The 10 Best Worldwide Records of the Year 2025
As the year draws to a close, we reflect on the international music that defied expectations. We explore ten notable albums that shaped the year in music.
Number Ten: The Percussionist Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
A continuous, 40-minute suite of repetitive percussion could sound like it isn't the most approachable listening experience. However, south Asian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar converts this persistent pulse into a strangely alluring work. Leading an group of three drummers, Korwar develops a intricate percussive vocabulary throughout the record's ten parts. His composition draws from the phasing techniques of Steve Reich as well as Indian classical phrasing, everything tethered in the repetition of a continual, thrumming motif. The longer one listens, this refrain evokes the trance-inducing cycles of devotional music, drawing the listener further into Korwar's singular percussive realm.
9. The Lebanese Artist Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget
After an hiatus of eight years, Lebanese vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan makes a comeback with a melancholy album of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-language, dub-influenced aesthetic that cemented her status in the Arab alternative scene since the nineties. Hamdan's vocal delivery is quiet and thoughtful, singing soft melodies atop the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the rumbling trip-hop beat of Vows. For more upbeat numbers such as Shadia and Abyss, she employs a trembling, longing vocal technique over Maghrebi-inspired synth melodies and rattling electronic percussion. The production is lean and subtle, yet this austerity creates the ideal canvas for Hamdan's deeply felt songwriting to take center stage. This is a record well worth the long anticipation.
Number Eight: The Mexican Producer Debit – Slowed Down
Mexican electronic artist Debit has a knack for eerie reworkings of historical sounds. On her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a decelerated, dub-inflected interpretation of the shuffling Latin American dance genre. Debit slows this sound to a near-halt, running its signature synths and syncopated rhythm through sheets of distortion and noise to create a fresh, menacing groove. At turns atmospheric and uneasy, Debit morphs the celebratory dancefloor sound of cumbia into a enduring, ethereal echo.
7. The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Sensory overload is the defining principle for the output of São Paulo producer Kaique Vieira, also known as DJ K. Inventing his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira piles a tumult of alarms, pummeling bass tones and screamed lyrics on top of the classic Brazilian genre of baile funk. This recreates the energetic sound of urban celebrations. On his new record, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira escalates the energy, throwing in everything from four-on-the-floor techno beats to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his frantic bruxaria mix. The result is a especially manic and overwhelmingly noisy 40-minute listening experience. Give in to the noise and Vieira's unapologetic productions become strangely freeing.
Number Six: Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's 1982 album of disco beats and Punjabi folk melodies is a reissued treasure. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an unusually compelling blend of the synthetic sound of 1980s synthesisers and drum machines with her fluid Indian classical singing style. Drum machine patterns mirrors the wavelike tones of the tabla, while synthesiser melody parallels the traditional sound of the reed organ on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Meanwhile, bossa nova rhythm is prominent on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya features a driving funky bass rhythm. It's a club-ready hybrid delivered over a decade before the global breakthrough of South Asian electronic music.
5. The Mongolian Artist Enji – Sonor
From Mongolia vocalist Enji's delicate fourth album, Sonor, develops her jazz-inflected sound to deliver some of her most diverse music so far. Departing from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's selection of pieces veer from the soft 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 lively, funk-inflected cover of the 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Showcasing a live band rather than her usual setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound remains close, drawing the listener into the warm acoustics of her singular voice.
Number Four: Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – Yarın Yoksa
Channeling the 1960s legacy of Turkish psychedelia pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, Turkish-born, Germany-based singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work alongside her group blends the distinctive buzz of the amplified traditional lute with drifting keyboard and soulful tunes. It's a 1970s throwback sound anchored in Yıldırım's strong high register and influenced by producer Leon Michels' warm, tape-saturated sound. Yet, 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, downtempo grooves and lifting vocals that give a new, off-kilter interpretation to the Anatolian psychedelic style.
3. Lido Pimienta – The Beauty
Gregorian chants, Czech harpsichord folksong and symphonic arrangements merge on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's extraordinary fourth album. 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 counterpoint melodies of Aún Te Quiero and the rhythmic reggaeton-inspired beats of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim
