From The Supremes, The Ronettes, The Emotions, Pointer Sisters and Sister Sledge to En Vogue, Xscape, SWV, TLC and Destiny’s Child, among others, all-girl R&B groups have always been a real musical force to be reckoned with. But, in more recent years these type of sisterhoods have, sadly, sort of fallen by the wayside.
However, fret no more, the latest act to emerge utilizing this same exact recipe-for-success dynamic and following in the famous footsteps of their multi-platinum predecessors are Bernie, Gabby and Tiara, collectively known as H3RIZON (pronounced Horizon).
The trio recently released a double single, which they recorded on a trip not long ago which found them in Atlanta with legendary producer C. “Tricky” Stewart and the SESSIONS ATL team. The songs, “Naughty” and “Wanna Love You” showcases just a bit of what’s to come from these women.
Collectively, they’ve been releasing music since 2019, but in 2023 they inked a deal with Epic Records. Much more is on the way from H3rizon. We caught up with the trio to talk about the new music and much more. Check it out in our H3rizon interview below…
We can proudly say that we are the first Asia-Pacific girl group to be signed to Epic Records / RZ3 Recordings! To us, it’s an incredible achievement and a testament to all our hard work, especially after being an independent girl group for over 5 years. Despite the risks and the fear of the unknown, we committed to this career because we all knew we wanted to aim for a moment like this, and when Tricky Stewart found us and took us under his wing, we finally felt like we’d found the right person; someone who is so well respected in the industry and would guide us in the right direction, and through him we were able to sign the major record deal…so we’re incredibly grateful and excited for this new chapter together!! – H3RIZON
Parlé Mag: Know it’s been a few years in the making, tell us how did it all begin for H3RIZON?
H3RIZON: We were brought up in Filipino households… we’ve been singing since we could hold the karaoke microphone! We actually met over 10 years ago, performing the Filo community event circuit. Backstage, we’d end up jamming and harmonizing together instead of rehearsing our own songs. Eventually our parents decided to help us by finding us a mentor / coach who eventually convinced us we were good enough to REALLY DO THIS, and that’s when we decided to officially do the Girl Group thang!!
Parlé Mag: Let’s hop right into this double single, “Naughty” / “Wanna Love You” — Tell me how this particular track came about?
TIARA: “Naughty” was actually the first song we recorded when we first got to Atlanta. When we first heard the song, we knew straight away it would be a party banger and we were so excited to record it, however, it was also the perfect song for us to kickstart our intense back-to-back recording trip.
”Wanna Love You” on the other hand, was a very different story. We had just spent the entire day recording another song, it’s now extremely late at night and we had just started to record “WLY”…until 5am the next day! When we left the studio, we were saying how we weren’t exactly proud of our performance, we thought “maybe we were too tired to make the song great.” We came back to the studio the next day, with fresh ears, and listened to the song…and it’s now one of our favorite tracks ever!!
Parlé Mag: What led to your current inking with Epic Records?
H3RIZON: While we were in ATLANTA, TRICKY invited a few labels to the studio to meet with us and to hear the 14 songs we’d recorded. Meeting with EPIC for that first time was particularly memorable as we’d just finished recording the A CAPPELLA track “YOU DON’T KNOW NOTHIN’” and the big boss asked us to perform it live, which we’d never done before… like, we had literally just finished recording it the day before, with more than 3 lines of harmonies. So we were really put on the spot, but we apparently blew them away! The rest… the trip to L.A. to go to the actual SONY EPIC Office and put pen to paper, you can see on our social media platforms!!
Parlé Mag: Now y’all are natives of Sydney, Australia, correct? So growing up in “Emerald City,” who do you all consider to be your strongest musical influences?
H3RIZON: Proud to say, we’re all Western Sydney girlies! Our strongest musical influences probably came from our parents and how we were brought up. Tiara was definitely inspired by the DIVAS; Whitney, Celine, Xtina, Destiny’s Child and especially the RnB artists of the ‘90’s. Tiara is now inspired by multi-faceted artists like Victoria Monét, Beyoncé, Teyana Taylor who are out there not only singing, but dancing, acting, managing being mums and entrepreneurs.
Gabby has more of a classical background; originally inspired by musical superstars like Lea Salonga, but definitely became invested in RnB girl groups of the ‘90’s when her choral training got her into A CAPPELLA and more harmony driven vocals.
Bernie’s influences definitely came from her parents and mentors with ‘90’s RnB, the girl groups, SWV, En Vogue and Destiny’s Child and boy bands like Boyz II Men and Jodeci. Now, with Vocal Production being a huge love, she’s heavily inspired by artists who are part of their writing and production process like Chloe Bailey and Janelle Monáe.
Parlé Mag: Now from an individual standpoint, what do each of you bring to the table both personality-wise and creatively?
H3RIZON: With our different musical backgrounds and upbringings, we definitely bring unique things to the group. The process of creating music with each other is such a fun process especially when we have Gabby’s classical music background, Tiara’s RnB influences and Bernie’s vocal production expertise. And not to mention, we love creating harmonies and playing around with A CAPPELLA techniques. And personality-wise, we have different traits that perfectly fit together! Tiara is our baddie and troublemaker, but is our biggest ride or die. Bernie has her childish humor, but is motherly whenever the other girls are sick or hurt. And Gabby is the girl with sassy (and) sarcastic humor, but is deeply caring and will make sure you never forget to put on sunscreen everyday!!
Parlé Mag: How do you all classify your overall sound?
H3RIZON: We’re all about RnB / Pop! And, we love how broad the genre is because there’s so many ways for us to fuse it with other styles, which allows us to bring our different musical backgrounds to the table. We also want to show off our A CAPPELLA roots, which is not only seen in our covers on social media, but also our official releases. We started off strong with our release of “You Don’t Know Nothin’,” and knowing us, we’ll keep reminding our fans just how much we love A CAPPELLA in our future albums!!
Parlé Mag: Where does the group’s moniker originally derive from?
H3RIZON: Our name, H3RIZON, is inspired by a saying we all live by: “she’s got her hands on the wheel and her eyes on the horizon.” And to us, this means to never lose sight of who we are and our goals in the end. And the first syllable in our name is “her” with a number 3 replacing the “e” because we’re a female trio all about empowering women!
Parlé Mag: What do you all feel will be the ultimate key to your longevity? And what will it be then that will continue to sustain you all in this business?
H3RIZON: We feel that the key to our longevity is not only our friendship with each other, but also our mutual passion for music and our strong dedication to the group, especially during our independent stage before we got signed to a major label. We were independent artists for 5 years and during that time, we all had to make sacrifices like quitting our jobs and dropping out of university to become full-time independent artists. We’ve gone through some difficult conversations with our parents about this, but we’re all so lucky that they’ve been continuously supportive of us and our decisions. And to finally be signed to a label is a testament to all our hard work, and with our goals aligned, we can go full speed ahead especially knowing we had each other’s backs during the highs and lows of being independent artists!
Parlé Mag: What do you all want people to get from your music?
H3RIZON: During our time recording in Atlanta, Tricky Stewart imparted some wisdom to us, saying he wants us to create hits that will help define the era that we’re currently in, so that in 10 or 20 years time when someone listens to our music, they’ll immediately think, “that’s 2020’s H3RIZON!” We want our fans to feel that our music is timeless for them, and feel a sense of nostalgia when they listen to our music in the future.
Parlé Mag: If you all could collaborate with any one artist, living or dead, who would it be and why?
Gabby: I would love for us to collaborate with H.E.R. because she’s a phenomenal artist I have looked up to for years. Growing up, I definitely saw a lot of myself in her, and I feel like it’d be an insane cross-over of just all-female Filipina energy!
Bernie: I’d love to one day collaborate with Victoria Monét! I just think she’s one of the most well-rounded artists out there. I admire her penmanship, her exquisite vocals, her stage presence, her dance skills, basically everything she’s doing as an artist!! I also love that she’s written for other artists, too, in her career, which I hope to do more of in mine.
Tiara: I think it would be a really cool opportunity to release some sort of RnB classic with Giveon. I’ve always loved the idea of having a really beautiful ballad of some sort with an amazing male artist.
Parlé Mag: If you all could play any venue in the world, which one would you choose and why?
Gabby: I’d say it’d be a pretty insane full circle moment if we performed at Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney. I remember every single concert I’ve attended there, and thinking how incredible it’d feel to be the artist up on that stage singing in front of thousands of people. I’m putting it out there right now, I think I’d bawl my eyes out the day it happens.
Bernie: Wembley Stadium is one of my dream venues. It’s hosted so many major events, especially the Live Aid concert in 1985. To perform on a stage where countless iconic artists have performed on would be one of the greatest milestones for me!
Tiara: Definitely the Superbowl Halftime show. It’s always the most exciting 15 mins of my life whenever I watch someone else do it, so I just KNOWWWW we’re gunna smash it one day.
Parlé Mag: What’s an average day like for you all?
H3RIZON: Our day-to-day schedule varies a lot depending on what we have planned; from song-arranging, to singing or dance rehearsals, filming content, getting in the studio to write and record, rehearsing for our upcoming shows, and all while balancing time for ourselves to prioritize our health and well being. We take time management very seriously, and every part of the process is crucial to making ourselves the best artists we can be.
Parlé Mag: Please discuss how you all interact with and respond to fans…
H3RIZON: Our fans are SO important to us, without them we wouldn’t be in the position we’re at today. We interact with our fans daily by liking and responding to their comments, sharing their stories and posts, messaging them in our DM’s; we truly like to build personal connections with our day ones, because as an artist, they are people that you never forget. We’ve even sent personal videos and FaceTimed a number of our fans to tell them face-to-face how much we appreciate them for their ongoing support, it really motivates and inspires us to see them love what we do!
Parlé Mag: What advice would you all have for someone wanting to follow in your footsteps?
H3RIZON: To the people who’ve been following our journey or you’re reading this and only finding out about us now…if you resonate with our story, we want you to know that you can achieve anything you put your mind to. As Western Sydney girls, we’ve worked extremely hard and continue to push ourselves to be better, and ultimately we want to make our community proud and show that there’s no limits to what you can accomplish if you just keep going and never give up. And in the process, always stay grounded, always remain humble and always be grateful for the people around you that help build you up.
Parlé Mag: Lastly, what’s next for H3RIZON?
H3RIZON: We’re on the road to releasing our first ever EP very soon this year! We’ll also be travelling a lot, and you may or may not see us touring in the next few months, so stay tuned on all our socials to find out more 😉
Stay Connected with H3RIZON
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