What Spaniards Listen To: Ten Artists For Your Playlist

15 Dec 2025

Olya Lukianova

Spanish-language music has been on the rise in recent years. It is vivid, varied, experimental, unafraid to flirt with traditional motifs while responding precisely to contemporary trends. La Cotorra presents a set of performers whom Spaniards appreciate today, and whom it is worth paying particular attention to.

Rosalía

Thirty-two-year-old Rosalía, born in Sant Cugat del Vallès near Barcelona, became a legend of both the Spanish and global music scenes in 2019, when she released Con Altura together with the Colombian singer J. Balvin. The track received a Latin Grammy and was repeatedly named one of the best songs of the year.

Shortly before that, in 2018, Rosalía released the conceptual album El mal querer. It did not reach the same level of international recognition, but Spaniards embraced it for its mixture of traditional flamenco, rap, electronic music, and pop. Pitchfork placed the album sixth in its Top 50 Records of the Year.

In 2022 her most recent album, Motomami, appeared. It caused a sensation: it won several Latin Grammys including one of the major awards, and it received significant critical acclaim, especially for its experimental approach. The album now has more than seventy million streams on Spotify, and her most popular tracks have exceeded one billion.

Rosalía has also acted: she played a small role in Pedro Almodóvar’s 2019 film Pain and Glory. She later acknowledged in an interview that she had always dreamt of becoming one of the “chicas Almodóvar” – an unquestionably iconic category in Spanish cinema, commonly referring to female characters, and the actresses portraying them, in the director’s films.

There is a possibility that she will release a new album in 2025. If that happens, it will undoubtedly become a major talking point. It is therefore worth preparing.

Bad Bunny

If you live in Spain, you have almost certainly heard him already — in a bar, from the window of a passing car, or from a neighbour’s speaker. For the thirty-one-year-old Puerto Rican singer Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, known as Bad Bunny, 2025 has been exceptionally successful.

In January he released the album Debí Tirar Más Fotos, whose Spotify streams are about to cross the one-billion mark. All seventeen tracks entered the Billboard Hot 100 chart, and many continue to remain there not only in Spanish-speaking countries but worldwide.

The album is dedicated to Puerto Rico — musically and lyrically — and to its struggle for independence and against American colonialism. The message is blunt and unequivocal: in one of the songs he sings that he does not want “what happened to Hawaii” to happen to his homeland.

Following Donald Trump’s election as President of the United States, this message resonates particularly sharply, and Bad Bunny is fully aware of this. On 4 July, Independence Day in the United States, he released the video for his song NUEVAYol. Firstly, it features an AI-generated voice of Trump apologising to all migrants and declaring that the United States is “nothing” without them. Secondly, the Statue of Liberty in the video is draped with the Puerto Rican flag.

After the album’s release, Bad Bunny announced an enormous tour. In Spain alone he will give twelve stadium concerts in 2026, each for tens of thousands of spectators. Tickets disappeared within hours, leaving many without a chance to attend. A similar situation unfolded in other countries.

And if you are still not convinced, here is a bonus: Bad Bunny recently appeared in a Calvin Klein campaign and acquired a vast following not only for his music but, quite frankly, for his physical appearance. Social networks reacted accordingly.

Mike Towers

Myke Towers, also thirty-one and also Puerto Rican, is extremely popular among Spanish listeners. Naturally, he has a collaboration with Bad Bunny — Estamos Arriba — and another one with Daddy Yankee, the performer of the hit Gasolina.

He has released five albums, almost all of which have received major awards. His most popular songs approach one and a half billion Spotify streams. One of them, LALA, spread widely through TikTok and Instagram, where users posted photographs set to the track.

Critics describe Myke Towers as “a product of the underground, even in his most popular projects”. Rolling Stone writes that, since 2016 and the album El Final del Principio, his reputation has grown thanks to “unusual flow and rhythm, sharp lyrics, and astonishing work ethic”.

His releases pay homage to the neighbourhoods in which he grew up, while attracting listeners from all over the world

The Rolling Stone

He recently performed in Valencia, where local media described his concert as a huge success.

Karol G

Thirty-four-year-old Colombian reggaeton singer Karol G received her first Latin Grammy in 2018 as “Best New Artist”. Since then she has had numerous successes, including collaborations with Shakira and Nicki Minaj. Her 2024 single Si Antes Te Hubiera Conocido has surpassed one thousand three hundred million Spotify streams.

Music has interested her since childhood. “At school I was in love with G-Unit. I had posters, trainers, everything. My name is Carolina, and at school they called me Carolina G because of my passion for G-Unit. So when I started looking for a stage name, I chose Karol G,” she explained.

For many years Karol G has remained in the Spanish charts, and she is not likely to leave them any time soon. In 2024 her collaboration track +57, recorded with several prominent musicians, became the subject of a scandal.

The creators were accused of sexualising minors, and Karol G publicly apologised. Judging from the data, she has recovered: she has more than fifty-five million monthly listeners on Spotify.

Bad Gyal

Alba Farelo, known as Bad Gyal, was born in 1997 in Vilassar de Mar near Barcelona. Her father, Eduard Farelo, is an actor and voice-over artist. She is the eldest of five children; her younger sister Irma is also a singer (Mushkaa).

Alba initially intended to work in fashion, but her life took a different turn. At eighteen, while working in a call centre, she recorded her first track — a Catalan-language cover of Rihanna’s Work. Even then she gathered an initial loyal audience, which has been growing ever since. She now has more than twelve million monthly listeners.

In 2024 Bad Gyal released her first full album, La joia. It remained at the top of the Spanish charts for weeks and eventually reached number one. It also earned gold status in both Spain and the United States.

If you prefer to start with something shorter, her new single Última noche, a collaboration with reggaeton singer Ozuna, is a good entry point.

C. Tangana

Thirty-five-year-old Madrid rapper Antón Álvarez Alfaro began his musical career in the 2000s, but fame came later, in 2016, when he released Mala Mujer (216 million Spotify streams). In the same year he recorded Antes de morirme with Rosalía, who had not yet reached global stardom. Shortly afterwards he released his first album, Ídolo, whose ironic yet melancholic tracks combined rap, R&B, and Latin rhythms.

In 2020 he released El Madrileño, a genuinely groundbreaking and significant record for contemporary Spain. Rolling Stone included it among the 250 best albums of the twenty-first century. With more than five million streams in the first twenty-four hours, it became debut by a Spanish artist in Spotify’s history.

My goal is not merely to gather as many people as possible at a concert. Yes, of course that is pleasant, but ultimately I want to go to the studio and produce a great deal of music

С. Tangano

Beéle

Twenty-two-year-old Colombian singer Beéle, who skilfully mixes urban pop, reggaeton, and afrobeat, has been rapidly gaining recognition in recent years. His start was striking: in 2019, while still very young, he released Loco, which has now accumulated almost 250 million views on YouTube.

His recent track No tiene sentido has held a firm position in the Spanish charts. It is the ideal starting point, after which you can turn to his debut album Borondo, released this year.

Aitana

Aitana Ocaña Morales, 26, born in Barcelona, became famous through television. In 2017 she participated in the talent show Operación Triunfo, reached the final, and even had a chance to represent Spain at the Eurovision Song Contest. She then released several studio albums and became a genuine social-media star: she has more than four million Instagram followers and over eleven million monthly Spotify listeners.

Fame is not always pleasant. On one occasion she and her partner, the actor Miguel Bernardeau (who played Guzmán in the highly popular series Elite), were aggressively pursued by the press.

Aitana also complained on her social networks about the spread of false news concerning her.

Guitarricadelafuente

Twenty-seven-year-old Álvaro Lafuente Calvo from Benicàssim in the Valencia Region, known as Guitarricadelafuente, has almost two million monthly Spotify listeners. This number, however, conveys less than his music itself — melancholic yet distinctly Spanish in its energy, deep yet rhythmically compelling.

He has released two albums: La Cantera (2022) and Spanish Leather (2025). His style is described as a blend of indie-folk, rumba, and flamenco. We especially recommend Agua y Mezcal, Catalina, and Nana Triste. After that, stopping may be difficult.

Shego

The bold Madrid girl-band Shego is the least well-known project in this selection, yet unquestionably deserving of attention. They have 190,000 monthly listeners on Spotify, and the platform includes them in its “Radar” — a list of artists expected to “break through” soon.

“We do not have a specific objective, and this makes our songs so varied,” they say. “There is heartbreak, self-love, anger, and fury. There are moments when we choose to be the antiheroines of our own story. The energy is: ‘Today I arrived and I chose violence’.”

This is accurate: among their tracks are both satirical pieces targeting intrusive, tactless men (Vicente Amor) and exceptionally bleak admissions of personal inadequacy (Siendo mala).

This time we recommend starting with the video. Despite modest budgets, Shego manage to produce striking visuals. Afterwards, turn to their album No lo volveré a hacer.