Stella Quaresma calls the making of Therapy at the Club a crash course in making music. Six months of work, and by the end of it FLO had learned to trust their own judgement.
The trio, made up of Quaresma, Jorja Douglas and Renée Downer, came into the industry as teenagers. They broke through in 2022 with Cardboard Box and have since taken Best R&B/Soul Act at the 2026 MOBO Awards. Their debut, Access All Areas, was nominated for Best Progressive R&B Album at this year’s Grammys.
The numbers behind them are substantial: more than five million monthly listeners on Spotify and 1.2 million followers on TikTok. The campaign around the second album has included an NPR Tiny Desk performance that passed a million views, along with appearances on some sizeable US podcasts, which has gone some way to reintroducing them in America.
“It felt like we went to university and graduated with honours,” Quaresma says.
Doing it themselves
On this record the three were involved at every stage, from writing and vocal arrangements through to production calls.
Douglas says the shift has produced an odd side effect. Sometimes you walk out of a session, she says, and people seem surprised that you contributed anything, that you had ideas at all.
Quaresma puts part of that down to how they operated at the start, when they deferred to the writers and producers in the room. They were fine with that at the time, she says, but they no longer need that sort of crutch.
Downer thinks the extra control has produced their truest record. They are a lot more grown up, she says, and much more involved, which makes this the best reflection of who they are right now.
Heartbreak on a night out
Love has always been FLO’s subject. Here they go after its less tidy side, using nights out as the setting for songs about heartbreak, recovery and friendship.
The title track puts it plainly: go ahead and kiss who you want, whatever the trauma, and if you fall out of love, try therapy at the club.
For Quaresma the title ended up standing for what friends do in bad moments. You are having the worst time of your life, she says, and your friends tell you that you are coming out anyway, you are going to dance, and you will forget about it for a while.
R&B is still the foundation, though they pushed harder towards pop this time. Quaresma says the album taught her how much fun blending genres can be, and what it takes to build really big pop songs. Remedied is one result, co-written with Amy Allen, the Grammy-winning songwriter behind work for Sabrina Carpenter and Tate McRae.
Writing apart
On Access All Areas the three wrote together. This time they went away separately and brought finished ideas back to each other.
Quaresma says that changed how she hears her bandmates. You do not fully appreciate each other’s talent when you are writing in a room with ten people, she says. Going off, writing, then showing each other what you made was something else.
The same method shaped the album’s collaborations, of which there are only two. Sex in Peace is their second track with British R&B singer kwn, and Quaresma wrote it before taking it to the others.
Downer says the pairing has become instinctive. The two acts work well together on sexier R&B, she says, so sending it over and asking for a verse felt obvious. It came back fast. They had no notes and loved it.
Everything else
The music is only part of what they are building. Choreography, visuals and videos were all in play while the album was being made.
Douglas says the aim is for everything to move up together. As they raise the level on vocals, music and how they look, she says, the videos and the dancing have to come with it.
That means long rehearsals and not much sleep, which she seems entirely at peace with, calling it the most thrilling, entertaining and fulfilling job they could have asked for.
Ask what success looks like over the next year and there is no pause at all.
“We want it all,” Quaresma says.
Douglas agrees, then itemises it: the shows, the numbers, the awards, the love, the success.
