M.I.A. PICKS

Best Global Sound

The Sri Lankan MC, who traveled the world gathering beats for last year's Kala, digs kuduro, the raw synth-heavy electronic music from Angola, a West African nation that is one of the poorest in the world. "It initially came from kids not having anything to make music on other than their cellphones, using samples they'd get from their PCs and mobiles' sound buttons," she says. "It's a rave-y, beat-oriented sound. Now that it's growing, they've got proper PCs to make music on."