“Strings of Solace” is Nsikak David’s Way of Sharing His Peace and Spirituality with the World

After every performance, the first thing Nsikak David looks for is a quiet place to disappear. Usually, for the Nigerian guitarist, famous for working with stars like Rema, Show Dem Camp, Tems, Davido, and Burna Boy, that quiet place is his hotel room, tucked away from the chaos common at the end of energetic performances. 

“Most times I'm out there being an artist, and there's just too much noise for me that sometimes I just need a break and I go into my shell,” Nsikak shares.

But solace isn’t the only thing Nsikak finds during these quiet times. As he tells OkayAfrica, a few days before the release of his debut solo project, Strings of Solace, these moments of solitude have also served as moments of great inspiration. Many of the tracks on this new project were first conceived in this period of solitude.

The tracks on this EP, which is soothing and features no singing, just instrumentations, are named after cities and or feelings. There is Nairobi, the third track, which features an upbeat drum and guitar composition. It’s a song that brings to mind the calming feeling of a sunny afternoon as one rides through a vibrant, new city. The last song, titled Home, is sparse, gentle, and builds up slowly to a groovy beat. It’s a song that is dense with emotion, perfectly capturing the sense of waking up early in the morning in a house you have returned to after a long time away. Featuring only two collaborators, Seun Kuti and Violinist Raaginder, Nsikak manages to explore a side of Nigerian music that allows the beat to do all the talking.

Whenever he is observing post–performance alone time, Nsikak listens to whatever city he is in at the moment, allowing his mind to sift through all the events of his day till he arrives at a point of inspiration.

On this EP, Nsikak captures that feeling of solitude with great clarity. Where a work that thematically engages with solitude might have veered into a melancholic state, Nsikak manages to make reflection joyful. The songs on the project feature a blend of gentle but often upbeat strings, soft drums, and soulful horns, translating into a melodic, syrupy escape. Because the tracks feature no singing and are driven by Nsikak’s original instrumentations, Strings of Solace still manages to say warm and powerful things. That it is okay to slow down, that sometimes, there is no greater delight than getting lost in music that has no words to give. 

“I want to be able to listen to this project and feel healing. I feel like music is such an amazing tool that it kind of heals people,” Nsikak explains. “I really want people to feel like, after this project, I was healed of something, and it brings some calm to me. That is a very core intention for me.”

Nsikak shares some of the key ideals and ideas, from cities to practices, that helped shape this project:

Travel

The conception of this project was me moving places. We had different tours that I've been on, and it was me moving from, say, Amsterdam to Paris, say, to Lisbon, etc. Sometimes I just get there, and I kind of feel some kind of connection to the place, sometimes it’s not even a musical connection – just my emotional state at the moment when I got to the city. Sometimes it's me listening to the city and seeing how quiet or how beautiful it is. That way, the sounds emerge from all the things that happen. Those things were instrumental in shaping the project. My favorite city remains Lagos, because it feels like home, especially after moving through different places and going everywhere. It just feels like I’m back home. And I always want to get back home. 

Lagos

I didn't grow up in Lagos; I was born in Port Harcourt, while originally from Akwa Ibom, but Lagos is where my music career picked up from properly, so I would say the city shaped most of the things that I've listened to, and that I’ve learned musically. Sometimes we say “Lagos is chaotic”, but I feel like inside the chaos, you can still find some kind of peace in Lagos if you look for it.

My Guitar

I use my guitar as a way to create a voice. I want people to listen to a project where I'm not saying anything, but you can understand that I'm trying to say something. Most times, people do not really get to see how these instruments speak to people because it’s often overshadowed by lyrics. I want to be able to communicate without saying words. The people who have listened to the project could understand what I was communicating, and that was validating, because that’s exactly what I wanted to do. I lean on the sound of the guitar in a way that can help me pass a message across to people, without me trying to do gymnastics or show off. I'm trying to make people know that I'm such an amazing guitarist, which I am, by the way. I want you to listen to the calm in the music I'm making. And generally, it's not just the guitars in the bass playing, it's in the drum playing, and the whole general project is just me.

Solitude and Quiet

When you listen to the album from the beginning to the end, you’ll find peace in it. You’ll find a lot of quiet moments, too. I usually found this solace after my shows, where I would go to my hotel and just listen to the city while taking time for myself. One experience that encapsulated that feeling of solitude came when I travelled to see my parents back home in Akwa Ibom. The kind of peace that I felt was one I hadn’t felt in a long time. I would say that home generally brings me peace, and what spans through the project are feelings of reflection, much similar to that period. It's a truly reflective project for me.

Spirituality

I'm a spiritual guy. I am often led by a strong spirit, and that spirit has always guided me through my most important life moments, including the decision to release this project now. It just felt right. I’ve had other projects that I've done, but never released. But for this, everything was just compelling to me to put it out. My spirituality has shaped how I view things. For me, there's no rush. I don’t feel led to do things because everybody's doing it, because I know I'm not on that kind of path. I feel like the spirit kind of just guides me through all this. But when it's the right time, everything just has its way of piecing together, and you can just tell that it's something divine. So I think for this project, everything was just as it was supposed to be; I was speaking to the right people, and different things were aligning with little effort.