There was a brilliant moment on one of the last Graham Norton Show episodes of 2025. “Your mother named you ‘Absolutely’?” a concerned-sounding Matthew McConaughey asked the fast-rising alt-pop singer, who was sitting alongside Dwayne Johnson and her big sisters RAYE and Amma. Chaos descended as she clarified that Absolutely was a stage name, prompting McConaughey to enquire as to its origins. “Tequila,” Johnson joked.
Primetime television spots are still a relatively new phenomenon for the artist born Abby-Lynn Keen. Today, I find her sitting in a quiet room backstage at her label offices; she jumps up to greet me with a hug as I walk in, her hair a mass of scarlet locks piled high on top of her head. A pair of knee-high suede boots are placed at one end of the sofa, a groaning rack of wardrobe options on the other. I interviewed Keen’s big sister Rachel, the pop star we know and love as RAYE, back when she was around 19, two years younger than Keen is now. It’s striking to see her up close – the family resemblance is impossible to miss. Born to a Swiss-Ghanaian mother and English father, they share the same high forehead, strong jaw, and almond-shaped, liquid brown eyes that seem to reach into your very soul. Both sisters have the capacity to disarm, in different ways: RAYE is wonderfully brash and bold, a chatterbox, while Keen is so shy I find myself talking more gently, out of fear of startling her.
