Bushido

At 45 years old, Bushido has this physical status:

Bushido and fellow rapper Vader formed the duo Search & Defeat in early 1998. They worked on an album titled Unbreakable, but it was never finished. Fellow Berlin rapper King Orgasmus One joined the group, together forming the 030 Squad. They recorded a demo titled Westberlin Represent, selling some copies to friends. Joined by King Orgamus One, Bushido had his first guest appearance on the track "Rap ist out", on Frauenarzt's 2000 demo album Tanga Tanga. Following the release of Tanga Tanga, Bushido, King Orgasmus One, and Bass Sultan Hengzt formed the group Berlins Most Wanted. This ultimately led to the creation of the record label I Luv Money Records in 2001. Bushido's first demo as a solo artist, King of KingZ, was released in 2001.

Carlo Cokxxx Nutten (often abbreviated to CCN), a collaborative studio album by Bushido and Fler, was released in October 2002. On the record, the two rappers performed under their aliases Sonny Black and "Frank White", respectively. The album marked the first major release for both and is now regarded as highly influential for gangsta rap in Germany. Bushido followed this up with the release of his debut solo album Vom Bordstein bis zur Skyline in July 2003. The album again included several collaborations with Fler, and is considered a milestone of German hip hop.

In summer 2004, Bushido left Aggro Berlin and signed with Urban/Universal. Together with DJ Ilan, he produced a remix of Rammstein's song "Amerika".

Bushido's second studio album, titled Electro Ghetto, was released in October 2004. The album reached number six on the German charts and spawned three singles, "Electro Ghetto", "Nie wieder", and "Hoffnung stirbt zuletzt", all of which placed in the singles charts for several weeks.

In April 2005, Bushido's second collaborative studio album, Carlo Cokxxx Nutten II, was released, once again under his alter ego "Sonny Black", but this time in partnership with Baba Saad instead of Fler. He followed this up with the release of his third studio album, titled Staatsfeind Nr. 1, in November 2005.

On 1 September 2006, he released his fourth solo album, Von der Skyline zum Bordstein zurück (abbreviated as VDSZBZ). The second sampler, Vendetta – ersguterjunge Sampler Vol. 2, was released on 1 December 2006.

In early 2007, Bushido founded the girl band Bisou featuring former candidates of the casting show Popstars. He also bought a mansion for himself and his mother in Berlin-Lichterfelde for €1,200,000 and spent an additional €800,000 to redecorate it.

In January 2008, it became known that Bushido and an unknown partner had founded a real estate business, which yielded a million Euros in the first ten months.

Bushido released his autobiography Bushido on 8 September 2008, which reached number 1 on the bestseller list Der Spiegel. His eighth album, Heavy Metal Payback, was released on 10 October 2008.

The music video for the single "Für immer jung" caused controversy when MTV stopped airing it after two days of heavy rotation. The main editorial office had decided that the feature with Czech musician Karel Gott did not fit the image of MTV. In a meeting with Bushido, the chief editors offered to air the video on their other music channel, VIVA. Bushido refused this, however, and later forbade MTV and VIVA from airing his videos because he couldn't reconcile this with his conscience. Bushido wrote in his forum on the topic that:

Cooperation between Bushido and MTV ended afterwards.

After Fler left Aggro Berlin and the label shut down on 1 April 2009, Bushido reached out to his former partner to end their feud. The renewed friendship led to the production of a sequel to the 2002 album Carlo Cokxxx Nutten. The album is titled Carlo Cokxxx Nutten 2, as distinguished from the Carlo Cokxxx Nutten II sequel, recorded with Baba Saad in 2005. The album was released in September, with the single "Eine Chance/Zu Gangsta" and a music video promoting it.

The movie Zeiten ändern dich was shot in and around Berlin from July to mid-September and released in February 2010. The movie is based on Bushido's autobiography, featuring Bushido as himself, directed by Uli Edel and produced by Bernd Eichinger. 80,000 people watched the movie on the release date.

The soundtrack to the movie, also titled Zeiten ändern dich, was released in three different versions on 19 February 2010.

Bushido and Kay One wrote and recorded "Fackeln im Wind", which was dedicated to the Germany national football team in honor of the 2010 FIFA World Cup and was released in June. Bushido got the idea for the song after meeting football player Sami Khedira during the "Zeiten ändern dich – Live durch Europa" tour.

In August, Bushido reformed the group Berlins Most Wanted, which originally consisted of himself, Bass Sultan Hengzt, and King Orgasmus, in 2001 during the King of KingZ era, and added Kay One and Fler to the group. Together they released the album Berlins Most Wanted with a single also called "Berlins Most Wanted".

In late-March 2011, Bushido released a video on his YouTube channel, in which he confirmed plans for a new album titled Jenseits von Gut und Böse and the guest appearance of French rapper Booba. On 19 April, his second statement video was published, where he first thanked singer J-Luv for his vocal parts on the single "Vergiss mich", which was released on 22 April, in digital format along with the music video. He also presented the producers Rsonist and Benny Blanco and confirmed that Xavier Naidoo from Söhne Mannheims is featured as guest performer on the song "Du bist ein Mensch". His third statement video was published on 28 April on his YouTube channel. In this video, Bushido confirmed that his labelmate Kay One has a guest appearance on the album, and introduced DJ Desue as producer. Bushido also announced that the song "Wie ein Löwe" could be downloaded on iTunes the following day.

American record producers DJ Premier, Swizz Beatz, Araab Muzik and R'sonist each contributed one beat for the album. A meeting with Dr. Dre was also intended, but Bushido cancelled due to the high price. Later, DJ Premier became disappointed that new vocals were added to the song "Gangster" and that his DJ cuts were edited without giving him a chance to hear the new version before it was released. However, it is unknown if this was Bushido's idea or that of his production team.

In 2011, after having ended their long-term feud, Bushido reunited with former Aggro Berlin labelmate Sido to form the short-lived rap duo 23. Their self-titled collaborative studio album was released in October 2011. It spawned the singles "So mach ich es" and "Erwachsen sein".

On 14 June 2012, Bushido announced in an interview with the Bild newspaper that he would found a political party to become mayor of Berlin. The same month he completed an internship for CDU deputy Christian von Stetten in the Paul-Löbe-Haus in Berlin, which led to a lot of criticism due to Bushido's controversial song lyrics and his criminal past.

Bushido announced his eleventh album AMYF via Facebook, which was also available for pre-sale on Amazon. Later the tracklist and the iTunes version were published. The first announcement video released on 22 August 2012, via YouTube on his channel. Bushido confirmed that the deluxe version features a DVD that shows footage of the recording period and also announced Sido, Eko Fresh, Julian Williams (aka J-Luv), MoTrip, and Joka as guest performers. On 19 September 2012, Bushido released the second announcement video, in which he announced several producers, including Beatzarre, Djorkaeff, X-Plosive Beats, and Phat Cripsy, and represented the other guest performers King Orgasmus One (who is only featured on the Premium edition) and Brutos Brutaloz. The third and last video released on 26 September 2012, where Bushido introduced Frauenarzt and Elmo as last guest features and announced the premiere of his music video for "Kleine Bushidos" (released via YouTube on 4 October), and the next day the song was available for any digital platform. On 12 October, released AMYF and ranked No. 1 on the album chart position in Germany and Switzerland.

The second single "Theorie & Praxis" (featuring Joka) was released on 9 November 2012, but failed to reach the charts. The third and final single release of the album, "Panamera Flow" (featuring Shindy), was released on 15 March 2013 and ranked no. 51 in Germany and Austria.

On 12 July 2013, released Shindy's debut single "Stress ohne Grund", which features Bushido, of his debut album NWA. After its release, the single caused controversy among the media and politicians. In the song, Bushido verbally attacked the politicians Serkan Tören, Claudia Roth and Klaus Wowereit. Tören and Wowereit filed charge against Bushido. The attorney of Berlin also filed charge against him for hate speech, defamation, and depiction of violence in his lyrics. The Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons indexed NWA and confirmed it on in September 2013. Bushido explained in several television broadcaster and online portals, including ARD and N24, that he didn't want to hurt anyone. His lyrics in the song were just a response to the insults, that Claudia Roth and Serkan Tören had made previously towards him. In November 2013, the district court dismissed the indictment as with regard to artistic freedom.

On 25 October 2013, Bushido announced via his forum the release date of his twelfth studio album, titled Sonny Black. He also put a link for the Standard, iTunes, and the Deluxe edition. On 20 December 2013, he released the first music video for "Mitten in der Nacht" via Bushido's YouTube channel. The second video "Gangsta Rap Kings" (featuring Kollegah and Farid Bang) released in January 2014. Before the release, Bushido posted two pictures on-set via Instagram. The first picture features Bushido and Farid Bang. The second picture features all three rappers with the hashtag "#KKS", referring to their then-up-coming album titles of each rapper: Killa (Farid Bang), King (Kollegah), and Sonny Black (Bushido). The third and last video "Jeder meiner Freunde", released one day before the album's release. On 14 February 2014, released Sonny Black which ranked No. 1 in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. According to the Media Control Gfk International, Sonny Black set a download record for being the most downloaded German rap album and ranking No. 1, beating Helene Fischer's album Farbenspiel.

In mid-January 2015, Bushido released a video via his YouTube channel where he announced the release date of Carlo, Cokxxx, Nutten 3. Before the album's release, many speculations and rumors circulated among Bushido's fan community about his collaboration partner for the album. The rappers Fler, Eko Fresh, Haftbefehl, and Shindy were rumored to be part of the project, but each artist denied it. Fler stated later in a YouTube interview with journalist Nico Hüls from hip hop magazine Backspin, that collaboration would not have worked that time due to personal issues.

In February 2015, Bushido released CCN 3 as a solo project and ranked No. 1 in the German, Austrian, and Swiss Album charts. The album certified twice gold.

In May 2015, Bushido served as a featured guest on the songs "Kimbo Slice" (also featuring Shindy) and "Best Friends" from the 2nd studio album, Rumble in the Jungle, by Ali Bumaye. The three singles "Brot brechen", "G$D", and "CLA$$IC", were released before the album's release as promotion, accompanied by music videos. The track "Rap leben" appeared on the disc of Juice, Issue 132. The final music video "Adel" released on the same date as the album. In November he released CLA$$IC, the collaboration by Bushido and Shindy, which ranked No. 1 in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. Due to the production and musical style the album was compared to Watch the Throne by Jay-Z and Kanye West. Later in November, Bushido was featured in two songs: "Statements" (released as the third single) and "Art of War" in Shindy's third album, DREAMS.

In June 2017, Bushido's 12th studio album, Black Friday, was released. His next studio album, Mythos, was released in September 2018. It featured guest appearances from Akon, Capital Bra and Samra, and debuted at No. 1 in Germany.

Source

• 2005