Meet a new gen pop sensation

With 50 million streams, a billion views on TikTok and a slew lebrity fans, FLO are being touted as the next Gen Z girl super group. Alexandra Jones meets Jorja, Stellaand Renee

- 

IT’S rare to meet a 20-year-old who tells you that their ambition is to retire by 30 and to believe wholeheartedly that they’ve got it in them. Even rarer to meet three such iconoclasts — but that’s the situation I found myself in last week when I sat down to breakfast with Jorja Douglas, Stella Quaresma and Renée Downer aka FLO, widely touted as the most exciting girl band in a generation.

In the brief time they’ve been putting out music (their first single, the MNEK-produced Cardboard Box, was released in March this year), they’ve amassed 50 million streams, a billion views on TikTok and endorsements from the likes of R&B queens SZA, Missy Elliott and Kelly Rowland (who the band even got to meet in LA).

There hasn’t been a ‘pinch me’ moment, they tell me, because the whole situation is a pinch-me moment. “We’re 20 and we’re doing this for a living,” says Renée. “It’s like, wow — every day.” But retired by 30? “Yeah, retired and financially free,” she says.

“With loads of dogs,” adds Jorja.

Did Rowland offer them any advice? “Honestly, who knows?” says Jorja.

“We get asked this all the time,” adds Renée, “but we were just mesmerised. Like, she looked good, she smelt good, her skin was glowing…”

“I know she gave us some nice pearls of wisdom,” says Stella, “and like, subconsciously they’re in our brains…”