French Montana’s Impact on Hip-Hop Is Underrated
French Montana is a notable figure in hip-hop: a non-English speaking Moroccan immigrant who transformed from a Bronx welfare recipient into the most-streamed African-born artist in history. From surviving a near-fatal gunshot to the head in 2003 to becoming the first African-born artist to achieve an RIAA Diamond certification, Montana’s impact spans musical innovation, executive mentorship, and global philanthropy.
Karim Kharbouch, better known as French Montana, was born on 9 November 1984, in Casablanca, Morocco. He spent his first 13 years on a family estate, an environment characterized by relative comfort where he developed a dual obsession with football (soccer) and rap music. This stability was disrupted in 1996 when his father, Abdelah, moved the family to New York in search of better opportunities. The family settled in a housing project in the South Bronx, a transition marked by immediate linguistic and social isolation.
Montana didn’t speak any English, he spoke only Moroccan Arabic (his first language) and some French. The fact that his classmates often joked about him by calling him “Bonjour” (hello in French), was a nickname he would later embrace by adopting the moniker “Young French”. The “Montana” came later, after some began calling him “Montana” as a reference to Tony Montana, during his days dealing in drugs.
VIDEO: French Montana – Shot Caller ft. Charlie Rock (Official Music Video) | Widely considered one of Montana’s best, the song became a classic hip-hop joint that fueled New York clubs and streets throughout 2011 and 2012.
1: The Cocaine City Empire and Guerrilla Entrepreneurship
In 2002, identifying a market inefficiency where traditional gatekeepers, namely radio and major labels, were inaccessible to underground artists, and inspired by the Smack DVD series, Montana and his friend Cams launched the Cocaine City DVD series. This was a grassroots media product built for a pre-YouTube era when hip-hop moved through barbershops, corner stores, and bootleg networks. Montana acted as the host, cameraman, and marketer, conducting high-stakes interviews with street legends like Pee Wee Kirkland and established stars like Remy Ma.
By placing himself at the center of these narratives, he used the DVDs as an oppotrunity to showcase his own music and freestyles to an audience that was already captivated by the street drama he documented. French put himself in every DVD, selling them and promoting his talent, making clear that rapping had always been the goal, As he himself stated about Cocaine City in the documentary For Khadija, “people pay to get promoted, I got promoted and got paid”.
The cultural impact of the Cocaine City series extended far beyond Montana himself. Drake revealed that those DVDs, along with Smack’s, were his tutorials to know what he wanted to be in the future. As Busta Rhymes articulated about the significance of the Cocaine City DVDs, “when people didn’t believe in [French] as a rapper, he created a platform for himself to make people believers. While he was trying to create a platform for himself, he ended up creating this incredible platform to promote and get so many other artists out, to give them opportunities as well. French being resourceful, he’s helped so many evolve. He is an architect and one of the leading forward thinkers when it came to the word being spread about talent.”
VIDEO: French Montana, Amber Run – Dirty Bronx Intro (Official Music Video) | Montana made this song to respond to critics.
2: The Wavy Sound and Keeping Max B Alive in the Culture
The collaboration between Montana and the Harlem rapper Max B represents perhaps the most influential creative partnership in modern New York rap history. Together, they developed the Wave Sound: a melodic, laid-back, yet street-oriented style characterized by atmospheric production and melodic flows. Their collaborative Coke Wave mixtape (2009) was revolutionary, establishing an entire aesthetic known as “The Wave” or “The Wavy Sound”. In its 2016 list of “The 50 Best Rap Mixtapes of the Millennium”, Pitchfork enshrined Coke Wave at number 49, writing “a tip of the fitted goes to French on this one, as his solo face time on deep cuts like “Smoking” and “Bricks & Walls” helped him pave his own lane as an artist with skills to stand alone. If anything is truly wavy, it’s that”. David Drake of Complex praised the duo’s “strategic alignment”, while XXL’s Infamous O acknowledged that Montana’s “energy and style inject life into every track”, correctly predicting that Coke Wave had “set up the stage for French Montana to make a name for himself”.
While Max B is rightfully credited as the originator of the “wave”, Montana is undeniably its co-creator and primary amplifier. Max B’s pivotal pre-incarceration work was executed alongside Montana, and together they popularized the sound through multiple successful installments of the Coke Wave series (2009-present). As Charlamagne tha God observed, discussing how closely the two artists connected, saying “I never known French with Max, I never known Max without French, EVER.” This dynamic was later crystallized in 2016 when French released his Wave Gods mixtape (2016), which he explicitly framed as a tribute to his incarcerated partner. Montana featured Max B on nearly every project he released, ensuring the incarcerated artist remained financially supported and culturally relevant.
The impact was further evidenced in December 2021, when iconic NY rapper Nas released a song also titled “Wave Gods” (ft. A$AP Rocky & DJ Premier), in which he acknowledged Max B’s enduring influence and ongoing incarceration, rapping on the hook, “shout out to Max B, he could be home any day, God”, a testament to the groundwork laid by Max and Montana’s relentless efforts to keep his partner’s name alive in the culture. As one XXL analysis noted, “French Montana is the closest link the music world has to Max B. He channels the same wavy, melodic street rap that Max revolutionized. This hazy style might be taken for granted now that it’s all over the place, but Max and French were two of the forefathers of the scene.”
Perhaps the most famous testament to the “Coke Wave” influence occurred in early 2016 when Kanye West announced his then-upcoming album would be titled Waves. The reaction was immediate. Wiz Khalifa, who had previously tweeted regarding Max B that “He’s the reason I sing on all my songs” publicly accused Kanye of “jacking” the culture. Montana intervened, revealing in an interview that “Kanye didn’t really know who Max B is, which was kind of strange to me. Once I gave him the homework behind everything, we got it together”. Despite this education, and despite Montana confirming that Max viewed the situation “as a form of flattery”, the hip-hop community continued to pressure Kanye. Ye eventually relented, changing the album title to The Life of Pablo. However, the victory lap was not complete without acknowledgment: Kanye included a recorded prison phone call from Max B on the album, titled the “Silver Surfer Intermission”, officially linking the “Wave God” to one of the biggest albums of the decade.
Montana later noted that Kanye, after understanding Max’s importance, became the first major artist to ask, “What can we do to get Max B out?” The narrative recently came full circle when, following Max B’s release in November 2025 after 16 years of incarceration, he and Montana immediately reunited to record Coke Wave 3.5: Narcos, released in January 2026.
3: Discovering Talent and Expanding The Coke Boys Records
Montana’s influence on modern hip-hop is characterized by his role as a talent scout, a collaborator, and a label head. He has consistently demonstrated an executive ear for culture, identifying and elevating artists and producers before they achieved mainstream recognition. In 2008, he rebranded Cocaine City as Coke Boys Records, an imprint that became a powerhouse incubator for talent. The Coke Boys roster has included, at various times, Montana himself, Max B, Y Dot, YNP Maine, JuS CODE, Red Mcfly, LGP QUA, Velous, and Montana’s younger brother Ayoub. The label has also rostered the late Chinx, and most recently young raw talents like DThang and Kenzo B, whom Montana introduced on The Breakfast Club. Montana has also championed DThang, whose most known track “Talk Facts” from 2021 was released through Coke Boys Records and has accumulated over 100 million streams and views combined.
Montana’s discovery of and partnership with the Brooklyn producer Harry Fraud resulted in some of the most iconic New York records of the 2010s, including “Shot Caller” and “New York Minute”. Fraud credits Montana with helping to refine his sample-heavy “Surf School” sound, noting that their shared melancholy aesthetic resonates deeply with listeners. This partnership produced seminal tracks that ignited radio in 2011 and helped define an era of New York hip-hop.
In 2013, Montana identified the talent of Chicago’s Lil Durk, almost signing him to his Coke Boys label. While Durk’s path eventually led to major solo success on other imprints, Montana is widely credited with providing early mentorship to Durk. The relationship was deeply personal from the outset, with Durk describing Montana as “a big brother” who “been teaching me a lot that he know” and “showed me the way a lot”. In December 2019, Durk posted an Instagram video previewing a song, (unofficially released as “Take Drugs”), that reflected on their history, rapping: “When I fell out with French Montana that shit did me damage. I learned the rules of a contract but I was planning on signing. He picked me up when Def Jam didn’t, he turned me diamond”.
This lyrical acknowledgment from Durk himself confirmed Montana’s role in supporting him during a crucial career juncture. In a 2018 interview with VladTV, Durk explained that while Montana “didn’t build me up”, he acknowledged that “if I had the head on my shoulders back then, smart enough to make my own decisions like I do now, I would have did it ’cause he showed me shit that I always wanted to see or I always wanted to do.” The pair have collaborated multiple times over the years, including on Durk’s Signed to the Streets 2 (2014), and Montana’s Mac & Cheese 5 mixtape (2024).
Montana’s mentorship of the late Chinx was equally significant. Chinx was a core member of the Coke Boys collective, and his success on tracks like “I’m a Coke Boy” served as a testament to Montana’s ability to build a cohesive, street-credible movement. When Chinx was killed in 2015, Montana honored him with a tribute song called “Off the Rip”, its music video showing Montana and everyone else wearing “R.I.P. Chinx” t-shirts. He continued featuring Chinx on projects long after his death, including on Jungle Rules (2017), Montana (2019), and Coke Wave 3.5: Narcos (2025).
Montana was also among the first to believe in and feature Kodak Black, collaborating with him on the hit track “Lockjaw” (2016), before the Florida rapper became a household name. The song was certified double Platinum by the RIAA, representing over two million units sold in the United States. The track was also featured in the video game WWE 2K17.
Another side of of Montana’s impact lies in his ability to elevate the artists he collaborates with. Several songs featuring him have gone on to become the most streamed in their respective catalogs. Most notably, his feature on French rapper Lacrim’s “A.W.A.”, from the album Corleone (2014), is now Lacrim’s most streamed song on Spotify (118M+) and his most viewed on YouTube (230M+). Similarly, his contribution to Fat Joe’s “All The Way Up” ranks as the second most streamed and viewed in Fat Joe’s discography, with 394M+ Spotify streams and 284M+ YouTube views.
This generational reach demonstrates how Montana’s impact as a tastemaker has created a lineage that extends far beyond his own commercial output. The most factual way to describe French’s executive impact is that he helped create lanes through co-signs, collaborations, and infrastructure, some of which became formal label relationships as with Coke Boys affiliates, and some of which were powerful without becoming paperwork.
VIDEO: Lil Durk – Take Drugs | At 1:48, Durk raps: “When I fell out with French Montana that shit did me damage … He picked me up when Def Jam didn’t, he turned me diamond”.
4: The Unforgettable Legacy and Global Recognition
The single “Unforgettable”, featuring Swae Lee and released as the lead single from Jungle Rules (2017), serves as the crown jewel of Montana’s discography. It peaked at number three on the US Billboard Hot 100 and became a long-running chart success. Its year-end achievements include ranking number 15 on the 2017 Billboard Hot 100 and number 152 on the 2024 Billboard Global 200. The song stands as one of the highest-certified digital singles in US history, earning a Diamond certification from the RIAA for the equivalent of 11 million units sold in the United States alone. It has achieved multi-platinum status worldwide, including 6 times Platinum in the United Kingdom representing 3.6 million units, 13 times Platinum in Australia representing 910,000 units, Diamond in Canada representing 800,000 units, and 3 times Platinum in Germany representing 1.2 million units, cementing its place among the most certified singles in several countries. This achievement made Montana the first recording artist born in Africa to reach Diamond status in the United States.
In a particularly symbolic victory, “Unforgettable” surpassed 2 billion Spotify streams in May 2024, making it the most streamed song in New York history. For an immigrant who settled in the South Bronx at the age of 13, the very birthplace of hip-hop, to hold the record for the city’s most-consumed track represents a definitive subversion of the traditional “outsider” narrative. The song’s cultural imapct was further underscored when former President Barack Obama added “Unforgettable” to his list of favorite songs of 2017.
Beyond individual songs, Montana’s overall digital footprint is staggering. In February 2023, it’s been reported that French Montana had become the most streamed African-born musical artist in history, with reports citing over 40 billion digital spins across global platforms. His publicist confirmed that the achievement was driven overwhelmingly by “Unforgettable” and its historic streaming numbers. As of February 2026, the song has amassed 1.9 billion views on YouTube, 2.8 billion streams on Spotify, and 2.7 billion plays on YouTube Music, with Montana maintaining over 28 million monthly listeners on Spotify, ranking number 237 worldwide.
5: Philanthropy and Global Citizenship
French Montana has leveraged his commercial success to become one of the most effective humanitarian voices in the music industry. His philanthropic journey began in earnest after filming the “Unforgettable” music video in Uganda. Moved by the lack of local resources, he donated $100,000 and launched a massive fundraising campaign that eventually raised over $430,000 to build the Suubi Health Center (inspiring The Weeknd and P. Diddy to donate $100,000 each).
In 2018, Montana released a remix of “Famous” featuring Adam Levine and pledged all royalties from the track to support continued construction of the Suubi facility. This maternal health clinic grew from a small outpost into a three-story facility, expanding its capacity to serve 260,000 people annually. This effort sparked a movement that has since raised over $220 million for Ugandan healthcare initiatives.
His commitment to his roots is equally visible in his response to crises in Morocco. Following the 2023 earthquake, Montana used his platform at the MTV VMAs to pledge $100,000 and establish an emergency relief fund with CARE and Global Citizen. Beyond disaster relief, Montana has also funded education initiatives in Morocco, financing the construction of two preschool classrooms in capital city Rabat. In Nigeria, he donated 500 locally-built wooden canoes to the floating community of Makoko to aid in school transportation and commerce. Furthermore, in memory of celebrity friends like Mac Miller lost to the opioid epidemic, he co-founded NAQI Healthcare to provide private detoxification services, donating 10% of the profits to MusiCares. For his philantropic work, he was named the first-ever rapper Global Citizen Ambassador and received the Pencils of Promise Innovator Award.
VIDEO: French Montana x Max B – Ever Since U Left Me (Official Video) | The most recent hit track by Montana and Max.
6: Classics and Bangers: The Sonic Architecture of a Career
The consistency of Montana’s musical output is evidenced by a decade of club bangers. His commercial debut “Shot Caller” (2012), dominated New York’s radio airplay, any car that listens to rap music, they played it, earning remixes from Diddy and Rick Ross. He followed this with the double-platinum “Pop That”, a high-octane collaboration with Drake, Rick Ross, and Lil Wayne that was a staple in nightlife across the US.
Montana’s impact is also visible in his catchy hooks. He laid the foundation for “All the Way Up” (2016), delivering the song’s iconic hook and opening verse, a contribution that earned the track two Grammy nominations, including Best Rap Song, and helped it win a BET Hip-Hop Award for Best Collaboration. Similarly, on “Welcome to the Party”, Montana crafted a catchy hook and verse that propelled the track to platinum certification.
His signature vocal extends across numerous hits: the double-platinum “No Stylist” (ft. Drake); the heater hook on “Cold” (ft. Tory Lanez); the upbeat hook on “Okay” (ft. Lil Baby); solo records like the emotionally-loaded hook on “Famous”; banger hooks on “Keep It Real” and “FWMGAB”, showcasing his ability to carry a track entirely on his own; and his latest dope hook on “Ever Since U Left Me” (ft. Max B). Built on a sample of the classic “That’s the Way (I Like It)”, it’s the kind of song that works in the bedroom and on the dance floor, sometimes in the same night! All of this prove that Montana continues to balance commercial viability with the Wave aesthetic. Speaking of iconic vocals, Montana is possibly the creator of “Haan!”, one of the most recognizable ad-libs in hip-hop history.
His music has also appeared in major film and television soundtracks, further cementing his presence in popular culture. “Welcome to the Party” was released as the second single from the Deadpool 2 soundtrack, the “Ay Vamos (Remix)” appeared as the 11th track on the Furious 7 soundtrack, and “Been to War” as the first song on the Godfather of Harlem soundtrack. Beyond these official soundtrack features, several of his other songs have been licensed for film and television, like “Ain’t Worried About Nothin'” appeared in the 2016 film The Perfect Match, and “Don’t Panic” was featured in the HBO series Ballers.
Beyond the microphone, Montana is a credited writer on Kanye West’s Grammy-nominated “All Day”, Pop Smoke’s “Enjoy Yourself” and “Who Do U Love?” by the K-pop group Monsta X. As a producer, he has taken the lead on his most personal projects, including the majority of the Montana (2019) and They Got Amnesia (2021) albums and the Mac & Cheese 5 (2024) mixtape, including songs like “Millionaire Row” (ft. Rick Ross) and “Stuck in the Jungle” (ft. Pop Smoke & Lil Durk). As a director or co-director, he co-directed the music videos of “Unforgettable” and “Writing on the Wall” and served as the sole director for “Wish U Well”.
VIDEO: The French Montana Story: For Khadija | Official Trailer | Paramount+ | Follow French Montana’s struggle and subsequent rise to become one of the most iconic rappers of a generation. by Paramount Plus
7: Personal Life and Romantic History
French Montana’s romantic relationships have chronicled his movement through hip-hop royalty, Hollywood glamour, and ultimately, aristocracy. Following his 2007 marriage to Deen Kharbouch, the mother of his son Kruz, Montana’s dating life became a subject of widespread public fascination. In the early years of his mainstream breakthrough, he was linked with rap stars Trina then Iggy Azalea. He was also romantically linked to Evelyn Lozada, star of Basketball Wives, and acclaimed actress Sanaa Lathan.
The most publicly scrutinized of his early relationships was his 2014 romance with Khloé Kardashian, which placed Montana at the center of the reality television universe and introduced him to a demographic far beyond traditional hip-hop audiences. During this period, he was also rumored to have relationships with models Rosa Acosta, Slick Woods, Sophia Body, and Rubi Rose, as well as Amber Rose, Alexis Skyy, Dorothy Wang, and singer-songwriter Jessie Reyez, each relationship or rumored connection adding another layer to his public persona as a figure navigating the intersection of music, fashion, and celebrity culture.
The culmination of this romantic trajectory arrived in 2025 with his engagement to Sheikha Mahra bint Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, a princess of Dubai and daughter of the Vice President and Prime Minister of the United Arab Emirates. This union represented a fairy-tale ascent from Casablanca to the South Bronx to actual royalty, serving as perhaps the ultimate inspiration for fans who had watched a Moroccan immigrant grind his way from housing projects to palaces.
Conclusion: Montana's Impact is More Than You Think
The legacy of French Montana is the ultimate blueprint for the immigrant hustle in a globalized world. While critics occasionally overlook his technical lyricism, the empirical data is undeniable: billions of streams, hundreds of millions of dollars raised for global health, and the discovery of a generations of talents. He has achieved what few artists can: he maintained his faith as a Sunni Muslim and his connection to his Moroccan roots while conquering the most competitive music market on Earth. Montana’s career is a living embodiment of his own philosophy: that many things are deemed “impossible” only until a “fool” with enough ambition and grit comes along and achieves them.
From a 13-year-old boy who arrived in New York speaking no English to releasing the most streamed song to ever come out of the birthplace of hip-hop; from the streets of Casablanca to dating some of the most beautiful women in the world; from walking around of New York selling DVDs hoping to be discovered, to becoming the one doing the discovering and signing; from surviving death to emerging as one of hip-hop’s most prominent philanthropists, Montana’s journey reads like fiction, yet remains entirely real.
