Music Exec Kevin Liles Details How Milli Vanilli’s ‘Girl You Know It’s True’ Was Stolen From Him And Made A Hit Song By The Pop Duo

Music Exec Kevin Liles Details How Milli Vanilli’s ‘Girl You Know It’s True’ Was Stolen From Him And Made A Hit Song By The Pop Duo

Kevin Liles credits the moment to shaping the trajectory of his career in music.

During a recent podcast, 300 Entertainment CEO and executive producer Kevin Liles revealed how having his record stolen and re-recorded by pop sensation Milli Vanilli changed his future in music from being an artist, to becoming a big name music exec.

Kevin Liles

Kevin Liles has produced for music greats such as Run DMC and Mary J. Blige, and continues his work to date signing deals with hit artists like Megan Thee Stallion and Young Thug. However Liles initially had big plans of making it as a music artist. That was before having a record he wrote at the age of 18 stolen from him and made a hit single, unbeknownst to him, with little to no consequence to the thieves in reference.

While visiting sports media personality Jalen Rose’s podcast Renaissance Man, Liles opened up about having the record “Girl You Know It’s True” stolen from him and re-recorded by singing rapping sensation of the late 80’s Milli Vanilli. Abruptly ending his dreams of wanting to be an artist, but peaking his desire in working behind the scenes.

Liles stated:

“I wrote this record that sold like 100,000 copies, but somebody stole it from me and sold 18 million copies.”

He continued:

“I’m a young kid. I found out that somebody remade my record because I was home chilling and this girl said, ‘They’re playing your record.’ And I’m talking s–t: ‘Of course, they played my record. They played my record all the time.’ She said, ‘No, [the] video’s about to come on.’ I’m like, ‘I never made a video.’ And damn if I didn’t see Milli Vanilli doing my song on the video. So that’s how I literally found out. So you can imagine, I’m 17, 18 … I’m trying to figure out. But that was the moment, J. I told you I didn’t want to be in the music business anymore. I wanted to be in the business of music.”

Young Thug, Kevin Liles

Prior to his career as a renowned music exec, Liles was part of the rap group Numarx based in Baltimore, and was opening for music chart toppers of the time like LL Cool J, Salt-N-Pepa and Will Smith. After the Milli Vanilli incident, Liles went on to intern and sit as acting president for Def Jam Records, as well as grew the careers of hip-hop giants such as LL Cool J, Jay-Z, DMX and Kanye West. He is also credited with helping push hip-hop and rap into the mainstream, creating more of an embrace for it by corporate America.

Russell Simmons, Kevin Liles, Fat Joe, Michael Kyser

Now, Liles is focused on his film and content studio that recently launched, and is producing a Netflix series based on Bubba Wallace – the only African American driver in the NASCAR Cup Series – entitled “Race: Bubba Wallace”.

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