This Ten Top Global Records of 2025
As the year draws to a close, we reflect on the international sounds that pushed boundaries. Here is a countdown of ten remarkable albums that shaped the year in music.
10. Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on cyclical drumming could sound like it isn't the easiest listening experience. Yet, Indian percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar transforms this persistent pulse into a unexpectedly magnetic piece. Directing an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar creates a intricate percussive dialect throughout the record's ten parts. His composition draws from Steve Reich's phasing motifs combined with Indian classical phrasing, all anchored in the repetition of a persistent, driving refrain. As the album progresses, this refrain begins to emulate the hypnotic repetition of ceremonial music, pulling the listener further into Korwar's unique percussive world.
9. Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember
Following an eight-year break, Lebanese vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan makes a comeback with a mournful set of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-sung, dub-tinged aesthetic that established her as a fixture in the Arab alternative scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's voice is quiet and thoughtful, singing tender melodies over the bowing strings of a track like Hon and the rolling trip-hop groove of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she adopts a trembling, longing vocal technique over Maghrebi-inspired synth melodies and skittering electronic percussion. The album's sound is sparse and restrained, yet this austerity provides the perfect environment for Hamdan's deeply felt songwriting to resonate. This is a record truly deserving of the long anticipation.
8. Debit – Desaceleradas
From Mexico electronic artist Debit has a knack for eerie reworkings of archival audio. For her new album, Desaceleradas, she turns her attention to the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected version of the shuffling Latin American dance genre. Debit decelerates this sound even further, processing its signature synths and off-beat rhythm through sheets of distortion and noise to generate a fresh, foreboding rhythm. Sometimes atmospheric and uneasy, Debit morphs the joyous dancefloor sound of cumbia into a persistent, ghostly memory.
Number Seven: The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Liberator Radio!
Maximalism is the defining principle for the output of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, AKA DJ K. Inventing his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira piles a tumult of alarms, explosive bass tones and shouted lyrics on top of the enduring Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This emulates the propulsive sound of favela street parties. On his new record, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira escalates the ferocity, incorporating everything from techno kick drums to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his chaotic bruxaria mix. The result is a especially manic and punishingly loud forty-minute listening experience. Submit to the cacophony and Vieira's unapologetic productions become strangely freeing.
Number Six: Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Punjabi Disco
Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's record from 1982 of disco music and Punjabi folk melodies is a newly appreciated masterpiece. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an unusually engaging combination of the sharp sound of 1980s synthesisers and drum machines with her fluid Indian classical singing style. Drum machine patterns mimics the rolling tones of the traditional drums, while synth lines doubles the classic sound of the harmonium on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. At other times, bossa nova rhythm is prominent on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya boasts a fast-paced walking disco bassline. It's a dancefloor fusion created over a decade before the rise of Asian Underground music.
5. The Mongolian Artist Enji – Resonance
Mongolian vocalist Enji's soft fourth album, Sonor, builds upon her jazz-influenced sound to deliver some of her most wide-ranging music to date. Departing from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's eleven songs veer from the soft Norah Jones-esque melodics of slow-burning number Ulbar to the German-language narration lyrics and trilling guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a sprightly, funk-tinged cover of the 1980s Mongolian classic Eejiinhee Hairaar. Utilizing a ensemble rather than her typical setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound manages to stay personal, pulling the listener into the warm soundscape of her unique voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım and Her Band – If There Is No Tomorrow
Drawing on the psychedelic tradition of Turkish psychedelia pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's third record alongside her group blends the metallic twang of the amplified traditional lute with dreamy Mellotron and R&B-inflected lines. It's a nostalgic vibe rooted in Yıldırım's strong falsetto and influenced by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape aesthetic. But, on classic Turkish songs such as the folk tune Hop Bico and 60s classic Ceylan, the group ventures into lively new territory. They create smooth, slow-burning grooves and powerful vocals that give a new, unconventional twist to the Anatolian psychedelic style.
Number Three: Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Catholic requiem mass music, Czech harpsichord folksong and orchestral strings converge on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's remarkable fourth album. Orchestrating music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett explore everything from the liturgical vocals of opener Overturn (Obertura de la Luz Eterna) to the dramatic interweaving lines of Aún Te Quiero and the rhythmic reggaeton-inspired beats of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim
