With “To Cry A Flood” Nonso Amadi Expands His R&B Repertoire 

Like his debut album’s title—Where it Blooms—To Cry a Flood, the title of Nonso Amadi’s latest EP buzzes with dramatic flair. In another world, it’s the title of a tragic film or a deeply stirring painting. In the cover art, we see Nonso Amadi splayed on a glassy ocean. The sun, a tiny orifice of light, has streaked the water with amber, so that it looks like molten glass transmuting into its solid form. Nonso Amadi looks to be at the cusp of drowning, and the warm streaks of sunlight separating his conciliatory face from the darkness that has cloaked the rest of his body give the scene a kind of morbid look. What does it really mean to cry a flood and why is he crying a flood?

The surprising thing about To Cry a Flood is that it pays no mind to these epistemological questions or how the title suggests an exploration of toxic love or heartbreak. Even more surprising is the fact that the songs on the project run counter to the haunting atmosphere that the cover, taken together with the title, conjures. To Cry a Flood is in large measure Nonso Amadi’s most expansive exploration of Afropop. As such the project revels in a, mostly, jaunty atmosphere. The vast majority of Nonso Amadi’s canon exults in syrupy R&B numbers that plumb the depths of emotional angst and tortured romance. So in a sense, To Cry a Flood represents a new chapter for him. One that has already started to usher in new milestones for the preternaturally gifted singer. Pillow, a delightfully whimsical Afropop song in which he compares his muse to Rihanna and sings about her love for materialistic things, recently cracked the top 20 of Apple Music NG’s Top songs chart—a first in his decade-long career. 

When Nonso Amadi rose to prominence in 2019, the air seemed tinged with magic. The same magic he easily conjures with the slinkering melodies that sluice through his discography. This magic was only further amplified by the movement that was washing over the Nigerian music scene: R&B, Mellow Afropop, and Alternative Music had become ascendant. Cruel Santino, formerly known as Santi, dropped his magnum opus Mandy and the Jungle, and Odunsi released Rare. Tems’ Try Me and Mr Rebel were proliferating with religious fervor. And the triumvirate of Rema, Joeboy, and Fireboy were painting the genre of Afrobeats with softer and more frothy brushstrokes. 

Against this colorful backdrop came Nonso Amadi’s Tonight. With its cinematic lyrics and memorable hook, the song felt like a callback to the golden age of Nigerian R&B. Think Styl-Plus’ Olufunmi or P-Square’s Ifunaya. Nonso Amadi had conceived the song shortly after walking in on his mom watching a movie on African Magic. A character had a gun pointed at her cheating partner. This scene takes on new life in the overture of Tonight. “My girl, she got a gun in her hand/ And she keeps warning a man,” he sings over a gorgeous self-produced beat. The song immediately took over the airwaves, establishing him as one of the most prodigious artists in the country.

In Sorry in Advance, one of the few melancholy songs on his latest EP Where it Blooms, we get a reprisal of the cinematic atmosphere of Tonight. Over an unbelievably tender production, Nonso Amadi thrusts us headfirst into the bubbling cauldron of a strained relationship. Here he affects remorse but still makes room for future lapses. He starts out apologizing for being inconsistent: “I had all the right intentions/ Words don’t add up with my actions/ I’ve been trying to make fireworks with you.” You feel the sincerity in his voice wrap around you. If this were a romcom, you’d be tacitly pleading for his lover to take him back. Moments later, the sincerity he evinced turns to ash when with grating nonchalance he sings: “Girl I’m sorry in advance/ If I f*ck up, I might fuck .”

For all the dramatic thrust Sorry in Advance supplies, the real pleasure of To Cry A Flood owes something to the project’s masterful reinterpretation of Afropop. True to Afropop tradition, lyricism takes the backseat to punchy melodies and earworm flows. Drown and Like Me, featuring Taves, find this motif at its peak. Consider where he straddles the disparate themes of finding solace in the waist of a woman and surmounting life’s vicissitudes. Towards the end of the first verse he segues into a beautifully composed flow: “Constance/ Nobody know my circumstance/ I enter moto but na one chance/ Na why I no dey show when dem come find me.” Alone these lyrics barely make any sense but the flow they establish and the precision with which they explore pockets within the production make them incredibly potent. To Cry A Flood delights in many such moments. The result is a project that feels like a cold, satisfying drink in the fraught times we currently inhabit.