cousin.world is an update on global music as told through four playlists:

• run ⇡ — club tracks from euro & UK dancefloors

• cherry soda ⚭ — k-pop, c-pop, idol and city pop

• the grid ✚ — sounds of urbano, reggaeton, funk

• magnitude △ — afrobeat, dancehall and amapiano rising

Today, magnitude △ #005 I’m looking at both developing and superstar artists on the Mavin Global roster, plus a Shazam hit in South Africa, new viral tracks out of Jamaica and the top streaming track in Ghana today.

Next week, it’s back to run ⇡ for breaking tracks out of UK and euro dance floors.

Have a great weekend!! 💌

magnitude △

1. Boy Spyce, Khaid — ‘I Don’t Care’ (Nigeria)

The big news in afrobeats this week was UMG becoming the majority stakeholder of Nigerian label Mavin Global.

Established in 2021 by CEO Don Jazzy, Mavin are best known today as the artist development vehicle behind Rema and Ayra Starr. Rema’s biggest track to date — ‘Calm Down’ with Selena Gomez — broke 1B streams on Spotify in September 2023, making him the first African artist to do so. Ayra Starr I will come back to later!

Alongside their big hitters, Mavin have a growing roster of developing artists like Magixx, Lifesize Teddy and Boy Spyce, whose eponymous debut EP came out in 2022. As he approaches the top 40 artist rankings on Boomplay and his first million monthly listeners on Spotify, this latest track ‘I Don’t Care’, ft. fellow rising Nigerian artist Khaid, landed last week.

Khaid is signed to Neville Records, another of the Nigerian music industry’s key independent labels, who I’m sure are also being courted by one or two other major music companies.

2. TitoM, Yuppe — ‘Tshwala Bam’ (South Africa)

This is currently the top trending track on Shazam in both Nigeria and South Africa.

In 2022, four years after buying Shazam for $400M, Apple rolled out Top 200 charts in 17 new markets, including many on the African continent. The move came as a response to African artists like Black Sherif, BNXN and CKay regularly topping their global rankings.

In a statement given to MBW at the time, Apple explained how success on Shazam is usually a precursor to global success on Apple Music:

“After they started gaining traction on Shazam, all of these tracks then started to take off on the Apple Music platform globally. For example, Wizkid’s Essence, featuring Tems, hit the Top 10 of the Daily Top 100 in 49 countries worldwide, including the United States, South Africa and Nigeria. Fireboy DML’s Peru reached the Top 10 in 22 countries, including No.1 in Uganda, Nigeria and Ghana. Jerusalema, meanwhile has reached the Top 10 in 58 countries worldwide, including France, Italy, Belgium and Sweden.”

‘Tshwala Bam’ peaked at #1 in the overall Apple Music chart in Malawi, Tanzania and Zambia, and held the #1 spot in the Dance genre in 26 markets including South Africa, Nigeria and Ghana.

3. Ayra Starr — ‘Commas’ (Nigeria)

Speaking of Mavin, Ayra Starr has a new song out this month called ‘Commas’ and it’s currently the top streaming track in Nigeria.

Apparently signed by Mavin CEO Don Jazzy three days after she started posting covers to Instagram, Ayra Starr released her first self-titled EP in 2021. Today, she is the fourth-biggest star in Nigeria, behind Rema, Burna Boy and Wizkid, and commands an audience of 14.5M (per Chartmetric’s combined audience figure). Some of her biggest international artist collaborations include tracks with David Guetta, Leigh-anne, NEIKID, Tyla, Skip Marley and Kelly Rowland, to name a few.

You can learn everything you need to know about Ayra Starr via her Teen Vogue cover story, released last year as part of their New Africa Wave series.

4. Intence — ‘SHH’ (Jamaica)

‘SHH’ is a new track from Kingston, Jamaica-based dancehall rapper Intence and is currently the biggest track in the country on Apple Music and YouTube.

Despite currently covering Spotify’s Back a Yard playlist, Intence’s audience is mostly concentrated on Apple Music and region-specific platforms like Audiomack, where he features on massive playlists like Verified: Dancehall (1.7M followers) and Sean Paul’s own Sean Paul Essentials.

Intence is signed to VP Records, the self-proclaimed “world’s biggest reggae and dancehall label”, with offices in New York, Rio, Tokyo, Miami, London, Kingston and Johannesburg. They are best known as the label who signed major names in the genre like Gyptian, Spice and Busy Signal.

5. King Promise, Gabzy — ‘Perfect Combi’ (Ghana, UK)

This track from Ghanaian King Promise and Londoner Gabzy is currently covering Spotify’s Hot Hits Ghana playlist, as well as charting top 20 in the Apple Music overall charts in Uganda and Kenya.

‘Perfect Combi’ was released back in October by the UK arm of Sony Music and its sub-label 5K Records, a joint venture between the two founders of 2K Management, and producer JAE5.

Outside of London, Gabzy’s biggest audiences can be found in Lagos and Nairobi. King Promise however seems to have a massive fanbase in Indonesia, with Jakarta and Bandung occupying over 10% of his total Spotify audience.

+ Five More

6. Stalk Ashley, Skillibeng — ‘Really like U’ (Jamaica)

Brand new dancehall from Stalk Ashley and Skillibeng, released mere hours ago. Check out this interview with Stalk Ashley on Jamaican culture podcast The Fix from last year.

7. Budah, Sotam, Aka Rasta — ‘Medida Certa’ (Brazil)

‘Medida Certa’ currently tops a third-party playlist called Afrobeats Brazil. Check out this article on The Vinyl Factory for some more great Brazilian afrobeats tracks.

8. Kamo Mphela, Khalil Harrison, Tyler ICU — ‘Dalie’ (South Africa)

This hit out of Johannesburg came out three months ago and is still streaming like crazy across the market. For the gym heads, it’s also the lead track on Spotify’s Beast Mode Amapiano playlist!

9. Shenseea — ‘No Woman No Cry’ (Jamaica)

Alongside the official soundtrack to the new Bob Marley movie, a seven-track EP featuring reinterpretations of his most famous songs came out last month and this is Shenseea’s contribution.

10. Slap Dee — ‘Jahman Juice’ (Zambia)

This new track from Zambian artist Slap Dee is currently the top trending track on Boomplay’s new music chart. You can check out more from him on Instagram.