Leyla Ebrahimi is Building Her Own World in Debut EP “Planet You Forgot Me”
Leyla Ebrahimi is taking the world by storm, one musical diary entry at a time. The Persian American singer-songwriter released her debut EP, Planet You Forgot Me, on June 5. A deeply personal six-track project, the EP ebbs and flows through a multitude of genres and feelings, from soul-crushing catharsis paired with heavy guitar to earnest, voice-cracking confessions. Following her EP release show in Los Angeles the day after the EP dropped, the New York-based singer embarked on a tour, opening for British singer-songwriter Holly Humberstone across North America.
EnVi chatted with Ebrahimi over a morning Zoom call about her debut EP and the weeks since its release. Equipped with her phone and wired earbuds, Ebrahimi shared touring tips, the creative process behind Planet You Forgot Me, and her favorite parts about being on the road.
Release and Reception
From the beginning, Leyla Ebrahimi had a clear vision of her debut project. “I always knew that whatever my first project was, it would be an EP,” Ebrahimi explained. “Just based on the type of music I was writing and the story I was telling.” While the eponymous track “planet you forgot me” came out a year and a half before the EP as a single, Ebrahimi described it as the catalyst.
She released it at the beginning of 2025 as the result of a long backpacking trip through “what felt like the edge of the world.” Ebrahimi had been at a crossroads, unsure if she would ever return to New York. Written throughout that backpacking trip, “planet you forgot me” not only changed the way she wrote and performed music, but the way she interacted with the medium as a whole. She decided to go back to New York to see it through.
A heartrending tale of yearning for a relationship that’s already gone, “planet you forgot me” became her breakout single of 2025. Clocking in at six minutes and one second, the track takes a journey through the stages of grieving not just a person, but the feelings associated with a love long gone. From the electric-guitar opening to the quiet refrain of “maybe in another life I’ll get to have you,” Ebrahimi brings the listener headfirst into her world for the opening track. Despite the impressive runtime, Ebrahimi said that the story was far from over. “I had more to say in that song that I didn’t get to say,” she confessed.
The tracks that follow cycle through obsession and fixation in “i’m a little flower,” reluctant acceptance in “I Know You’re The Moon,” and radical catharsis in “I’m Sorry Maria.” The latter was Ebrahimi’s first single of the year, and it quickly climbed the ranks of her previous releases in all its authentic, explosive glory. Co-produced with longtime collaborator Shane Pielocik and producer Alexander 23 (Olivia Rodrigo, Reneé Rapp), “I’m Sorry Maria” earned the singer the opportunity to open for the indie rock band Wet Leg at their sold-out Las Vegas show that same month.
Far from new to the stage, Leyla Ebrahimi played a headlining show of her own the day after she released Planet You Forgot Me. She headlined a house show presented by Sonder Music Group in Los Angeles with support from camille blackman. “It’s always harder playing in a city that you don’t live in,” Ebrahimi said, contemplative. She could better anticipate playing shows in New York. In her city, she could count on friends and music industry peers to show up. “It ends up feeling more like it’s a karaoke, like, we’re all singing,” Ebrahimi shared with a smile. “I wasn’t sure what energy to expect from doing this somewhere else.”
Despite her initial nerves, Ebrahimi described the release show as a special experience. “I got to meet people that I didn’t know that listen to my music, and that was kind of the first time that that’s really happened to me,” she reminisced. Ebrahimi felt touched by the diverse crowd who came to support her.
“I love my listeners,” she said. “There’s a lot of gays. Which, you know, I’m gay, so I’m like, let’s f—ing go.”
Give Me A Beat
Although Planet You Forgot Me got its start in 2025, Ebrahimi’s musical career stretches back a little farther. In the summer of 2024, Leyla Ebrahimi sat down with her family at the dinner table and listened. Conversations in both English and Farsi overlapped each other as her extended family ate, laughed, and chatted among themselves. In a press release, Ebrahimi described this as the moment she realized she was hearing the soundtrack of her life. She recorded an audio clip of the meal and played it over a looping guitar melody to create her first-ever song, “if there’s a light it’s burning out.”
Ebrahimi’s sound has evolved in the years since, but hasn’t lost its emotional core. Alongside her musical partner Shane Pielocik, Ebrahimi has crafted a discography that reflects her life in all its ups and downs. Pielocik plays a “massive part” in the song creation process, from producing to acting as a sounding board for Ebrahimi’s base ideas. “I basically sit him down, and I’m like, stay with me,” she described, “And I just acapella sing out. I’ll be like, ‘this is what I’m imagining for this part.’”
Over time, Pielocik helped Ebrahimi learn to hone her musicianship. “It’s like a language, you know. I play instruments, but I don’t read any notes.” Pielocik was the first producer Ebrahimi ever worked with, but despite this, they just clicked. Many songs began with a simple piano melody written by Ebrahimi with no notation, and Pielocik would roll with it. “I didn’t speak the same [musical] language, but he understood.”
“planet you forgot me” began much the same way, with its opening guitar riff originally a softer piano. After that, Ebrahimi said she wrote the song in around ten minutes. “It just poured out of me,” the singer said, recounting the songwriting process. With Pielocik’s producing hand, they hammered out the full six-minute track in just about five hours.
During the creation process, Ebrahimi doesn’t shy away from getting experimental with her tracks. Throughout the EP, she plays with genre, BPM, and instrumentation, often all within the same song. “I Know You’re The Moon” is a prime example, switching up after the second chorus to bring the listener from a mid-tempo mourning love song to a more erratic post-breakup tale. At first, Ebrahimi worried she might “take the listener out of the moment” by genre-hopping or changing the song abruptly in the middle. Then, she came to a realization: As long as the message of the song made sense, she could do whatever she liked with her music.
“I think that was really liberating for me,” Ebrahimi said lightheartedly. If she grew bored of a certain section in a song, she would take the opportunity to switch up the BPM or tack on an entirely new section, citing Frank Ocean as an inspiration in that regard.
“[He] does such a great job of that. You don’t even know where the song is going,” she said emphatically. “I love that. I love when people just use their free will.” Even if a song didn’t make complete sense at first, Ebrahimi maintained that it always came together in the same world.
On the Road and Onwards
After playing her new songs for crowds across the country, Ebrahimi is still itching for someone to take her out on the road again. “Honestly, opening for artists is the best thing ever,” Ebrahimi said with a grin. “It is so f—ing fun to interact with an audience that doesn’t know your music, and maybe like a few people just realized that they really like it.”
Although Ebrahimi had a blast on the road, the tour had an equal share of joy, lessons, and hardships. One such lesson came from packing, or lack thereof. “I went on tour with a tiny duffle bag, and one pair of shoes that were fake Uggs,” she chastised herself lightly. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”
Time constraints put tour life on a tight schedule this time around, with the artists and crew hitting seven cities in nine days. Ebrahimi recounted running into her own issues during long travel days in the car.
“You’re in the car for like 10 hours a day, and you have no service anywhere,” she said, describing the days between shows. “I had nothing downloaded, so half the time I would just be like sitting with my thoughts.” Spending several hours on end reminiscing on anxiety-inducing memories was “no good” for Ebrahimi, and she learned a quick lesson on preparing for all aspects of the tour. “It was the best thing I’ve ever done in my life,” she said, resolute. “I’m literally sitting here; I can’t believe it’s over.”
Reflecting on the first couple of years of her music career, Ebrahimi felt intensely grateful. Just a month after her debut EP came out, two of her songs (“planet you forgot me” and “I’m Sorry Maria”) hit one million streams. In an Instagram caption, Ebrahimi called herself “so lucky” to be able to make music and to have people who listen.
“Two years ago, I just had one demo out on Spotify,” she told Envi. “It’s been really cool to grow alongside an audience.” Ebrahimi thanked every listener who has tuned in so far, dedicating her debut EP to the countless people who can relate to the heartbreak. “For anyone who has ever loved fiercely and lost brutally, this is Planet You Forgot Me.”
Planet You Forgot Me is available to stream on music platforms now. Keep up with what’s next for Leyla Ebrahimi on her Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and official website.
Want to learn about more emerging female musicians? Check out EnVi’s exclusive interview with Thai singer pami here.
