“This EP is a question I am asking myself,” Mmaku explains in the liner notes. “ Ojemba means traveler. But I am asking: Where are you really going if you have forgotten where you came from?”

The darkest moment on the EP. Here, Omoo Mmaku experiments with spoken word over a minimalist, rumbling bass. He speaks of water as memory, as trauma, as cleansing. The production here is sparse, forcing the listener to sit with every word. It is not a club banger; it is a late-night introspection.

Released to quiet acclaim this month, Ojemba (translated roughly as “Journey” or “Expedition” in Igbo) is a five-track manifesto. It rejects the auto-tuned, fast-fashion tempo of modern Afropop in favor of something rawer: the heartbeat of the igbo (forest) and the cadence of the elders. The title track, “Ojemba,” opens with the faint sound of a metal gong ( ogene ) and the rustle of palm fronds. Then Mmaku’s voice enters—not singing, but calling . It is a sound that immediately transports the listener to a moonlit village square in Southeastern Nigeria.

For fans of: Salif Keita, The Lijadu Sisters, Mdou Moctar (for the guitar tones), and early Beautiful Nubia. Stream ‘Ojemba’ by Omoo Mmaku on all platforms.

The lead single is a mid-tempo groove driven by a hypnotic akpọcha rhythm. Lyrically, Mmaku speaks to the duality of the modern African: “I carry my laptop in one hand / and my ancestral staff in the other.” It is a melancholic but proud anthem for the diaspora child returning home.