Layton attended the
Barbara Speake Stage School in the 1980s and appeared as an actor in TV shows such as
Casualty and
Press Gang (though many people have mistaken the latter for an appearance in
Grange Hill on BBC One, getting Layton mixed up with the actress
Lindy Brill, who had also played a character called Cathy (Hargreaves)). In the early 1990s, Layton was part of Norman Cook's dance music collective
Beats International, which featured her as lead vocalist on a couple of singles, including the number-one hit "
Dub Be Good to Me". Beats International's debut album,
Let Them Eat Bingo, sold moderately. Following the success of the singles with Beats International in 1990, Layton signed a solo deal with
Arista, and released her version of
Janet Kay's hit "
Silly Games". The single was a hit, and further releases followed from her 1991 debut album
Pressure. However, these decreased in popularity.
Pressure was mostly produced by
Norman Cook and the dance-
soul-
funk outfit
Driza Bone. The album's second single, "Echo My Heart", narrowly missed a UK Top 40 placing in January 1991, and "Rock Steady" from the 2013 LP
Worshipping the Dollar. In 2013, she began a daytime radio show on Kane FM with Mel Foster,
The Mrs, which ran for about a year. She is now a songwriter and composes with her writing partner Matt Kootchi, who owns and runs house label Good Lucky Recordings. ==Singles==