Our Ten Most Outstanding Global Records of 2025
The past twelve months have offered a rich tapestry of international sounds that expanded horizons. Presenting a selection of ten remarkable albums that characterized the year in music.
Number Ten: Sarathy Korwar – There Is Beauty, There Already
The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on insistent percussion may not appear the most approachable musical proposition. Yet, south Asian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar converts this driving beat into a strangely alluring album. Guiding an group of three drummers, Korwar crafts a dense percussive dialect throughout the record's ten sections. The album draws from the phasing techniques of Steve Reich as well as classical Indian rhythmic patterns, everything tethered in the repetition of a persistent, driving figure. The longer one listens, this refrain starts to mirror the hypnotic repetition of ceremonial music, pulling the listener deeper into Korwar's singular percussive world.
9. Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget
After an eight-year break, Lebanese singer-songwriter Yasmine Hamdan re-emerges with a melancholy set of songs. It continues exploring the Arabic-sung, dub-tinged sound that cemented her status in the Arab alternative scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's voice is quiet and introspective, singing soft melodies over the bowing strings of a track like Hon and the rumbling trip-hop beat of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she employs a trembling, longing vibrato against electronic lines with North African flavors and rattling electronic percussion. The album's sound is lean and subtle, yet this minimalism offers the ideal setting for Hamdan's emotive songwriting to take center stage. The album proves to be truly deserving of the long anticipation.
Number Eight: The Mexican Producer Debit – Desaceleradas
Mexican producer Debit specializes in haunting reinterpretations of traditional music. For her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a decelerated, dubby take of the shuffling Latin American dance music genre. Debit slows this sound to a near-halt, running its characteristic synths and syncopated rhythm via sheets of sludge and hiss to create a novel, foreboding rhythm. At turns atmospheric and uneasy, Debit transforms the exuberant dancefloor sound of cumbia into a persistent, ethereal afterimage.
7. The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Maximalism is the operative word for the music of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, also known as DJ K. Pioneering his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira layers a cacophony of alarms, pummeling bass tones and shouted lyrics on top of the enduring Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This recreates the driving sound of urban celebrations. On his follow-up release, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira cranks up 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 particularly hyperactive and deafeningly intense 40-minute listening experience. Give in to the cacophony and Vieira's bold productions become strangely exhilarating.
6. Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's 1982 album of disco beats and Punjabi folk melodies is a newly appreciated treasure. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an unusually engaging blend of the metallic sound of 1980s synthesisers and programmed drums with her ornate classical Indian singing style. Electronic percussion echoes the undulating tones of the traditional drums, while synth lines replicates the traditional sound of the reed organ on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Elsewhere, Latin-inflected grooves comes to the fore on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya boasts a fast-paced walking disco bassline. It's a party blend pioneered more than ten years before the global breakthrough of South Asian electronic music.
5. The Mongolian Artist Enji – Resonance
From Mongolia vocalist Enji's delicate latest record, Sonor, develops her jazz-influenced sound to deliver some of her broadest music yet. Moving away from her background in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's eleven songs veer from the gentle jazz-pop melodics of slow-burning number Ulbar to the German spoken-word lyrics and twanging guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a sprightly, funk-inflected cover of the 1980s Mongolian classic Eejiinhee Hairaar. Showcasing a full backing band rather than her typical setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound remains intimate, inviting the listener into the warm acoustics of her singular voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – If There Is No Tomorrow
Drawing on the 1960s legacy of Turkish psychedelia pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's new album with her band Grup Şimşek merges the electric jangle of the amplified traditional lute with woozy keyboard and classic soul melodies. It's a nostalgic vibe rooted in Yıldırım's powerful high register and shaped by producer Leon Michels' warm, tape-saturated aesthetic. Yet, on classic Turkish songs such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group reaches vibrant new territory. They craft smooth, slow-burning grooves and lifting vocals that lend a new, unconventional interpretation to the Anatolian psychedelic style.
3. The Colombian Artist Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Sacred music, Czech harpsichord folksong and symphonic arrangements merge on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's stunning latest work. Arranging music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett journey through a vast range including the liturgical vocals of opener Overturn (Obertura de la Luz Eterna) to the dramatic interweaving lines of Aún Te Quiero and the syncopated reggaeton-inspired beats of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. Ultimately, it is Pim
