Kim Appleby (born 28 August 1961, London), is an English singer, songwriter and actor. She participated in the duo Mel and Kim, with her sister Melanie Appleby, until her sister's death from pneumonia following treatment for cancer.
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Appleby was born in Hackney to a Jamaican father and English mother.[1] Her childhood was spent in poverty, with her parents splitting when she was fifteen and she was a mother by the age of seventeen.[1] She attributed her maturity to becoming a mother, stating that she "grew up overnight" and that she "changed and became a better person because of it".[1] She found success at the age of 24 and enjoyed chart hits with her sister between 1986 and 1989, including a number one UK single with "Respectable", although they had stopped performing and recording in 1987 due to Mel's illness.[2][3] When her sister Mel was diagnosed with cancer, Kim took time out of her career to nurse her for two and a half years until her death in January 1990.[1]
With the aid of her boyfriend, ex-Bros bassist Craig Logan, Kim launched a solo career with much of her debut solo album composed of songs co-written with Mel, for what was intended to be the next "Mel and Kim" album.[1] The album, Kim Appleby, contained her debut solo single "Don't Worry" which reached number two on the British charts in November 1990.[4] A follow up single "G.L.A.D." was a UK #10 hit.[4] Subsequent singles from her debut album were "Mama" [#19] and "If You Cared" [#44].[4] Kim's second album, Breakaway, was not a commercial success and had a limited release. She released three further singles, "Light Of The World [#41, 1993], "Breakaway" [#56, 1993], and reunited with Stock and Aitken on "Free Spirit" [#51, 1994].[4] A download only single called "High" was released in 2007.
She had a show on the European internet station Storm Live. She also acted in the movie Going Straight and in the soap opera, Doctors (on BBC One).
Appleby featured on two tracks on Tonka's 2004 album 84 ("Believe" and "Follow You"), and also features on Levthand's 2010 album Taxidrive.
Appleby was on the judging panel of the 2010 Ivor Novello Awards.[5]
In December 2010 the single "Took a Minute" by Levthand featuring Kim Appleby was released in Europe.
There's very little known of unreleased Kim Appleby songs, but plans to return for Kim were always in the pipeline and she never stopped recording throughout the years. She worked with a string of different producers like Anders Bagge (Madonna, Janet Jackson, Britney Spears), Michael Garvin (Jennifer Lopez), Sheppard Solomon (Dido) Terry Roland (Dannii Minogue) and many others. The above list of unreleased songs are titles that have been registered on ascap.com and bmi.com under Kim Appleby songs.
Mike Stock stated that they also worked on two-three additional songs at the time they recorded "Free Spirit".