Five months after winning Best Rap Performance at the Ghana Music Awards, Strongman has turned inward. “Everlasting”, featuring the singer Ayisi, came out on Friday, 2 October 2026, with a lyric video on Strongman’s YouTube channel and the song now on Apple Music. It runs 3:39, and after singles with titles like “The Legacy” and “The Statement”, this one is about faith.
Ayisi sets the tone on the hook, in English:
The air in my lungs when I am drowning
The faith in my heart still burns for me
They are the plainest lines in the song, and they set up everything Strongman says around them.
The credits
The production is by Apya, according to the description on the lyric video, and the song comes out under Strong Empire, the label Strongman now runs himself. As of Friday it is on Apple Music, with other platforms expected to follow. The full lyrics are printed in the video’s description, which makes it easy to follow the Twi even if your Asante is rusty.
What Strongman is saying
Strongman raps mostly in Twi, and “Everlasting” is no different, though he slips into English for some of his sharpest lines. One of them sets the mood for the first verse: “Street no nyɛ restaurant but everyone is on the run”. The street is not a restaurant, and nobody is sitting down to eat.
Another is a warning to anyone who thinks his life looks easy from outside: “You wish you were in my shoes, nso wo nnim me shoe size”. You want to be in his shoes, but you don’t even know his size.
Running through all of it is gratitude. “Yɛnkɔ da Awurade ase”, he raps: let us go and thank the Lord. Coming from a rapper whose catalogue includes an album called God and Rap, that is not a new subject, but here it is the whole point of the song.
Strongman’s year so far
Strongman, born Osei Kwaku Vincent, is from Buokrom in Kumasi. He came up through radio freestyle contests in 2010 and 2011 and won the first edition of The Next Big Thing in GH Rap in 2012. He later signed to Sarkodie’s Sarkcess Music, released his debut album Buokrom Boy in 2019, and has since gone independent with Strong Empire.
2026 has been a big year for him. In May he won Best Rap Performance at the 27th Ghana Music Awards for “Mensei Da”. That category also included Sarkodie’s “Violence”, Medikal’s “Welcome to Africa” and Ko-Jo Cue’s “Abebrese”, which tells you how strong the competition was.
The singles have kept coming since. “The Legacy” arrived in May, “Yaanom” with Tinny in August and “The Statement” in September. He also turned up on “I” with Lalid, from Kelvyn Boy’s album 2nd Step, in late September. “Everlasting” is his first single since the award with a singer on the hook.
Who is Ayisi?
Ayisi is Emmanuel Kwadwo Oware, born on 21 July 1986 in Accra, with roots in Akosombo in the Eastern Region. He started recording in 2004 at Presbyterian Boys’ Secondary School. He found his love of music through his father, a drummer in a band who kept a large record collection. For years he recorded as A.I before switching to Ayisi.
Many rap fans know his voice from Ko-Jo Cue’s records. He was on “Tsioo Benke Mi” in 2016, still as A.I, then “Wo Nsa Be Ka” on For My Brothers in 2019 and “Onipa Hia Mmoa” on KANI: A Bantama Story last year. His own catalogue runs from the Mixtape Mayhem tape in 2014 through the Headstrong EP, Linkop and The Unbroken to Evergreen 2.0, which came out in December 2025. In 2026 he has been putting out jazz reworkings of the Evergreen songs.
He is often called one of Ghana’s most underrated voices. A Strongman single is about as good a platform as that reputation could ask for.
Our first take
“Everlasting” plays to both men’s strengths. Strongman writes dense Twi verses that reward a second listen with the lyrics in front of you, and Ayisi has spent years singing the hooks on rap records. A faith song with a hook about breathing while you drown is exactly where those two skills meet.
It is also a smart move after an award year. A Best Rap Performance win invites a victory lap, and Strongman has chosen a song about gratitude instead.
Where to listen
Play the preview on the “Everlasting” song page, and find more from Strongman on his AfroYard profile.
