Song written by Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus, originally recorded in 1980 by the legendary Swedish group Abba on their album ‘Super Trouper’. It was a considerable club hit.

The melody of this song is used in a DJ remix by J.R. Clements in 1990 of Kim’s Can’t Get Enough (Of Your Love). This remix was released by Hot Tracks, a DJ remix service.

Singer/songwriter Belle Lawrence (born as Belle Erskine) started her career as dancer and singer in the West End musical ‘Cats’. After leaving the show, she auditioned for bands and producers and ended up recording with Hed Kandi, BMG Italy, Northstar, Almighty records, Sound4group Italy and Fierce angel records.

On Almighty Records, she’s recorded cover versions of songs like ‘Don’t You (Forget About Me)’, ‘Skyfall’, ‘Jar of Hearts’ and many more. Her version of Kim Wilde’s Never Trust a Stranger is, like all of her cover versions, dance-oriented.

Most recently Belle has been writing and recording with producers and DJ’s Daniele Tignino and Eric Kupper.

Formed in 1987, Lawnmower Deth toured around for some years before signing a record deal with the Earache label. The first fruits of this union was the album “Oh Crickey It’s Lawnmower Deth” in 1990. It was a humorous attempt at lightening up heavy rock.

And more lunacy followed a year later, with the release of the Kim Wilde classic Kids in America, without a doubt one of the most heavy versions of this song ever recorded. The CD-single also contained the ‘De La Deth mix’ of this cover, which leaned towards the rap genre.

The group did some support slots with the likes of Death, VoiVod, and Suicidal Tendencies, as well as their own successful UK tours. The humor was evident, but so was a belief that the band had something more to offer than temporary relief. The album Billy, which contains a new version of the aforementioned ‘Kids in America’ cover, their second album, was released in 1993.

Their next album, Return Of The Fabulous Metal Bozo Clowns took the band to the next level, proving they could actually write songs and powersurging riffs.

In December 2015 the band started a campaign to get their version of ‘Kids in America’ to number 1 in the UK singles chart. Although the campaign was unsuccessful, it did give the band some media exposure. On 11 June 2016 they performed live at Download Festival in Donington Park, and had Kim as their special guest. They performed three songs together: Egg Sandwich, Watch Out Granma and of course Kids in America.

In December 2017 Lawnmower Deth and Kim Wilde released a festive single called F U Kristmas. They performed the song live in Manchester during the Wilde Wild Xmas Show on 22 December 2017.

The Lavenders are the genus Lavandula of flowering plant in the mint family, Lamiaceae. They are small woody plants. The name is most often applied to those species in the genus that are grown as herbs and for ornament. The most common form of these is the English Lavender, Lavandula angustifolia (formerly L. officinalis).
Lavenders are much grown in gardens. Flower spikes are used for dried flower arrangements. The fragrant, pale purple flowers and flower buds are used in potpourris and in pouches. The plant is also grown commercially for extraction of lavender oil from the flowers. This oil is used as an antiseptic and for aromatherapy.

Kim about lavender

I grow lots of lavender at home. I love the smell of it so much. It’s a very powerful herb. It has well-known calming and soothing properties so it’s great for children. (1)

Do you have favourite flowers?
Lavender – because of their colour and smell. It has such a mediterranean feel. (2)

Interview source

(1) At home with the legendary pop queen Kim Wilde In: OK! (UK), 21 September 2004
(2) What is Kim Wilde doing now? In: Stern (Germany), 1 April 2001

Yvonne Lau Man Kuen was born on 26 September 1967. She studied Chinese Language and Literature in Hong Kong and was an exchange student in Japan for a year. After a short while working at a bank, she released her first solo album in 1991. The album ‘神話’ (‘Myth’) featured covers in Chinese of Jane Wiedlin’s ‘Rush Hour’ and Al Green’s ‘Let’s Stay Together’, along with original material. She followed the album up the next year with ‘Blue’, and in 1993 she released her last album ‘Loving Feelings’.

In 1994, a compilation album called ‘失戀餐廳’ (‘Lovelorn Restaurant’) was released. This album included some new tracks, including a cover of Kim Wilde’s Four Letter Word.

Yvonne Lau emigrated to Vancouver, Canada and married a businessman.

James Last (born as Hans Last on 17 April 1929 in Bremen) is a German composer and big band leader. He learned how to play piano as child, switching to bass as a teenager. He joined Hans-Gunther Oesterreich’s Radio Bremen Dance Orchestra in 1946 at age 17. In 1948, he became the leader of the Becker-Last Ensemble, which performed for seven years. After the disbandment of the Becker-Last Ensemble, he became the in-house arranger for Polydor Records, as well as for a number of European radio stations. For the next decade, he helped arrange hits for artists like Helmut Zacharias and Caterina Valente.

Last released his first album, ‘Non-Stop Dancing’, in 1965. The record consisted of brief renditions of popular songs, all tied together by an insistent dance beat and joyous crowd noises. It was a hit and helped make him a major European star. Last subsequently released over 190 records, including several more volumes of Non-Stop Dancing. On these records, he varies his formula by adding different songs from different countries and genres, as well as guest performers like Richard Clayderman and Astrud Gilberto.

He has won numerous polls and prizes, for example Billboard magazine’s ‘Star of the Year’ trophy in 1976, and has been honored for his lifework with the German ECHO prize in 1994. During the 1990’s Last is less active with touring, although he does appear on TV shows and in galas. In 1997 James Last returns from his chosen homeland of Florida to do 16 live concerts. However, in the same year, his wife Waltraud dies, leaving behind James and their two children. He doesn’t stop making music: already in 1998 he’s back on stage, and even after reaching the stately age of 70 continued to make music.

Among the many tracks he has played with his big band is Kim Wilde’s Chequered Love. He played it as part of a medley with the songs ‘I’ve done everything for you’ and ‘La, la, la, la’, most notably on ‘James Last in Ost-Berlin’, recorded in 1987 and released on DVD in 2004.

James Last passed away on 9 June 2015 in Florida at the age of 86.

Lasgo is a Belgian dance trio consisting of Peter Luts (Producer, Keyboard player & MC) David Vervoort (Producer, Keyboard player, singer) and Evi Goffin (born 27 February 1981; frontwoman, singer). Their debut single ‘Something’ immediately became the biggest hype in the clubs in spring 2001. Shortly after, most Dance radios decided to start playing the track on vinyl because they couldn’t wait for the commercial CD release. ‘Something’ made its way to the UK in early 2002, after becoming a big hit everywhere else in Europe throughout 2001. The albums ‘Some Things’ and ‘Far Away’ were reasonably successful throughout Europe and even managed to reach the top 20 in the Billboard Dance/Electronic Albums chart.

The voice of Evi has been compared to Kim’s a few times in the press, although the similarities are marginal. However, this was a reason for the popular Flemish music magazine ‘Joepie’ to organise a meeting between the two in December 2001 for an article.

Evy subsequently performed Kim’s song Loved during a live concert given to celebrate 10 years of Radio Donna in Belgium on 29 March 2002. Two years later, on 30 April 2004, she performed a reggae version of Kids in America during the Belgian TV programme Biebabeloela.

In 2008, Evi was forced to leave the band. She was replaced by Jelle van Dael. Lasgo’s third album ‘Smile’ was less successful than the first two, with singles scoring mostly in Belgium and Turkey. Between 2010 and 2013 Lasgo released six singles. These only charted in Belgium.

The Larks are Hayley Rodgers and Dan Noble, specialists in stripping down well known, brilliant tunes and performing them with no special effects or electronic additions.

Dan Noble got into music in his teens when he discovered a love for the music of Paul Simon, which inspired him to start learning to play on his dad’s old guitar. Hayley Rodgers discovered her musical ear at an early age playing whatever instruments she could get her hands on and singing along to the likes of the Eurythmics and Alison Moyet. Having parents of a similar age, their musical tastes have been heavily influenced by the sounds they were weaned on. Having chosen career paths outside of the music industry, both unaware of each others existence, they both spent their spare time writing, recording and doing covers of their favourite songs in the privacy of their own homes.

A chance meeting between former schoolfriends, Hayley and Dan’s wife Janette after not having seen eachother for 23 years led to their meeting. The pair quickly discovered a style encompassing the simplification of otherwise complex sounds and a purity and clarity they have become noted for.

Since The Larks were first established in September 2011, they have been working with acclaimed producer Beanz Rudden of Plutonic Group and were selected to be chosen by the Swiss public to represent Switzerland in The Eurovision Song contest 2014 for their song ‘Summer Loving’ (co-written and Produced by Beanz Rudden.)

Before that, they recorded a cover version of Kids in America. Originally uploaded to their Soundcloud account in October 2013, it got over 5000 plays within three months.

L’uke is a German musician duo from Göttingen (Germany), consisiting of the singer Karin Reilly (vocals) and Daniel Adler (ukulele). They cover pop songs from the Eighties, using only a ukulele and voice. Their first and so far only album ‘L’uke play Ukuleighties’ was released in 2012. It features a cover of Kim Wilde’s Kids in America.