerian stepfather he converted to Islam. From December 2004 until May 2005 Kollegah participated in rap battles hosted on online platform Reimliga Battle Arena (RBA) and won 11 out of 14 evaluated battles.

Blume released his first Mixtape, the Zuhältertape (ZHT) for free on 20 July 2005 on his website. The 14-track long project was downloaded – according to Blume – over 5,000 times in one month. The project was re-released in December 2005 through Selfmade Records. In July 2006, Blume published his second Mixtape Boss der Bosse (ZHT 2). He was criticised for his live performance during the Splash! in 2006. Blume's first studio album Alphagene was set to release in September 2007, but was postponed to November, after he was found with cocaine and amphetamine in Bad Kreuznach. Alphagene became Kollegahs first project to enter the German charts on 30 November 2007. The album debuted on number 51 and left the charts next week. According to Selfmade Records, the album was sold over 20,000 times.

In February 2014, Blume launched his own fitness program named Bosstransformation. Two years later he launched the Bosstransformation 2, an updated version. In November 2015, Blume launched his own clothing line Deus Maximus. A year before, his first brand Copayn had flopped. With his new brand Deus Maximus he has a cooperation with Def Shop, one of the biggest German online shops.

Blume studied law at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz for some years.

At the age of 15, Blume came in contact with Islam through his Algerian stepfather. He converted to the religion in the same year.

During a concert of his "Imperator" tour in Leipzig, there was a violent incident onstage. As is often the case with rap concerts, a rap battle between two spectators should be performed on the stage. One of the participants tried to grab Blume's sunglasses. As a result, Blume shoved the man, kicked him and punched him in the face. A few hours later, videos of the attack were uploaded to YouTube and Facebook. An uninvolved person reported Blume to the police.

Antisemitism and conspiracy theories

On his third mixtape Zuhältertape Volume 3, Blume used the line "Endlösung der Rapperfrage", directly referring to the Final Solution during the Holocaust. Gerhard Strate called it mocking of Holocaust victims. His fourth studio album Zuhältertape Vol. 4 contained statements like "Nutte, Zeit, dass du Putzlappen befeuchtest / Ich bring Schusswaffengeräusche wie die Schutzstaffel der Deutschen" ("Hooker, that time that you moisturize cloths / I bring firearms sounds like the Schutzstaffel of the Germans") or "Kid, es ist der Boss, der für 'ne Modezeitschrift Posen einnimmt wie die Wehrmacht, die in Polen einschritt" ("Kid, it is the boss, who poses for a fashion magazine like the Wehrmacht, which invaded Poland").

In 2016, Blume released the song "Apokalypse", in which he depicts human history as being the good against the bad. The final battle is set in East Jerusalem. The devil is sitting in a skyscraper and the climax of the video is a book burning. After the world is freed from the evil, Blume says that "Buddhist, Muslims and Christians will rebuild the world peacefully" and forgot to mention Jews.

Kollegah denies any accusations of antisemitism. In 2021, he published an album with Asche, a German rapper with Jewish roots. Furthermore, Kollegah and German-Jewish rapper Sun Diego fueled rumours that they plan a collaborative albums together.

Kollegah criticized the American foreign policy several times. He also doubts the official version of 9/11, the Moon landing and evolution theory and also spread rumours about Pizzagate and chemtrails.

In November 2016, Blume released the documentation Kollegah an Palästina (Eine StreetCinema Dokumentation) on his YouTube channel Alpha Music Empire. He travelled through the Palestinian territories, visited the West Bank barrier, the refugee camp Am'ari and supported a school. The documentation started a controversy in the German rap scene.

In 2018, months after release, Kollegah and Farid Bang were criticized for the lines commit another Holocaust and come with Molotov and My body is more defined than those of Auschwitz inmates on their album Jung Brutal Gutaussehend 3. They received the coveted German ECHO award for this album and also performed live, and in reaction to this, several artists gave their ECHOs back. Both had originally defended their lines as a form of stylistic means, exaggeration, provocation, artistic boundaries, but later apologized.