The Drain Gang rapper’s party lifestyle almost ended in disaster. Now, after a spell working in a shampoo factory, Sweden’s dark teen icon is back with a furious and euphoric new sound

As one quarter of the Swedish underground-ish rap collective Drain Gang, Bladee (pronounced Blade) spent his 20s on the frontlines of a hyper-online youth culture. But as his 30th birthday loomed, the musician born Benjamin Reichwald started to sweat. His anxiety about ageing, a serious depressive spell, and the mixed reception to his latest album, spiralled into a crisis: were he and his Drain Gang peers “permanently frozen as 20-year-olds because we came up at a certain time of our lives”, he wondered. Was he already past it at 29?

“I got so old, I got embarrassed to be even here,” Reichwald sings on his newest album, Cold Visions. Older readers may roll their eyes, but given Reichwald has built up one of the most ardent young fanbases in music, this was a valid worry. “I had a lot to get off my chest,” he says now. “I was thinking a lot about my position and I felt stuck – do I have to be perceived as an artist to feel fulfilled? I’m chasing that and it doesn’t give me anything. So why am I doing this?”