Our 10 Greatest Worldwide Records of the Year 2025
As the year draws to a close, we reflect on the global music that pushed boundaries. We explore ten notable albums that characterized the year in music.
Number Ten: The Percussionist Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on repetitive drumming may not appear the easiest listening experience. Yet, south Asian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar converts this driving beat into a unexpectedly magnetic piece. Guiding an trio of three drummers, Korwar creates a dense percussive dialect over the record's 10 movements. His composition channels the phasing techniques of Steve Reich as well as classical Indian rhythmic patterns, each grounded in the repetition of a ongoing, driving figure. Over its duration, this refrain begins to emulate the ceremonial rhythm of ritual music, luring the listener deeper into Korwar's singular percussive world.
9. Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember
Coming off an eight-year break, Lebanese vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan re-emerges with a contemplative album of songs. It continues exploring the Arabic-language, dub-tinged style that cemented her status in the region's indie music scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's vocal delivery is soft and ruminative, delivering tender melodies over the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the rumbling trip-hop groove of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she adopts a wavering, yearning vibrato against Maghrebi-inspired synth melodies and rattling electronic percussion. The production is sparse and subtle, yet this minimalism offers the perfect environment for Hamdan's deeply felt lyricism to take center stage. The album proves to be that justifies the wait.
8. The Mexican Producer Debit – Slowed Down
Mexican producer Debit excels at uncanny reworkings of traditional music. On her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dubby interpretation of the shuffling Latin American musical style. Debit decelerates this sound even further, processing its signature synths and off-beat rhythm through layers of murk and static to generate a novel, sinister beat. At turns atmospheric and uneasy, Debit converts the joyous party music of cumbia into a persistent, spectral echo.
Number Seven: The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Sensory overload is the operative word for the records of São Paulo producer Kaique Vieira, AKA DJ K. Pioneering his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira layers a cacophony of sirens, explosive bass tones and shouted lyrics over the longstanding Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This recreates the propulsive sound of urban celebrations. On his new record, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira cranks up the intensity, throwing in everything from driving techno rhythms to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his chaotic bruxaria mix. The result is a especially manic and overwhelmingly noisy forty-minute listening experience. Give in to the cacophony and Vieira's brash productions become unexpectedly freeing.
Number Six: The Singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Punjabi Disco
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's 1982 album of disco music and Punjabi folk melodies is a reissued treasure. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks present an strikingly engaging blend of the sharp sound of early synthesizers and drum machines with her fluid classical Indian vocal technique. Drum machine patterns echoes the undulating tones of the traditional drums, while synth lines parallels the traditional sound of the harmonium on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Meanwhile, Latin-inflected grooves comes to the fore on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya features a fast-paced disco bass groove. It's a club-ready hybrid created over a decade before the rise of Asian Underground music.
Number Five: Enji – Sonor
Mongolian singer Enji's delicate fourth album, Sonor, expands on her jazz-influenced sound to offer some of her most diverse music to date. Moving away from her background in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's 11 tracks travel from the soft Norah Jones-esque melodics of downtempo number Ulbar to the German-language narration lyrics and twanging guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a sprightly, funk-inflected cover of the 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Utilizing a full backing band rather than her typical setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound remains personal, inviting the listener into the warm acoustics of her unique voice.
Number Four: Derya Yıldırım and Her Band – If There Is No Tomorrow
Inspired by the psychedelic tradition of Anatolian rock pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's new album alongside her group merges the electric jangle of the electrified saz with drifting Mellotron and classic soul melodies. It's a nostalgic vibe rooted in Yıldırım's powerful falsetto and influenced by producer Leon Michels' warm, tape-saturated sound. However, on classic Turkish songs such as the folk tune Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group reaches lively new territory. They craft slinking, slow-burning grooves and powerful vocals that lend a new, off-kilter spin to the Anatolian psychedelic style.
3. Lido Pimienta – The Beauty
Gregorian chants, Eastern European folk melodies and orchestral strings converge on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's extraordinary fourth album. Orchestrating 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 theatrical counterpoint melodies of Aún Te Quiero and the rhythmic dembow rhythms of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. Yet, it is Pim
