Our 10 Finest Worldwide Records of the Year 2025
As the year draws to a close, we reflect on the global sounds that pushed boundaries. We explore ten remarkable albums that characterized the year in music.
10. Sarathy Korwar – There Is Beauty, There Already
An album consisting of a single, extended movement of cyclical drumming may not appear the most approachable listening experience. However, south Asian percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar converts this persistent pulse into a unexpectedly magnetic album. Leading an trio of three drummers, Korwar crafts a complex percussive language across the record's ten parts. His composition draws from the phasing techniques of Steve Reich alongside classical Indian rhythmic patterns, everything tethered in the reiteration of a persistent, thrumming motif. As the album progresses, this refrain evokes the ceremonial rhythm of devotional music, drawing the listener further into Korwar's distinctive percussive realm.
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-sung, dub-influenced aesthetic that established her as a fixture in the region's indie music scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's vocal delivery is quiet and introspective, delivering tender melodies over the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the deep trip-hop beat of Vows. For more upbeat numbers such as Shadia and Abyss, she adopts a trembling, longing vocal technique against electronic lines with North African flavors and rattling electronic percussion. The album's sound is minimal and understated, yet this simplicity offers the ideal setting for Hamdan's deeply felt lyricism to shine through. It is well worth the wait.
8. Debit – Slowed Down
From Mexico electronic artist Debit specializes in haunting reimaginings of historical sounds. For her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dubby interpretation of the shuffling Latin American dance music genre. Debit slows this sound down to a crawl, running its characteristic synths and off-beat rhythm through veils of sludge and static to create a novel, sinister beat. Sometimes atmospheric and uneasy, Debit converts the exuberant dancefloor sound of cumbia into a persistent, ghostly afterimage.
Number Seven: DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Sensory overload is the operative word for the music of São Paulo producer Kaique Vieira, also known as DJ K. Pioneering his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira piles a tumult of sirens, explosive bass tones and screamed lyrics on top of the longstanding Brazilian genre of baile funk. This captures the energetic sound of neighborhood block parties. On his second album, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira cranks up the intensity, throwing in everything from four-on-the-floor techno beats to the sound of the Islamic call to prayer into his unruly bruxaria mix. The result is a notably hyperactive and deafeningly intense 40-minute sonic journey. Surrender to the noise and Vieira's bold productions become oddly liberating.
Number Six: The Singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's record from 1982 of disco beats and traditional Punjabi tunes is a reissued masterpiece. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks present an unusually engaging blend of the synthetic sound of 1980s synthesisers and drum machines with her ornate Indian classical singing style. Drum machine patterns echoes the wavelike tones of the traditional drums, while synthesiser melody 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 features a up-tempo funky bass rhythm. It's a party blend created more than ten years before the rise of Asian Underground music.
5. Enji – Resonance
From Mongolia singer Enji's gentle fourth album, Sonor, develops her jazz-inflected sound to present some of her broadest music to date. Moving away from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's selection of pieces travel 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-tinged cover of the 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Utilizing a live band rather than her usual setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound remains personal, drawing the listener into the warm soundscape of her singular voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – Yarın Yoksa
Drawing on 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 metallic twang of the amplified traditional lute with dreamy Mellotron and classic soul melodies. It's a 1970s throwback sound anchored in Yıldırım's commanding high register and shaped by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape aesthetic. But, on classic Turkish songs such as the folk tune Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group finds dynamic new territory. They create slinking, slow-burning grooves and powerful vocals that give a new, quirky spin to the Turkish psych sound.
Number Three: Lido Pimienta – The Beauty
Catholic requiem mass music, Czech harpsichord folksong and orchestral strings merge on Colombian singer Lido Pimienta's remarkable fourth album. Arranging music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett traverse a vast range including the liturgical vocals of opener Overturn (Obertura de la Luz Eterna) to the theatrical interweaving lines of Aún Te Quiero and the syncopated dembow rhythms of the woodwind-heavy El Dembow del Tiempo. Yet, it is Pim
