Lia Kali: "The most toxic relationship I've ever had in my life has been with music."

Barcelona"She's the big international star of our house. Rosalía doesn't set Lia Kali's ceiling," said the director of Cruïlla, Jordi Herreruela, a few weeks ago during the presentation of the 2025 edition of the festival. Julia Isern (Barcelona, ​​1997), better known as Lia Kali, was unaware of this praise. "Wow! I had no idea," she exclaims. "Well, I'm so grateful that this man has so much faith in my project." Herreruela's enthusiasm is typical when she defends the artists she programs, but it's also true that the singer from the Teixonera neighborhood broke many glass ceilings with her album Against all odds (2023). Rapping with soulful lyrics and urban war paintings that Amy Winehouse once covered, Lia Kali has had to come to terms with two years of success, millions of Spotify streams, and an international tour. Now she's back with the album Kaelis (2025), also released on the Manresa-based label Propaganda por el Hecho! And before sharing the bill with Gracie Abrams on the first night of Cruïlla on July 9, Lia Kali will perform at the Cartuja Center in Seville and the Movistar Arena in Madrid (formerly WiZink), give concerts in London, Berlin, Hamburg, Buenos Aires and Santiago de Chile, and has already sold out two shows at 2 y 2 in Barcelona.

Does the album meet your expectations?

— I love it. And the feedback from people who've heard it is much better than the previous one, so I feel very, very satisfied with the work done.

Kaelis It's a concept album. When did you decide it would have a common thread?

— From the beginning, I was very clear about what I wanted the narrative to be. Because of everything I was experiencing at the time, because of everything that had happened with the first album, because of the vertigo and fears I'd felt following the success that had come my way.

Were you so surprised by the success?

— A lot, yes. I've been doing bars, weddings, and baptisms for sixteen years. And suddenly I make my first album, have a thousand people at Apolo, everyone singing the songs... And I do eighty concerts in a year. All of this changes my life a lot. It changes how people around you see you and how people who don't know you see you. Things are happening very fast.

I guess the fact that it came to you when you were 25 or 26 was easier to accept.

— This happened to me when I was 17 or 18 and I would be in terrible shape.

What story did you want to tell on the album?

— I wanted to share what I was experiencing. I'd always imagined success as something incredible, like the ultimate, that once you reach it, you have everything: an easy life, money, fame... But I felt a lot of insecurities, fears, and vertigo. I really wanted to explain all of this, the process of overcoming these fears, and also, of course, that I had managed to dedicate myself to what I love most and what I've fought for my whole life. I also thought there was a parallel between how I experience my relationship with music and love.

Speaking of relationships, two songs are two opposite sides: With you necklace and I will sing. Because each one is sung from a different place. Who are you singing to?

— They are very different, yes. With you necklace, to a betrayal and a loss I suffered. When things are going well for you, sometimes the people around you, unfortunately, don't take it well, and suddenly you lose someone you loved very much, because they can't process it. And I will singAlthough it seems like a love song, I write to music, as a song of gratitude for all the positive things that music has given me.

There are some rhymes that express anger, or even despair.

— The most toxic relationship I've ever had has been with music, because you can't stop making it. You're completely dependent on it. It's given me the most incredible experiences and the most beautiful moments in life, but at the same time, when everything starts going well, there's a sense of pressure and responsibility... a feeling that, paradoxically, is only relieved by music. I mean, it's like a vicious cycle: it gives me everything and takes everything from me.

When it comes to singing these sentiments, you sometimes gravitate toward old-school hip-hop, other times toward sadder trap, and there are also times when you sing with greater melody. How do you choose each style?

— I don't choose it; I just like to do things with a touch of purity and truth. Sometimes it's with greater accords, other times with lesser ones, or I want to go towards Afro-trapo or more Brazilian funk. I let myself be carried away by the music and the feeling. And the rage of the first part of the album expresses hip-hop very well. Then, towards the end of that first stage, when I embraced this journey, I needed a much more melodic song.

With your first album, when people asked you about your influences, you mentioned soul singers and female rappers. Have you added any others?

— Yes, I've discovered people. Luz Gaggi, for example, an incredible Argentinian, and Milo Jota. And Eladio Carrión, who I hadn't listened to much until he asked me to collaborate with him. I listened to him and said wow, I like the way he makes music. And, of course, there are always the influences that are never lacking: Amy Winehouse, Erykah Badu, Lauryn Hill, Ray Charles, Etta James...

Unlike other singers of your generation and younger, you have influences that go way back. Do you think it shows in your singing?

— Yes, it's very noticeable. Sometimes people tell me, "What a strange voice." They're people who've never heard soul music. I think soul music has helped me because it's given me that identity. I come from mothers that most people in urban music don't have.

What do you think of artists like María José Llergo and Queralt Lahoz, who also have old references like you?

They're both incredible. Queralt touches me the most, because she's like a sister. We adore each other, and I've admired her deeply since she released her first album. I think she's a complete artist, besides being incapable of doing so, she gives you goosebumps. She has a stage presence, a magnetism, a talent for writing and composing that's admirable. And I'd love to meet María José Llergo in person, because I also think she's a woman who grasps a lot of the truth; this is what gives me goosebumps.

You also have a very particular song, Julia, not so much because it is sung in Catalan, but because it is the song where there is the most longing.

— I always thought I would want to leave as soon as I could, and now that I travel and spend half the year away from home, I often notice that feeling of longing that reflects JuliaIn Barcelona, ​​in Catalonia, I have my history, my family, my roots, and Julia It is a song in my land, and the feeling is so great that I have to tell you that I want to live my whole life here, because it is my home.

Do they call you Julia or Lia?

— It depends. Until now, I didn't take well to being called Lia, because it created a kind of distance, because the person who said it didn't know me. Now I feel like I've increasingly embraced Lia, also in a more familiar and natural way.

How do you think Teixonera is heard in your music?

— A lot, a lot. I come from a neighborhood where the majority of the population has Andalusian family, and there are also many Roma. I lived across from a park, and there was always Mari, the former butcher, who sang incredible flamenco. With this music, I connected with the park, with the neighborhood, because flamenco wasn't the most popular genre at home.

What is your best memory related to music and what memory would you like to forget?

— One of the best, especially the first times. Over the years, you lose the sensations you experienced with your first kiss, those things that happen when you're a child and you're just beginning to discover the world. And music has given them back to me. For example, the prospect of making the first WiZink [now Movistar Arena] is giving me butterflies again. Like the first time I went up to the Palau Sant Jordi with Kase.O and did that collaboration with an artist I'd listened to for so many years. The best thing music has given me is being able to somehow return to that childhood or innocence, to those beautiful things you feel the first time you do it.

And the worst part?

— Especially when music and business merge, and everything starts to shake. You start to feel like it's an obligation, instead of what it's always been: an emotional necessity. And anxiety, rush, and blockages set in. This has been the worst part.

How do you manage the fact that the work of many other people also depends on your work?

— I still don't know how to handle it. I feel an enormous responsibility. In the end, it's what you say: there are more and more people living off you, and if one day you fall, they all fall. Now I'm very happy to be able to give them all this, but when I think about it, wow, you never know how long it will last. I feel like a giant ball weighing me down, to be honest. That's the downside of it.

Now that it's been a while since you posted the song UCA, about the Adolescent Crisis Unit at the Sant Boi de Llobregat psychiatric hospital, what's the most positive thing you've learned from the impact it had?

— A group of people affected by the Sant Boi University of Applied Medicine (UCA) was formed, and that makes me very happy because I felt the song had helped. Many people have written to me explaining that it's important to talk about it. I was lucky because I didn't have to be there; it was absolute medical negligence, from someone who didn't want to deal with your anxiety attack anymore and sent you to the UCA. I was there for a week, at most, but there are people who were there for a year and then attempted suicide, when they had never even thought about it before. I think the best thing I've been able to achieve has been for people to unite and report it. Of course, I'm speaking from my personal experience at the UCA when I was 14, and I'm sure there are psychiatric centers that are incredible and have sensible staff who truly want to help and who don't tolerate any violence.