The Ten Greatest Global Records of 2025
As the year draws to a close, we reflect on the international sounds that defied expectations. Presenting a selection of ten notable albums that characterized the year in music.
10. Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on repetitive percussion could sound like it isn't the most accessible listening experience. Yet, Indian percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar transforms this persistent pulse into a strangely alluring work. Guiding an trio of three drummers, Korwar develops a complex percussive dialect across the record's ten parts. The album channels minimalist concepts from Steve Reich as well as traditional Indian musical phrasing, everything tethered in the recurrence of a continual, thrumming figure. As the album progresses, this refrain evokes the trance-inducing cycles of ritual music, drawing the listener further into Korwar's singular percussive realm.
Number Nine: The Lebanese Artist Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget
Following an long absence, Lebanese singer-songwriter Yasmine Hamdan returns with a mournful set of songs. She expands on the Arabic-sung, dub-influenced sound that cemented her status in the region's indie music scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's voice is gentle and thoughtful, singing tender melodies over the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the deep trip-hop beat of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she uses a quivering, longing vocal technique against Maghrebi-inspired synth melodies and rattling electronic percussion. The musical backdrop is sparse and restrained, yet this minimalism provides the ideal setting for Hamdan's emotive songwriting to take center stage. It is truly deserving of the long anticipation.
8. Debit – Slowed Down
From Mexico electronic artist Debit specializes in haunting reworkings of archival audio. For her new album, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected version of the rhythmic Latin American musical style. Debit decelerates this sound to a near-halt, filtering its signature synths and off-beat rhythm via sheets of distortion and noise to generate a novel, menacing beat. At turns ambient and unsettling, Debit transforms the joyous party music of cumbia into a enduring, ethereal memory.
7. The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Sheer intensity is the operative word for the music of São Paulo producer Kaique Vieira, who performs as DJ K. Inventing his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira layers a tumult of sirens, pummeling bass tones and screamed lyrics over the enduring Brazilian genre of baile funk. This captures the energetic sound of urban celebrations. On his second album, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira escalates the ferocity, adding everything from techno kick drums to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his unruly bruxaria mix. The result is a notably manic and punishingly loud forty-minute sonic journey. Surrender to the noise and Vieira's brash productions become strangely liberating.
6. The Singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Punjabi Disco
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's early-80s release of disco beats and traditional Punjabi tunes is a reissued treasure. Recorded by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks present an remarkably captivating blend of the synthetic sound of early synthesizers and programmed drums with her fluid classical Indian vocal technique. Drum machine patterns mimics the rolling tones of the traditional drums, while synthesiser melody replicates the traditional sound of the harmonium on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Meanwhile, Latin-inflected grooves takes center stage on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya channels a driving funky bass rhythm. It's a party blend pioneered more than ten years before the rise of Asian Underground music.
Number Five: The Mongolian Artist Enji – Resonance
From Mongolia singer Enji's delicate latest record, Sonor, develops her jazz-inflected sound to deliver some of her broadest music so far. Departing from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's eleven songs veer from the soft jazz-pop melodies of slow-burning number Ulbar to the German spoken-word lyrics and trilling guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a sprightly, funk-inflected cover of the 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Featuring a ensemble rather than her usual setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound is still intimate, pulling the listener into the tender soundscape of her unique voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – If There Is No Tomorrow
Inspired by the 1960s legacy of Turkish psychedelia pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work alongside her group blends the metallic twang of the electrified saz with dreamy Mellotron and R&B-inflected lines. It's a retro-70s aesthetic rooted in Yıldırım's powerful falsetto and influenced by producer Leon Michels' warm, tape-saturated sound. Yet, on classic Turkish songs such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 60s classic Ceylan, the group reaches vibrant new territory. They craft slinking, downtempo grooves and powerful vocals that impart a new, off-kilter interpretation to the Anatolian psychedelic style.
3. Lido Pimienta – The Beauty
Sacred music, Eastern European folk melodies and symphonic arrangements converge on Colombian singer Lido Pimienta's remarkable fourth album. Arranging music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett explore everything from the Gregorian chants of opener Overturn (Obertura de la Luz Eterna) to the theatrical interweaving lines of Aún Te Quiero and the syncopated reggaeton-inspired beats of the woodwind-heavy El Dembow del Tiempo. Ultimately, it is Pim