Leila K   (Sweden)

EuroDance group
Added : 18/02/2001
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Latest Leila K news

30/08/2017 : Leila K will start a tour called The Fingerprint DJ set. Show will feature Leila as MC, along with a DJ. Leila's artist agency is run by Peter Thelenius from Basic Element.

30/07/2017 : Yesterday, Leila K did a guest appearance during pop-rock artist Håkan Hellström's concert in Ullevi stadium in Göteborg, taking part to songs Känn ingen sorg för mig Göteborg and Det Kommer Aldrig Va Över För Mig.

04/04/2016 : Leila K released a new best of compilation entitled High Energy Dance Collection (thanks to Denis).

12/02/2016 : Yesterday, Leila K and Denniz PoP were among the 9 Swedish to join this year's Music Hall of Fame.

06/05/2015 : Leila K should perform on stage along with Rob'n'Raz, with whom she did her debuts in 1989, after the Denniz PoP Awards 2015.

01/06/2011 : You can read an article about Leila K's new collaboration with Wallenbergs and watch the videoclip. of Legendary. (Thanks to Tavi Meran and Cesar)

06/05/2011 : Leila K is back. She was featured on Petter Wallenberg's new single Legendary, to be released in Sweden on May 30th. It will be included on Wallenberg's forthcoming album Legends (Thanks to Tavi Meran)

More news

Leila K albums

	Carousel	1993	BUY X
	Manic Panic	1996	BUY X
	Leila K's Greatest Tracks	28th May 2003	BUY X
	The Mega Years Collection	1st Mar 2010	BUY X
	High Energy Dance Collection	25th Mar 2016	BUY X

Leila K singles

	Magic Ball	1991	BUY X
	Time	1991	BUY X
	Open Sesame	1992	BUY X
	Ca Plane Pour Moi / Check The Dan	1993	BUY X
	Slow Motion	1993	BUY X
	Close Your Eyes	1993	BUY X
	Electric	1995	BUY X
	C'Mon Now	1996	BUY X
	Rude Boy	1996	BUY X
	Blacklisted	1996	BUY X
	Open Sesame '99	1999	BUY X

Leila K remixes

	Open Sesame (Plutone Remixes)	1992	BUY X
	Open Sesame remixes	1992	BUY X
	Ca Plane Pour Moi (Felix Remixes)	1993	BUY X
	Check The Dan (Plutone Remixes)	1993	BUY X

Featurings and collaborations

	Backyard Babies - I Love To Roll		BUY X
	Rob'n'raz - Got To Get	1989	BUY X
	Rob'n'raz - Rob'n'Raz Featuring Leila K (album)	1990	BUY X
	Rob'n'raz - Rok The Nation	1990	BUY X
	Dr Alban - Hello Afrika	Jul 1990	BUY X
	Dr Alban - Hello Afrika (album)	Oct 1990	BUY X
	Elephant And Castle - Burning Up	1999	BUY X
	Wallenberg - Legendary	30th May 2011	BUY X
	Maddix - Open Sesame (Abracadabra)	2nd Feb 2024	BUY X

Leila K biography

Leila K. (Laila El Khalifi) is a swedish pop-star born September 6th 1971 in the suburb Bergsjön of Göteborg in Sweden. Her parents are from Morocco. Her dad, a traditional muslim, worked as a trolley driver. Leila did not really enjoy going to school, so she did whatever she could to get thrown out from classes. As she was 15, her parents got angry at her and sent her to a Moroccian school, but after one year (or 3 years according to others), she was sent back to Sweden where, after running away from home to escape a forced marriage, she hung out on bars and discos.

In 1988, through one of those discos she got aware of a music contest, and entered the competition under the name Ms Melodie. Among the jury of the music contest were the members of Rob'n'Raz, and they liked her music so much that they offered her at music contract, which she accepted.

As a result, Leila K's music career started in 1989, with the huge hitrecord Got To Get, which she performed together with Rob'n'raz. According to Leila K. Got To Get should never have been released, but, due to a huge demand on radio stations, the teams changed their mind. Other hit singles Leila K. and Rob'n'Raz had together were Rok The Nation, Just Tell Me and It Feels So Right. They also released an album called Rob'n'raz feat. Leila K. Leila also appeared on Dr Alban's Hello Afrika.

In 1990 Leila K. and Rob'n'Raz went on a tour, but after a while she got tired of this collaboration and went on her own to Ibiza, where she was welcomed and treated like a real superstar. She managed to arrange concerts of her own, and on those she earned a lot more money per concert than she ever did as a member of Rob'n'raz. Doing so well she didn't want to go back to Sweden, so she had to be forced home. And once home again all the easy money was spent. Since Leila K. ran away from the tour, Rob'n'Raz didn't want to know anything more about her, so she suddenly was on her own.

Her solo career started in 1991, with the first single Time, later followed by Magic Ball. Both were never been released on an album. In 1992 she was back with the monster hit single Open Sesame, climbing high on the charts all over Europe (becoming for example # 12 in Israel, and # 12 at MTV Europe). The album Carousel came the next year, followed up with singles such as Check The Dan, Ca Plane Pour Moi (a cover of Plastic Bertrand's hit, which went # 21 in Israel, # 9 MTV Europe), Slow Motion and Close Your Eyes.

Although Leila K. did quite good for some years (in 1993 she was the best selling female artist in Europe, where she was called "the new Neneh Cherry"), she also experienced problems. After the success with Rob'n'Raz, she didn't manage to do just as well on her own and to produce songs popular enough to follow up the success with them. After the Carousel album she experienced some real trouble. In 1994 she earned only about 50.000 SEK (about $7,100) and at the end of the year she owed the swedish tax collectors about 122.000 SEK. She actually got bankrupt! She claimed, however, that the debt of 122.000 was just a mistake.

Leila K. does not (as far as we know) have any education, she does not have a drivers license, her only occupation is as pop star. She is extravagant, loves driving in a limo and loves to be on stage. She has a most unserious view of life : "life is just a party" as she says in her latest album Manic Panic.

After 2 years of inactivity, she returned in December 1995 with the hit single Electric, featuring choruses by Jessica Folcker which became hot on several dance-charts, reaching #18 in Israel, #8 in Belgium and a top 3 single in Sweden and Finland. In the spring of 1996 the second single came : C'mon Now, which was quite different for her earlier singles by beeing more of a rock-track than a dance-track.

In the early summer 1996 her latest album was released : Manic Panic. Later the same year a new single was released: Rude Boy, with Papa Dee assisting her on the lyrics. Both C'Mon Now and Rude Boy did quite well as singles. The last single from Manic Panic was Blacklisted, but it never became a success. She was nominated for the best album Grammi Award for Manic Panic, but finally Dilba (Dee's sister) won. Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet published a story about Leila K peeing on the floor at the award ceremony, and she filed a lawsuit against them.

From spring of 1997 everything became very quite around her. A reason for that is that she had big trouble finding a producer who would stand by her after she was involved in a serious traffic accident in 1998, and specially after the death of her former producer and friend Denniz PoP in 1999. She suffered from back injuries and had to refuse many offers and collaborations due to these health troubles, for instance a collaboration with the Finnish Boomfunk MC. She won her trial against the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet.

There has however been a little bit of activity. Late 1998 SVT, a Swedish TV-corporation, made a documentary about Leila K's struggle for stardom, entitled Fuck you, fuck you very much. And in 1999 two singles were released : Open Sesame '99 with new remixes of her most popular hit ever, and Burning Up a cover of an old Madonna-song (from the first Madonna album) together with the group Elephant and Castle. She was also featured on Backyard Babies' single I Love to Roll.

1999 : Daisy Dee has released a cover version of Open Sesame. Leila K appeared as a guest in the videoclip.

2001 : she was interviewed by Fredrik Strage in his book Mikrofonkåt and he drew of her the picture of someone whose drug-dependency had led her to lose control over her life. Later, Leila K accused Strage to have stolen money from her during the interview.

2003 : Leila lived in the streets, a life far away from the stardom and glamour that surrounded her in the early 90s. She had to steal her food and got sometimes arrested by local police. She had 6 months of rehabilitation at an institution in Skåne. She felt betrayed and exploited by those who made her a star in the first place. She still burned for her music, and she would love to go back in to a studio. Her family never accepted her choice to become an artist and broke up with her.

A new collection of Leila K's greatest hits was released. The profit of the record release was destined to help the pop-star back to a better life. This brand new compilation contains 3 previously unreleased tracks : Positive Energy, Possessed and Burnin' Up. On the second CD one could find the videos of Open Sesame, Slow Motion, Electric, C'mon Now, Close Your Eyes and Got To Get (feat Rob'n' Raz).

2004 : Leila K's hit Open Sesame was covered by Syndicate of Law and renamed Accelerator. Leila K, now 33 years old, spent 3 monthes in jail but kept on claiming that she wants to go back to music.

In 2005, the Swedish cartoonist Martin Kellerman interviewed her for his own Comic book magazine Rocky.

2007 : on June 15th she did an appearance at a release party in Stockholm in the club Marie Laveau, for the gay blog Bögjävlar, performing the songs Electric and Ça plane pour moi. She was still homeless. 2 days after, she got hit by a car at a traffic light in central Stockholm.

2011 : Leila was featured on Petter Wallenberg's new single Legendary, to be released in Sweden on May 30th. It was included on Wallenberg's forthcoming album Legends

2013 : Petter Wallenberg published "Historien om Leila K", a book about her, without her consent, based about interviews he did with her. He told how he tried to record songs with her and develop an hypothesis as to she would suffer from ADD.

2014 : Leila was sentenced to 4 months prison for committing an aggression.

2015 : Leila and Rob'n'Raz were planned to perform together at TV-show Sommarkrysset on TV4, but they finally cancelled their appearance.

2016 : Leila K released a best of compilation entitled High Energy Dance Collection. She entered Swedish Music Hall of Fame.

2017 : Leila K started a tour called The Fingerprint DJ set in which the starred as MC. Her artist agency is run by Peter Thelenius from Basic Element.

2018 : she is a part of the lineup of Vi som älskar 90-talet concerts. She announced her plans to go back in studios to record some new material and to work with artists of the new generation. A theater play entitled K, inspired from her life, premiered in November.

Leila K Homepage
Leila K at Findance
Thanks to Shimon O'Hana for the charts positions
Thanks to Mheidi and Apho for the latest informations

Leila K biography was last updated Sun, July 31st 2022

Charts (singles)

Magic Ball					#30
Open Sesame	#5			#2	#21	#4	#23
Ca Plane Pour Moi / Check The Dan	#8			#31	#25	#17	#69
Slow Motion	#26				#27
Electric		#37	#2		#8
C'Mon Now			#3		#21
Rude Boy			#8		#29

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