Yung Lean

Jonatan Aron Leandoer Håstad (born 18 July 1996), known professionally as Yung Lean, is a Swedish rapper, singer and songwriter.

Håstad was born on 18 July 1996 in Stockholm, Sweden, to Kristoffer Leandoer, a Swedish poet, fantasy author, and translator of French literature who owned a book publishing company and Elsa Håstad, a former human rights activist who worked with LGBT groups in Russia, Vietnam, and South America, since 2019 serving as the Swedish ambassador to Albania.

Håstad spent his early childhood in Minsk, Belarus, where his mother moved the family so Håstad could have a similar childhood to her.

The family returned to Sweden and settled in Stockholm when Håstad was somewhere between the ages of three and five.

He was raised in the city's Södermalm area.

Later that same year, he released his debut mixtape, Unknown Death 2002, and the following year, he released his debut studio album, Unknown Memory.

Yung Lean became widely known when the music video for his track "Ginseng Strip 2002" went viral.

Consequence of Sound placed "Ginseng Strip 2002" at number 44 on their "Top 50 Songs of 2013", while Vibe included Unknown Death 2002 in their list, "The 10 Most Overlooked Debut Rap Mixtapes of 2013", describing it as "a natural progression from the freely associative, often nonsensical rhymes of Lil' B with a keener sense of melody".

In between, Håstad was a student at UNIS Hanoi from 6th to 10th grade.

During his time in high school, Håstad often got in trouble for doing drugs or writing graffiti.

He also had a job at a local McDonald's. When he was 15, he was put on probation for smoking cannabis.

Håstad began to develop an interest in hip hop music, mentioning 50 Cent's Get Rich or Die Tryin', The Latin Kings's Mitt Kvarter and Nas's Illmatic as his early influences.

In 2012, Håstad met Yung Sherman and Gud in a local Stockholm park and they struck up a friendship, discovering they enjoyed much of the same music, going on to form the collective Hasch Boys.

Another group of Stockholm artists who would later form the group Drain Gang were also members.

When many of the other members of Hasch Boys began to lose interest in the group, Håstad, Sherman and Gud broke off and formed the group "Sad Boys" as a trio.

By 2012, Yung Gud and Yung Sherman were producing and mixing music while Håstad had begun writing lyrics and recording vocals in a makeshift studio in his basement.

They shared the music they made on the platforms SoundCloud and Tumblr, where Lean began to generate a large following.

Widely cited as one of the most influential figures in the early cloud rap era, Yung Lean rose to prominence in 2013 with his song "Ginseng Strip 2002", which went viral on YouTube.

Sad Boys performed their first show in Gothenburg, Sweden on 5 May 2013.

Later in 2013, he put out his first official releases: Marble Phone, a single featuring Kreayshawn, Unknown Death 2002 and an EP titled Lavender which includes the track "Ginseng Strip 2002" along with other songs that were cut from Unknown Death 2002.

In 2013, Yung Lean and Sad Boys toured throughout Europe.

Later that same year, Acclaim Magazine had Yung Lean as their guest for a Q&A "smalltalk" segment, where they asked him about a wide variety of miscellaneous things, including his favourite hangover cure and his desktop wallpaper.

In 2014, Yung Lean and Sad Boys embarked on the White Marble Tour, playing in 24 cities across Europe.

Shortly after the conclusion of this tour Sad Boys announced a further Black Marble Tour, which would include several performances in cities across North America.

The first of these shows took place in July at the Webster Hall in New York City, and was well received by writers for publications such as XXL, and The New York Times.

Yung Lean starred on Studio PSL in May 2014 and was also one of five final nominees for the 2014 P3 Guld in the Hip Hop/Soul category.

Yung Lean released his debut full-length album, titled Unknown Memory on 23 September 2014.

The album was accompanied with North American and European tours, beginning on 1 December in New York with a nearly sold-out show on Webster Hall's main ballroom stage.

In 2016, Yung Lean released his second mixtape, Frost God, and his second studio album, Warlord.

Yung Lean released his second full-length album, Warlord, on 25 February 2016; he also released a line of clothing, "Sad Boys Entertainment".

Håstad modelled for Calvin Klein's July 2016, AW16 Campaign.

During his Warlord American tour, his tour bus in Pennsylvania was shot at.

Håstad was also featured on Frank Ocean's critically acclaimed Blonde where he provided backup vocals on the songs "Godspeed" and "Self Control".

According to Håstad, his part on the project was recorded when he was seventeen in Ocean's apartment in London.

Yung Lean released a surprise track on 25 November 2016 titled "Hennessy & Sailor Moon (feat. Bladee)".

On 14 December 2016 he released the mixtape Frost God containing eight tracks including "Hennessy & Sailor Moon" and "Crystal City" which featured A$AP Ferg.

In 2017, he released his third studio album, Stranger, followed by his third mixtape, Poison Ivy, in 2018.

Håstad released his third studio album Stranger on 10 November 2017, with the singles "Red Bottom Sky", "Hunting My Own Skin", and "Skimask", through Stockholm label YEAR0001.

He released the albums Nectar (2019), Blodhundar & Lullabies (2020) and Sugar World (2023) under the pseudonym Jonatan Leandoer96, a project which strays away from his hip-hop roots and goes for a blend of indie rock and neofolk.

Yung Lean's fourth studio album, Starz, was released in 2020.