There are groups that are assembled, and then there are groups that feel destined. SZN4, comprised of Donzell, Cameron, Katie, and Aaliyah, feel like they belong to the latter. The group which first gained attention from their time on Netflix‘s Building the Band. The streamer’s competition series centered around solo acts combining to pursue success as a group.
When we caught up with the group, Cameron doesn’t hesitate when asked if it feels real. “It absolutely feels real. Every performance, every time we get to just be in certain spaces, I’m just trying to take mental pictures of what the actual hell we’re doing. It’s everything that we dreamt of and we prayed for,” he says.
While many trace the group’s origin story back to the Netflix show, the real beginning came in a moment of pure creative electricity. Donzell traces it back to working on their cover of “Somebody That I Used to Know” by Gotye. “We were sitting there at the kitchen counter just going through it, and I was like, dang, this is actually crazy.” Cameron remembers the realization hitting during their first performance together describing it saying “I was like, wait, these aren’t just random people that were put together, you know, based off an algorithm or whatever that were destined to be in each other’s lives to make magic. So every time we continue to do that, it’s insane.” Aaliyah describes those early sessions as an almost out-of-body experience. “It felt like magic,” she says. “That’s the best word to describe it.”
The quartet acknowledges that being in a group is different from being solo. Donzell shares “You have to think about what Cameron would like to do, what Katie would like to do, what Aaliyah would like to do.” Cameron draws a line to the groups he grew up watching. “These are different people — but they became one. They became family. And that’s exactly what we’re doing” he explains, or as Aaliyah puts it, “There are four of us, and we each have a different story to tell. Somebody might relate to Donzell’s story, somebody might relate to Cameron’s or Katie’s. We’re real human beings at the end of the day, and we’re all going through stuff. To be able to share that in our music—I feel like it’s stuff that people need to hear.”
Their debut single “Back to Me,” announced that mission clearly. “We wanted an anthem,” Cameron says. “A song that was talking to our listeners and letting them know not only who we are and what we stand for, but that we’re in this industry and we’re not leaving anytime soon.” Then came “Closer,” and everything deepened. Pushing past 690,000 views in under a month, the shift was evident. “We started looking at music differently. We started getting more vulnerable, showing who we are inside the music. We put it all on the table.” Katie agrees saying “We were in a completely different headspace…more open to learning new things and more vulnerable in the studio.”
The, “Closer,” music video eventually became an internal milestone for the group. “I was just so confident in the work we’d put in. Every new element on set—the hair, the outfit, the lighting—I was in love with every single aspect of it,” Katie shared which Aaliyah echoes saying it felt like a shift. “It felt like we were entering a different era,” she says. “More locked in; more serious.” The shared sense of pride in the video is a common throughline in our conversation with the group. Cameron even chimes in “I cannot believe this is us. I love the idea that I can be 80, 90 years old and watch this video and be so proud of it.”
SZN4 has been moving through a number of events including award shows and red carpets, but certain moments stand out to them. Running into Kelly Rowland, meeting Ravyn Lenae (an artist Cameron had long admired) and more begin to collapse the distance between inspiration and reality. Donzell describes a new sense of confidence. Before the show, he was DoorDashing and close to walking away from music altogether. “I used to think I wasn’t supposed to be doing this,” he says. “But now it’s like—oh, this makes sense. This is where I always was supposed to be.” Cameron moves through it on his own terms. “I’m just doing me in this massive industry.” Katie sees the humanity in it now, “Most people who are in it are doing it because they love it.” And Aaliyah points to the pace of it all, “It’s constant. Every day. If you want it, you have to really, really want it bad. But seeing other people’s work ethic in those same environments just makes you want to put in the work ten times harder.”
When asked what feeling SZN4 would be, the answer comes quickly: change, and community. “Because we have four different backgrounds and personalities, people can see themselves in different parts of us. They feel automatically included,” Katie says. When Aaliyah weighs in, her answer is immediate: Real. “We are very much ourselves in everything that we do. We like to have fun, we like to joke, people don’t even really know that side of us. But yeah. Real.”
With new music on the way (a single first, then a full project), they’re trying to be deliberate about the rollout and protective of what they’re building. “I thought we had it with “Back to Me.” I thought we had it with “Closer.” But we continue to top ourselves sonically,” Cameron says. “We want our fans to have something they’re going to want to listen to for years and years,” Katie says. Donzell adds with a grin, “their kids’ kids listening to it.”
As for the songs that demand the most in performance, Cameron and Donzell arrive at the same answer without comparing notes: Closer. “It takes so much control,” Donzell says. Cameron agrees saying “It’s about mental preparation. After the performance, I want to be able to say: I did my big one. Because I felt it.” Katie names “Take It to the Grave,” for herself as it’s vocally demanding and emotionally loaded. Aaliyah circles back to “Closer.”
What they hope this moment will look like in ten or fifteen years is something simple: not something realized in hindsight, but something people still feel. They’re committed to staying intentional, to not rushing this process, and maintaining a sense of authenticity. SZN4 is in the middle of something; they’re sure of it. And hopefully listeners will too.
Photographer: Roman Udalov Stylist: Lisa Smith Craig Assistant Stylist: Essence Carson Make-Up: Apollo Barragan Hair: Cindy Zamora Nails: Amber Studer
A version of this story appears in the Summer issue of Groovevolt.
