Flyana Boss are plotting world domination. “We want to create a whole Flyana Boss world,” the pair tell Teen Vogue over brunch in L.A., joined by their videographer Evan Blum, who brings to life their instantly-iconic running video format. With the recent virality of their single “You Wish” on TikTok, that shouldn’t be too hard.
Bobbi LaNea and Folayan, who make up the hip-hop duo Flyana Boss, exude Black girl joy. Sitting at an outdoor table at Bacari in Sherman Oaks, Folayan is wearing her signature elf ears with dangling Cowerie shells and African beaded earrings. She’s giving a pan-African wood nymph vibe in a beige knit crop top, her hair nestled on top of her head in a messy bun and orange wrap with two single braids in the front secured at the bottom with wooden beads and seashells. Her style is effortless.
“What happened to the braids you had yesterday?” asked their publicist after seeing her new 'do. “It’s a wig,” she replied. The multi-faceted performer has become known for her eye-catching hair choices. That all tracks when at the end of brunch Folayan drops the bomb that her mom, a well-known and accomplished hair braider in Dallas, used to braid Erykah Badu’s hair. Folayan would sometimes help.
The yin to each other’s yang, Bobbi LaNea is effortlessly cool in a matching gray knit set, with her signature Herschel fanny pack slung across her chest. “Herschel needs to sponsor us, someone needs to reach out,” LaNea jokes. In a blink-and-you’d-miss homage to one of her inspirations Whoopi Goldberg, LaNea wears a pair of stud earrings with a picture of Ciely from The Color Purple on them. “They’re from Etsy,'' she tells me as I snap a quick picture.
The duo’s unique styles in both fashion and music have become a Flyana Boss calling card. You never know what fashion moments they’ll give, or where the next line in one of their catchy pop-culture reference-filled bars will take you. “When we're writing just us two together, I'll yell out something hard, she’ll yell out something,” LaNea says. “She'll say that's hard, I'll say that's hard, and we'll write it down and put it in the verse.”
That was the same formula used for “You Wish.” Working with up-and-coming producer Marky Style — “He touches everything we work on,” says Folayan — and writer Ellrod, the duo felt safe and heard. Skeptical about working with writers given past experiences with co-writers who didn’t cater to the duo’s vibe, their collaboration with Ellrod was a refreshing experience. “He matched our weird,” Folayan adds.
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Their weird has impassioned millions with schoolyard lyrics like “Hello Christ?/I’m ‘bout to sin again/I said I love you to that man but I’m not feelin’ him/I’m made of sugar, spice, kanekalon and cinnamon/Me and my bestie are the same/Like a synonym.” A calling card to Black girls everywhere and a meme in one, this verse and their accompanying running videos haven’t slowed down with their cultural impact. In the few weeks since we sat down in Los Angeles, the pair have since been featured on billboards in Times Square, snagged featured spots on Spotify and Youtube, and let the girls who don’t know in on what kanekalon means (Black girls, we know).
At their truest heart of hearts, Folayan and LaNea are two Black girls living their dreams of making music and inspiring other young Black people to be unapologetically themselves. Born in Dallas and Detroit respectively, they met in L.A. at the Musicians Institute on Hollywood Boulevard. The duo wouldn’t become besties or start making music together until later when Folayan moved to California and they had a reunion that was the creative spark that formed Flyana Boss. Since then, they’ve been a dynamic bestie duo looking to make people laugh and experience intense bouts of joy whenever they listen to their music.
Along with millions of viewers, the duo has already caught the eyes of icons like Lupita Nyong'o recreating the video in Paris, Keke Palmer posting on her Instagram story, and Missy Elliott — who the day before we meet went on a multi-tweet thread defending them against haters who had a problem with the multiple video releases for their single “You Wish.”
“It means a lot. Words can't describe it, you don't even have the words for it, but it means so much because we grew up loving and admiring her,” LaNea says of Elliott’s acknowledgment and support.
This was a part of the catalyst for the video's virality across socials; people hate-shared the videos, complaining about their “repetitiveness.” That’s how I initially found them — they’d been RT’d in my feed by another Black woman clapping back at haters and trolls on the girls' behalf. “Protect Flyana Boss at all costs” has become a rallying cry among Black women online who see these girls as trailblazers, doing what they love and having fun.
“People are already changing their names on Twitter to like Flyana Boss Stans or Flyana Boss Cousin or Protectors,” LaNea and Folayan share as we discuss the cultural marker their running videos have become. As natural-born besties are wont to do, the pair frequently finish each other’s sentences or respond in almost perfect unison. Trolls may think this was staged, that they’re trying to present as an aligned duo, but the pair exude authenticity in everything they do and say.
“I feel like when people see us, it's probably a little jarring because they don't see this type of Black girl joy expressed in such a viral way like this,” Folayan says.
Regarding the famous videos, the pair and their videographer Evan have kept the how of the video's execution on the low. As it’s now become their signature and sparked the “You Wish” trend across TikTok and Instagram, none have been able to fully replicate the chaos and precision of the original videos. What’s the secret? A combination of creativity and stamina.
I assumed the trio must have had a planning session to get the video logistics down, especially the run-ins by LaNea in her verse. You know what they say about assumptions, and what I assumed wasn’t the case at all. While filming the video for their song “Miss Me,” which involves them riding their bikes down the street while Evan captures them in a car, they decided to keep creating more videos.
“We were just like, what can we do on the street that we filmed the miss me shoot on?” Folayan says as she relays how the first video for “You Wish” came to be. “We all were like okay, maybe running. And then we're like, okay he needs to get in the car. He was like, no. I don't need to get in the car. I can run, I can do this.”
I look at Blum and he laughs. “You just run?” I ask. He’s quick to respond, “I used to play Lacrosse. Attack man.”
The pieces slowly came together as the trio explained how they got the first video down in one complete take and decided to post it. “I don't know who came up with it, but it was, Folayan goes and then I just hop in and then she hops out. Yeah, it kind of just happened all in the moment,” LaNea says.
“There was the first time and Bobbi got the hop in perfect,” Blum adds as the trio reminisces on their first try with the video. LaNea explains, “I stood down the street around where we thought I would come in and I had to run up and then just hop in. That's kind of how it normally goes, we just eye it. Sometimes I have to run with them."
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The second question on most people’s minds after seeing the videos is how they filmed in spots like Ikea and a grocery store chain.
“I keep bribe money on me just in case,” Blum jokes. But in reality, the videos happen so fast that most people in their vicinity don’t realize until it’s over. (Note: Flyana Boss recently came to the Teen Vogue offices and recorded a version of “You Wish” in about 15 minutes. People noticed.) In places like Disneyland and the Santa Monica Pier, people see they’re having fun and not terrorizing them for views like some people do. The only place there was some visible pushback was at the gym. At the end of the 24-second video, you can see an annoyed manager beginning to yell at them, but they're already out the door.
“So they generally will ask you to leave, but not only are we already leaving, we’re running,” Blum says as the trio laughs, remembering their only somewhat controversial video shoot. “We were in there for about maybe 22 seconds, so it’s not like we’re loitering, right?”
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The day before our brunch, the trio held a video shoot where they brought in Flyana Boss fans to join them. In a behind-the-scenes look, Blum runs half-backward, camera in hand, as the duo runs toward him, fans trailing and screaming along to the lyrics as LaNea and Folayan do what they do best.
That world domination may be coming sooner than later for Flyana Boss as every day brings a new video, brand deal, collab, or social media feature. “We have huge dreams. Fashion, TV, comedy, we want our own show,” says Folayan. LaNea adds, “We want to be the biggest duo in the world.”
