I see this issue was long ago brought up - Bug #306260, 13 years ago. Said bug is archived, so I cannot reopen it.
I verified this by:
# mkdir /etc/ncmpc
# echo host=fake.example.com > /etc/ncmpc/config
# exit
$ ncmpc
It still connects to localhost. However,
# mkdir /usr/etc
# mv /etc/ncmpc /usr/etc
# exit
$ ncmpc
tries to connect to fake.example.com
