Nigerian singer-songwriter EKENE opens up about the weight of a failing relationship on his emotionally raw new single titled “Relations,” featuring Braye.
For anyone who has followed EKENE’s journey, this territory feels familiar. Since sharing his earliest songs on SoundCloud back in 2019, he has built a reputation around sitting inside uncomfortable emotions rather than running from them. His debut EP, Little Us, unpacked family trauma and a fascination with mortality across seven tracks. So “Relations” continues that same thread, except this time the focus shifts entirely to romantic entanglement and the difficulty of walking away from something that clearly isn’t working.
The Story Behind the Song
What makes this record interesting is the story behind its creation. EKENE has shared that the song came together almost by accident, during a songwriting camp in Ghana where he ended up working from an Airbnb alongside Braye and another collaborator named Duke. Out of that casual setting came a conversation about staying in a relationship purely because of how much time and effort had already gone into it. That idea – the emotional version of sunk cost – became the backbone of “Relations.”
How Braye Fits In
Braye’s presence on the track isn’t incidental either, since he was part of the very session that produced the song. That shared history gives the collaboration a lived-in feel rather than a standard feature arrangement. Both artists seem to understand the emotional stakes of the song from the inside, and that familiarity translates into a performance that feels honest rather than performed.
Where Relations Sits in EKENE’s Catalogue
This single arrives not long after “Red Benz,” a track that explored secretive romance with a similar sense of unease running underneath it. Taken together, both songs suggest EKENE is deep into a creative period focused on relationships and the discomfort that often comes with them. He has said before that he wants listeners to actually sit with their emotions instead of rushing past them, and “Relations” asks exactly that of anyone who presses play.
For listeners who have ever stayed in something past its expiry date, “Relations” will feel uncomfortably familiar. Go stream it now across all major platforms and decide for yourself whether staying or leaving ever gets easier.
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