Fifth Harmony has already defied the odds -- by selling nearly half-a-million albums in a career launched on TV's The X Factor less than five years ago, by scoring two top five Billboard Hot 100 hits ("Worth It” in 2015 and "Work from Home” earlier this year) and by proving that the group, constructed on the whim and A&R savvy of Simon Cowell and developed with the seasoned industry know-how of Epic Records chairman L.A. Reid, has a purpose in the pop world. So how did things turn so sour?
In what's been a volley of she said/they said statements over the last 72 hours, following the girl group's routine performance at their final Jingle Ball stop in Miami on Dec. 18, Fifth Harmony members Ally Brooke, 23, Normani Kordei, 20, Dinah Jane, 19, and Lauren Jauregui, 20, announced via social media that Camila Cabello had, in their words, "decided to leave” the group. The unexpected statement was followed by Cabello's own response that, "Saying that I was 'leaving the group' is simply not true,” Harmonizers, as their fans are known, have taken to social media to express their confusion over what really led to the act's downsizing from five to four. At the same time, many in the industry are wondering what happens to the hashtag-christened "Fourth Harmony” from here -- especially considering the label is staring down a deadline at the end of December by which the company has to decide whether to pick up the group's option for a third full-length album (Epic Records has not commented on the status of the deal; reps for Fifth Harmony and Cabello declined further comment).
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