Mattmac Sends Smoke Signals From Garden Hill to the World

Hero image: Mattmac via his official Bandcamp artist page.

There is something fitting about an album called Smoke Signals arriving from an artist whose career has always been about finding new ways to communicate.

Mattmac, the award-winning artist and producer from Garden Hill Anisininew Nation in Manitoba, released his third studio album on September 11, 2026. The new project stretches across 14 tracks and brings his melodic hip-hop sound together with collaborators from the Blind and Famous music community, including Atlanta rapper QuestionATL.

For longtime listeners, the album feels like another marker in a career that has steadily expanded from Garden Hill to stages, studios and playlists across the country.

A New Chapter for Mattmac

Mattmac has built his name as both a recording artist and a producer, combining melodic rap, pop instincts and hard-hitting production with stories drawn from his own life.

His Bandcamp page describes him as an artist from Garden Hill Anisininew Nation with more than 30 million streams and a growing audience well beyond Manitoba. With Smoke Signals, he is continuing that momentum while keeping the project closely connected to the people and experiences that shaped him.

The album is hosted by QuestionATL, with Mattmac serving as executive producer. Production and mixing credits are shared by QuestionATL, Mattmac and Lil Miva, while Jon Tornblom handled mastering. Album photography is credited to Eric Peters and the artwork to Nik Handson.

That collaborative structure matters. Mattmac has increasingly become part of a wider network of blind artists and creators who are building music together across borders instead of waiting for the traditional industry to create space for them.

APTN News marked the release with an in-studio performance and conversation featuring Mattmac and QuestionATL, giving the project national Indigenous-media attention on release day.

Fourteen Tracks, One Clear Identity

The 14-track project includes songs such as “League,” “Right Back Home,” “Can You Hear Me?” and “I Remember When,” with QuestionATL appearing across several tracks.

The title itself gives the album a strong centre.

Smoke signals have long represented communication across distance. Here, that idea becomes a useful metaphor for music: sending something out from one place and trusting that somebody else will receive it.

That is especially fitting for an artist whose music has travelled far beyond the community where he began.

The record moves between celebration, reflection and ambition. Rather than presenting success as a finish line, the project feels more like a transmission from an artist who is still building, still experimenting and still trying to connect with listeners who recognize pieces of themselves in the music.

Accessibility Built Into the Release

One of the most distinctive details around Smoke Signals is physical.

Mattmac is offering a limited-edition CD with embossed braille, alongside apparel and merchandise that also incorporates braille elements. It is a small design choice with a much larger message: accessibility does not have to be an afterthought.

It can be part of the artwork, the merchandise and the identity of the release itself.

That approach fits Mattmac’s career. He has never treated being a blind artist as something separate from his music. Instead, it is part of the perspective he brings into an industry that still has plenty of room to become more accessible.

Indigenous Hip-Hop Keeps Expanding

The release is also another example of how wide Indigenous hip-hop has become.

There is no single Indigenous rap sound, city or formula. Artists are building careers from communities across Turtle Island, moving between trap, melodic rap, R&B, boom-bap, pop and experimental production while bringing their own identities into the work.

Mattmac occupies his own lane inside that movement.

He is a producer as much as a performer, a collaborator as much as a solo artist, and an example of what can happen when talent, technology and persistence meet.

Smoke Signals is not simply another album added to a discography. It is another message sent out from Garden Hill—and judging by the reach Mattmac has already built, plenty of people are receiving it.

Source

DNA coverage was developed from verified reporting and publicly available information. Mattmac Bandcamp — Mattmac / APTN News.