The 2025 JUNO Awards mark a groundbreaking moment for Canada’s music landscape with the introduction of the South Asian Music Recording of the Year category. This long-overdue recognition comes amid the meteoric rise of Punjabi and South Asian pop—genres that have exploded across global charts, driven largely by Canadian artists from cities like Surrey, Vancouver, and Toronto.
Punjabi-Canadian singer Karan Aujla, already a trailblazer after winning the 2024 TikTok Fan Choice Award, returns this year with nominations in three major categories: Fan Choice, Single of the Year, and the newly created South Asian music category. It’s a moment that validates the international success of hits like On Top and Winning Speech, while celebrating the cultural resonance behind his genre-blending sound.
The new category was a natural evolution, as artists of South Asian heritage are redefining Canada’s music identity. Warner Music Canada and Warner Music India captured this momentum in 2023 with the launch of 91 North Records, a label dedicated to promoting South Asian fusion music. Producer Ikky, the label’s creative director, emphasized, “This is not an experiment—it’s the future.”
One of the defining moments of this movement is the viral success of Excuses, produced by Surrey-based Intense and performed by AP Dhillon and Gurinder Gill. The track recently became the first Punjabi song to surpass 500 million streams on Spotify. Intense’s label, Double Up Entertainment, recently signed a distribution deal with Warner Music Group—an industry signal of Punjabi music’s mainstream breakthrough.
Among this year’s JUNO nominees are trailblazing talents such as Chani Nattan, Inderpal Moga, and legend Jazzy B—whose decades-long legacy has earned him a spot on Vancouver’s B.C. Entertainment Hall of Fame. They’re joined by GMINXR, a Victoria-based producer with credits alongside AP Dhillon, Sukha, and Shinda Kahlon, who will perform at this year’s awards alongside the Surrey trio.
“Growing up, we didn’t have much representation,” GMINXR reflected. “The addition of this category is a huge deal. We all started making music during the pandemic, sharing it from home studios. The world was watching—and that gave birth to this wave.”
The wave isn’t just musical—it’s cultural. Desi sounds are now backed by global streaming platforms and fueled by the expanding reach of Bollywood content on Netflix and Prime. “Punjabi music is now being recognized globally, and language is just one part of the story,” said Chani Nattan. “You’ll hear our songs being sung in Amsterdam, the U.K., everywhere.”
The sound isn’t limited to bhangra or hip-hop. Today’s South Asian Canadian artists are fusing folk instruments with hip-hop beats, Sufi influences, EDM drops, and nostalgic 2000s R&B. Whether it’s tabla-trained vocalists like GMINXR or classical talents like Ontario’s Sandeep Narayan and Yanchan, this new wave is pushing boundaries and building a diverse future for Canadian music.
As names like Diljit Dosanjh, Babbu Maan, and Satinder Sartaaj sell out arenas across Canada—and A.R. Rahman prepares to take the stage at Pacific Coliseum this July—it’s clear the Punjabi wave is more than a trend. It’s a cultural movement that has finally earned its spotlight, with the 2025 JUNOs marking just the beginning.
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