9 Tracks Blending Afrobeats and South Asian Music

Before you hit play on another rainy-day playlist, make some room for Afrodesi, one of the most exciting sounds coming out of the Indian music scene right now. Blending Afrobeats, amapiano, and R&B with South Asian influences, it's a sound taking shape across the map: AP Dhillon linking with Ayra Starr, Diljit Dosanjh teaming up with producer Thiarajxtt, Tsumyoki leaning into Afro-inspired production, and Charanpreet joining forces with Badshah. These are the nine tracks worth soundtracking your monsoon with. 

1. “Bora Bora” - AP Dhillon, Ayra Starr

   

   Ludhiana and Lagos meet on a bassline that doesn’t pick sides. Dhillon and Starr trade verses without either one bending toward the other’s sound, landing somewhere new.

   
   

2. “Dhiruti” - Reyan

   

   Reyan folds Afrobeats percussion into a Malayalam pop frame, a groove built less for a club and more for a balcony, rain outside, volume up.

   
   

3. “Ban Ja Tu” - Charanpreet, Badshah

   

   Charanpreet's amapiano groove gives Badshah's ask-her-to-be-mine playfulness somewhere warm to land in this love confession dressed up as a dare.

   
   

4. “Shaam” - Jai Dhir, NEVERSOBER

   

   NEVERSOBER’s production leans into warm, low-slung Afro-R&B, and Jai Dhir’s vocals settle into it rather than fight for space.

   
   

5. “Ni Billo” - Semwal, Agaazz

   

   She walks in, he puts the glass down, and Semwal plays the whole thing knowing exactly how much she's aware of her own effect.

   
   

6. “You & I” - Tsumyoki

   

   Tsumyoki drops the guitar-driven indie tone for something looser here, amapiano's log drums doing the lifting while the vocals stay soft around a one-day romance with its own signature step.

   
   

7. “Thakthom” - Reyan, Melvin, Jassie Gift

   

   A Malayalam-English dance anthem built on Afrobeat percussion, with Jassie Gift’s veteran ease anchoring Reyan and Melvin’s punchier energy.

   
   

8. “Never Let You Go” - Steel Banglez, AP Dhillon, Omah Lay

   

   Steel Banglez’s production is the connective tissue, giving Dhillon’s melodic runs and Omah Lay’s soulful cadence a shared home instead of two separate lanes.

   
   

9. “Kinni Kinni” - Diljit Dosanjh, Thiarajxtt

   

   Thiarajxtt’s production brings an Afro-inflected low end to a Punjabi pop hook, and Dosanjh, never one to overthink a good beat, just rides it.

What’s clear across this list is that Afrodesi isn’t a novelty crossover, it’s a sound with its own logic. Punjabi hooks sit naturally over amapiano log drums, Malayalam vocals find room inside Afrobeat percussion, and nobody involved seems to be forcing the fit. It's not one formula repeated across artists, it's a shared language multiple corners of Indian music happen to be speaking at once, and this monsoon is as good a time as any to sit with it.