GRAMMY® Winner Matt B Finds His Way Home on ALKEBULAN III: THE WATER REMEMBERS
“Matt B’s latest project, ALKEBULAN III: The Water Remembers, is a musical journey from generations of separation to reconnection.” — Rolling Stone Africa
Some albums begin with a melody. For Matt B, ALKEBULAN III: The Water Remembers began with a question: Where do I come from? What started with an AncestryDNA® test six years ago eventually led the GRAMMY® Award-winning artist from Los Angeles to Ghana and Nigeria, where he traced his lineage to the Igbo people of Owerri and turned that homecoming into the foundation for the most personal installment of his ALKEBULAN trilogy. Musically, the album is every bit as expansive as the journey behind it, bringing together Afrobeats, R&B and orchestral elements with collaborators including Fatoumata Diawara, Skales, Goya Menor, Boy Spyce, Camidoh, The Cavemen. and Kabusa Oriental Choir. Add in the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, recorded at Abbey Road Studios, and The Water Remembers becomes something much bigger than a collection of songs—it’s a musical exploration of ancestry, identity and what it means to reconnect with a history that stretches far beyond your own lifetime.
That idea of remembrance runs through the project, shaped by Matt’s experiences traveling through Ghana and Nigeria with his wife, producer and manager Angela V. Benson. Visits to Assin Manso Slave River and Elmina Castle brought the history of the Transatlantic Slave Trade into painfully immediate focus, while Nigeria offered something different: reunion. In Owerri, Matt met relatives for the first time, learned more about his family lineage and was welcomed into the community through traditional ceremonies. That emotional range—grief, discovery, belonging and celebration—gives ALKEBULAN III its weight, while its international cast of musicians keeps the music vibrant and forward-looking. The project also extends beyond the album into a short film and feature documentary, allowing the visual storytelling to deepen what the songs begin. It’s an ambitious undertaking, but the personal story at its center keeps it grounded: this is one artist using music to follow a trail back through generations and finding something very much alive waiting at the other end.
Matt B is a GRAMMY® Award-winning artist, producer, filmmaker and creative visionary whose work sits at the intersection of music, culture and storytelling. Blending Afrobeats, R&B, orchestral music and cinematic filmmaking, he has built his ALKEBULAN series around collaboration with artists and musicians from Africa and around the world. In 2025, ALKEBULAN II earned him the GRAMMY® Award for Best Global Music Album, setting the stage for an even more personal third chapter. His work increasingly reaches beyond the traditional boundaries of an album, bringing music and filmmaking together to explore African culture, identity and the connections between the continent and its global diaspora. With a creative vision that continues to grow in scale without losing sight of the human stories behind it, Matt B has found a distinctive way to make the personal feel universal.
For more information on Matt B and ALKEBULAN III, visit his website at mattbworld.com.
REVIEWS
“Matt B Turns Discovery of His Igbo Heritage Into Story of Memory,
Survival, Reconnection.”
— Rolling Stone Africa
“Matt B… [is] working to deepen ties between Africa and the diaspora…
[building] lasting relationships with Africa that will continue far beyond this
album.”
— Forbes Africa
“For more than a decade, Matt B has built a career at the intersection of
R&B, Hip-Hop and African popular music, gradually turning a distinctly
global musical identity into one of the most accomplished stories in
contemporary African diasporic music.”
— Afrocritik
“His most personal project yet… [exploring] the enduring relationship
between Africa and its global diaspora.”
— Billboard Africa
“A sprawling sonic tapestry.”
— iMullar
“ALKEBULAN III emerges as more than an album; it becomes an ambitious
work of music, memory, and cultural reclamation.”
— NotJustOk
“Some albums are made to be heard. ALKEBULAN III: The Water
Remembers insists on being witnessed.”
— DigiMillennials
“The most compelling element of Matt’s story is not the discovery itself, but
what he chooses to do with it.”
— GQ South Africa
