Matisyahu first became a household name with 2006’s “Youth” album. A follow-up to his acclaimed “Live At Stubb’s” live release, “Youth” featured the single “King Without A Crown” and was certified gold — over 500,000 copies shipped in the U.S. — within a month of release.
Plenty more success would follow for Matisyahu with future albums, as “One Day” – an unofficial anthem for the 2010 Olympics – from 2009’s” Light” helped yield another gold-selling album for the New York native. To date, he has sold over 5 million career physical albums, and has over 500 million total career streams across all global platforms. He has topped Billboard’s Reggae Album charts 4 times, and 4 of his last 5 studio albums have landed in the top 20 on the Billboard 200. Matisyahu is a founding signatory of the Black-Jewish Entertainment Alliance and the Creative Community For Peace.
2022 is yet another busy year for Matisyahu. March 25, 2022 brings the release of his self-titled album via Fallen Sparks/Thirty Tigers, as distributed by The Orchard. It was produced and co-written by the Columbian-born, Brooklyn-based pop and electronic duo Salt Cathedral. Recent hit single “Keep Coming Back For More” is a look at the birth of the New York native’s daughter Esti River. The title of third single “AM_RICA” is a spin on the Hebrew phrase “Am Reika,” which roughly translates to “empty nation.”
On March 14, 2022, I had the pleasure of interviewing Matisyahu again, as embedded below. Beyond talk about his new album, we discussed his time living in Los Angeles, Phish and some of the other bands who inspired him, Jewish musicians of note, and future career plans.
More on Matisyahu can be found online by clicking here, here and here.
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