“This record was written after an extended period of illness (long COVID) in 2021, reflecting on how being sick suddenly gave an urgency to my understanding of the body I live in — suddenly seeing my body from the inside out, not the other way around. While writing this, I sought to share my physical and psychological experiences during the period of illness, as well as reflections in the period thereafter — I mark January 2022 as the end of my long-COVID (although there are some persistent, but manageable, aftereffects). In this record, I contend with this time that I became so aware of the body, and noting that even after, there’s a trauma of illness that remains within you, both in the physical places that it existed; and in the mind. However, in the first track, I foretell that I do get better, and in the final track, I confirm it. The music is not only about the pain and the weight accompanied with being sick; but it is about the appreciation of the body, and how it understands hope and patience before we ourselves believe it.

Needless to say, the process of writing a record that was so close to my physical and emotional pain has been a difficult one. I was never sure how close to my pain I wanted to share. Yet, there has been something interesting to remark about the process. To want to share a painful story is to also to curious ways to protect yourself as you do so: looking towards methali (Swahili proverbs) to nourish the lyrics; asking text-to-speech to say phrases you struggle to repeat; recording stream-of-consciousness voice notes so that you don’t have to sit long in thoughts; and to find, in sound — from field recordings, to dreamy improvisations by musical friends — a way to express visceral feelings and noisy thoughts.

Part of this, too, is the thematic undercurrent of water, which, à la my first record, peace places: kenyan memories, was a place of solace during the illness. Field recordings of water in different states — a river in Ngurumo, cracking ice, a tap dripping; being submerged underwater — flow throughout the work, and I also wanted to point towards Kikuyu homeopathy, where river therapy was particularly prescribed to women who were struggling mentally. There’s also a nod to the symbolism of healing water in the biblical context of the River Jordan (in the final piece, “Nazama” — “I sink” in Swahili). Lastly, it is reflected in the artwork for the cover; a painting by South Asian visual artist and dear friend Serena Seshadri, from her collection of paintings, “Someone Between Body and Water”. I couldn’t take my eyes off her work when I saw it. It felt like a reflection of the record: the body being as much water as it is body; and the water being as much body as it is water. 

There is a lot to say about being sick, about being sick during a pandemic; about how the world treats you if you are sick for longer than “just a cold”. There is also a lot to say about feeling understood in online communities (I see you and appreciate you, r/longcovid) but not by doctors, and about how things change even when you get better. But I think this is a good place to stop. I am ever in awe of our bodies, and how they keep going, despite and in spite of all the pain we go through in life. In a way, this album is an expression of love, and gratitude, to my own.”

–Nyokabi Kariũki