Naïka and the art of not belonging

"My everlasting internal dilemma is my belonging,” Naïka reveals, which is understandable for someone who has lived a strikingly international life. Her tone is plainly accepting, as though she’s gotten used to explaining her frequently transitory background not only to others, but also to herself.

Born to a Haitian mother and French father, Naïka’s location was dictated by her father's work in renewable energy, which has seen her move between the Caribbean, Kenya, France, and South Africa. Every few years meant packing up and leaving to embark on a journey in a new country, as she tells me. Settling into a new school, learning a new language, and making new friends. "That's all I knew my whole life," she recalls. "We'd get somewhere, live there for three to four years, and then pack up and start over somewhere else." Unbeknownst to Naïka at the time, each move would add another layer to her identity, which she would ultimately come to appreciate wholly.

However, this all changed when Naïka’s father unexpectedly lost his job during her mid-teens. Her family settled in Miami, where Naïka was born but had never actually lived. Although Miami should have offered some level of familiarity, Naïka admits that it felt like arriving somewhere completely foreign. "For the first time, I had to come face to face with the question of my identity," she explains. "I was in a place that I was supposed to be from, and I felt so disconnected to and felt so lost and alien in."

"From that point on, there was always a bit of inner turmoil about where I belong, and who my community is. I never felt like I was enough of anything to be from somewhere,” she continues. “When I started making music, that was a bit of a stressful time, because I strive to be authentic. So, I was trying to figure out what angle I would take with my artistry and music. But little by little, with time, I started realising that instead of trying to find this one thing that doesn’t exist, I should just embrace all of it.”

Naïka’s desire to embrace every part of her experience has ultimately culminated in her debut album, ECLESIA, due for release in February. The name — suggested by her father — comes from an ancient Greek word meaning "a gathering, coming together of people,” as she tells me. “I thought that was so beautiful, and exactly the type of sentiment that I want to bring,” she smiles.

It’s fitting, as the album is eclectic by design. Across thirteen tracks, Naïka offers a thoughtful blend of pop sensibilities steeped in multicultural influences, sung across English, French, and Haitian Creole. "The album has a wide spectrum of different sounds, topics, and energies that fit so perfectly with who I am. ECLESIA is an introduction to what I truly have to bring to the table.”

The singles alone paint a vivid picture of the range within Naïka’s world. The smooth percussion of “Bloom” is punctuated by an almost buzzy key note against Naïka’s collected vocalising, creating something slightly off-kilter and engaging, an ode to her appreciation for subtle details. “Blessings” is drenched in tropical warmth, the production tinged with afrobeats influence. When Naïka sings, ”I should take my time, trust the signs, I decide all the blessings,” it feels meditative — a contrast to ”Matador”, which serves as a snappy, enticing curveball. It’s sung entirely in French, moving with quick, sleek rhythms.

Hearing Naïka navigate the language through her sound with such cool ease emphasises the artistry within her code-switching. It requires an intuitive gaze. Naïka’s multilingual approach to songwriting is organic; she doesn’t sit down and decide when a verse needs to be expressed in a different language in a calculated, organised way, but she lets the language emerge naturally from the emotion. Sometimes French captures a romantic inflection that English can't quite reach. Other times, a line demands the depth of Haitian Creole. "Different languages have their essence in a way," Naïka tells me. "Sometimes you can paint a more impactful picture with one language versus the other."

Naïka's intentional diversity is embedded in the very fabric of the album's creation. She worked with various producers across different continents, enlisting the help of her best friend to serve as executive producer, Kwame Kazy, who pitched in from the UK, and Sebastian Torres, who contributed while being split between Mexico, LA, and Europe. It’s Naïka's biggest project yet, and it embodies the global collaboration that she so passionately champions. "The people who were involved in this project were also from all different types of places," she notes. "I love that that essence was part of the creation of it."

Getting to the point of making a debut album with the kind of fluidity, expansiveness, and confidence that allows Naïka to express herself with such seamlessness was its own journey. Naïka went to Berklee College of Music to pursue her craft, and then moved to Los Angeles on her own in 2019. “I didn’t go into this career with any guidance or North Star,” she explains. “It was very much just chipping away and trying to figure out how to make my dreams come true since I was a kid. I left home at eighteen, moved to LA to make music and chase this dream, so it’s crazy to finally be here.”

Before writing ECLESIA, Naïka had taken the time to understand the sound that she wanted to convey. “I had always done EPs; they helped me develop my sound and figure out who I am as an artist,” she notes. Her ability to do so unexpectedly came from hitting a wall and realising that she’d have to rebuild things from the ground up. After releasing three EPs, Lost in Paradise Pt. 1 and Pt 2 in 2020/2021, and TRANSITIONS a year later, Naïka found that she was stuck. “To be fully honest with you, at the end of 2023, I was in a creative hole,” she admits. “I had to start all over and start my team all over from the ground up. Everything I was creating, I wasn’t happy with it. But I didn’t want to just disappear.”

By this point, Naïka had seen the way her work resonated with others in a rather monumental way. Her breakout came with “Sauce” in 2021, which was the backdrop of an Apple commercial and a FIFA video game, demonstrating that her songs could occupy major spaces. Tracks like "1+1" and "6:45" followed and began to find their audience, but it was “Layers" which dropped this year — initially just as a TikTok video — that truly crystallised her connection with fans who saw themselves reflected in her multicultural narrative. The song wasn't even meant to be a single, but its reach was undeniable.

"I was a bit nervous to even release it," Naïka admits. But when she did, it contextualised her impact more clearly. Fans created their own versions of the video, sharing where they were from, making the song their own. The track racked up over one million Spotify streams in its first month, all through word-of-mouth. "Not only were people resonating with it and identifying with it and feeling seen and comforted by the song," she says, still clearly moved by the response. "That's so special, because people are making it their own."

“Finding that so many people relate to being in between the lines has brought me so much comfort,” she continues. "I call it being an in-betweener, when you feel as though you don’t fully belong in one place. So many people don’t know how to pinpoint it or put it into words, so to be able to carry that narrative through my music and connect with people who feel that way has given me a lot of direction in what I’m doing.”

That emotional resonance is what has allowed her to create a space for nuance and conversation with ECLESIA. “I’m a very empathetic person, sometimes a bit too much,” she laughs. “I really hope to create a safe space with room for thought. Sometimes my songs can be more easygoing, but other times, you can dissect the lyrics and find a lot of complexity, thought, and detail behind them.”

“Having space for nuance is very important, especially nowadays. I feel like we’re very reactive and emotional, and things are very black and white, even though we live in a world that’s so complex. So I want to create a space to understand layers.”

So when Naïka found herself in a creative hole, she couldn’t just retreat — as evidenced by the two million fans behind her who crave that safe space. Instead, she released songs sporadically as she worked on rebuilding. She called her college friend Marta to help manage her, even bringing her father on board to help out. "I feel like it's a new beginning for me, this album,” she says, feeling settled in the new foundation that she has built.

Beyond the music, some of Naïka’s most meaningful work is happening off-camera. She is building foundations elsewhere — literally. She serves as an ambassador for Fleur de Vie, a Haitian NGO, actively helping to build schools in Haiti. They have two schools, one of which is currently three-quarters complete in the mountainous area of Anse-à-Veau, Naïka tells me, struck by the unfavourable conditions that the children are presently learning in. "The kids have been in a structure that's barely a structure," she explains. "Wooden sticks and tarps, you know. It's not only a safety hazard for the kids, but their equipment gets damaged when it's raining.”

“This is so important to me because education is the future,” she continues. “The kids of today are shaping the future of tomorrow; they're going to be the next leaders. So, education is fundamental.” However, she notes that in Haiti, children are at a disadvantage due to the lack of educational infrastructure. “It’s just a lack of opportunity. You’re cutting the seed before even giving it the opportunity to grow. I want to see Haiti stable; I want to see it rise and thrive in the way that all Haitians know that it can and will someday. One of the main driving forces for me wanting to succeed so much in what I do is so that I can have the resources to give back.”

Her commitment stems from a direct, almost glaring awareness of privilege. "The lottery of life is something that has always mind-boggled me," she reflects. "Just because I was born in a certain place, I have access to things that other people don't because they were born in a certain place. It’s something that troubles me that I’m very conscious of.”

Naïka is playing the long game with her work, building a career that is substantial enough to fund the change that she wants to see, aiming to create a brighter future for others. ECLESIA lays the groundwork for her to continue paving her way to success, and she’s hopeful for what’s to come: more collaborations, more pushing the limits of her sound. But for now, she is also comfortable with the idea of not having a play-by-play and just seeing where the universe is willing to take her.

"I'm just surrendering myself to the universe and to see where I'm going to go next in terms of the sound and what I'm going to create,” she says. Considering Naïka’s childhood was spent in constant motion, it's an approach that doesn’t feel so far-fetched.

She's built a career on refusing easy answers to difficult questions. Where is she from? Everywhere and nowhere. What genre does she make? All of them, depending on the day. Who is her audience? The “in-betweeners”, the people who have never easily fit into one definable box. With ECLESIA, Naïka has created a gathering place for everyone who has ever felt suspended between different worlds. And judging by the expanse of devoted fans around her, who have internalised her songs in ways of their own, the congregation is only growing — and she hopes for their experience of the new work to be just as engrossing.

"I hope people will listen to it from top to bottom," Naïka says of the album, her smile bright with a sense of achievement. "It'll take you to different places." Having moved between worlds with little recourse around what that meant for her identity, ECLESIA feels like a turning point for Naïka and the most honest depiction of her finding her way home.