This 10 Greatest International Records of 2025
As the year draws to a close, we reflect on the global music that pushed boundaries. We explore ten exceptional albums that characterized the year in music.
10. Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
An album consisting of a single, extended movement of insistent percussion might not seem the most approachable listening experience. Yet, south Asian percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar converts this insistent rhythm into a strangely alluring work. Guiding an trio of three drummers, Korwar crafts a dense percussive language over the record's 10 movements. The work channels the phasing techniques of Steve Reich combined with classical Indian rhythmic patterns, all anchored in the repetition of a ongoing, thrumming motif. The longer one listens, this refrain evokes the trance-inducing cycles of devotional music, luring the listener further into Korwar's distinctive percussive realm.
9. Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget
After an eight-year break, Lebanese vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan returns with a contemplative set 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 voice is quiet and thoughtful, singing soft melodies atop the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the rumbling trip-hop beat of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she uses a wavering, longing vocal technique against north African synth lines and skittering electronic percussion. The musical backdrop is minimal and subtle, yet this minimalism creates the perfect canvas for Hamdan's deeply felt songwriting to take center stage. The album proves to be well worth the wait.
Number Eight: Debit – Slowed Down
From Mexico electronic artist Debit specializes in uncanny reinterpretations of archival audio. On her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected take of the rhythmic Latin American musical style. Debit slows this sound to a near-halt, filtering its characteristic synths and off-beat rhythm through layers of distortion and static to generate a fresh, foreboding groove. Sometimes ambient and unsettling, Debit converts the exuberant dancefloor sound of cumbia into a enduring, spectral echo.
7. The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Sheer intensity is the key term for the records of São Paulo producer Kaique Vieira, also known as DJ K. Inventing his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira stacks a cacophony of sirens, explosive bass tones and screamed lyrics on top of the classic Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This captures the driving sound of favela street parties. On his second album, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira ramps up the ferocity, adding 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 especially frenetic and punishingly loud forty-minute listening experience. Surrender to the noise and Vieira's brash productions become strangely exhilarating.
6. The Singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Punjabi Disco
Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's record from 1982 of disco beats and Punjabi folk melodies is a rediscovered gem. Recorded by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks deliver an unusually engaging combination of the metallic sound of electronic keyboards and drum machines with her ornate classical Indian vocal technique. Drum machine patterns mimics the wavelike tones of the traditional drums, while synth lines replicates the classic sound of the reed organ on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. At other times, Latin-inflected grooves takes center stage on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya channels a up-tempo funky bass rhythm. It's a party blend created more than ten years before the Asian Underground explosion.
Number Five: The Mongolian Artist Enji – Sonor
From Mongolia vocalist Enji's delicate fourth album, Sonor, develops her jazz-influenced sound to offer some of her most diverse music to date. Moving away from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's eleven songs travel from the soft Norah Jones-esque melodics of downtempo number Ulbar to the German-language narration lyrics and trilling guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a lively, 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 distinctive voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – Yarın Yoksa
Channeling the 1960s legacy of Turkish psychedelia established by groups such as Moğollar, Turkish-born, Germany-based singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work with her band Grup Şimşek merges the metallic twang of the electrified saz with woozy keyboard and R&B-inflected lines. It's a 1970s throwback sound rooted in Yıldırım's powerful high register and influenced by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape sound. However, on classic Turkish songs such as the folk tune Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group finds lively new territory. They create slinking, slow-burning grooves and soaring vocals that lend a new, quirky interpretation to the Turkish psych sound.
Number Three: Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Catholic requiem mass music, Czech harpsichord folksong and symphonic arrangements all come together on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's stunning fourth album. Orchestrating music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett explore 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 syncopated dembow rhythms of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim
