2025 saw a steady stream of new releases of global music and reissues of historic recordings but the highlight of releases in 2025 was Fear No Man, the brilliant podcast series available on Audible and other streaming platforms on the life, music career and politics of the scourge of the Nigerian establishment, the revolutionary Fela Kuti.

The 12 podcasts contained plenty of his unique music that saw rock artists including Ginger Baker, David Byrne, Brian Eno and Paul McCartney flocking to Fela’s Lagos club, The Shrine, to listen in disbelief to the Afrobeat and jazz funk that Fela was putting down.

Rwanda Sings With Strings (Glitterbeat) by The Good Ones (Adrien Kazigira and Janvier Havugimana) was recorded in a Washington DC hotel room, in one take and no overdubs, supported by a violinist and cellist with music and songs harking back to the great Miriam Makeba, as well as singer-songwriters Leonard Cohen and Nick Drake.

A Selection Of Music From Libyan Tapes (Habibi Funk) featured tracks from thousands of cassettes and eight tracks (remember them?) found by Jannis Sturtz in a shuttered factory in Sousse, Tunisia — plus homemade cassettes of essential Arab rhythms and Afro reggae.  

Why Fathi Aldiquiz & The Sons Of Africa’s Palestine Is My Homeland a demo favourite?

Damon Albarn’s Africa Express returned cutting the album Bahidore (World Circuit) in Mexico on tour of the Americas in 2024.

Albarn is joined by Django Django, Joan As Police Woman, Mexican rapper Mare Advertencia, singers Fatoumata Diawara, Luisa Almaguer and Seye Adelekan, plus DJs and producer/multi-instrumentalist Tom Excell.

World Circuit also hit the target with the return of Senegalese multi-instrumentalist Cheikh Lo on Maame cut during the pandemic in a home studio and Nick Gold later produced the full album with musicians from Senegal, Benin, Congo, US and Britain with songs about human dignity and Pan African unity.

And finally, Roots Rocking Zimbabwe — The Sound Of Harare Townships 1975-1980 (Analog Africa) — a compilation of tracks cut and broadcast right under the noses of the right-wing Rhodesian regime consisting of Congolese rumba, South African township jive, soul, reggae and rock into a music that helped topple the white supremisists.