This Ten Best Global Records of the Year 2025
Looking back on the musical landscape of global releases that defied expectations. Here is a countdown of ten remarkable albums that shaped the year in music.
Number Ten: Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on repetitive drumming could sound like it isn't the most accessible musical proposition. But, Indian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar turns this insistent rhythm into a hypnotically captivating piece. Leading an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar develops a complex percussive language across the record's ten sections. The work references the phasing techniques of Steve Reich alongside Indian classical phrasing, each grounded in the recurrence of a persistent, thrumming motif. As the album progresses, this refrain evokes the trance-inducing cycles of devotional music, drawing the listener deeper into Korwar's distinctive percussive realm.
9. The Lebanese Artist Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget
After an hiatus of eight years, Lebanese singer-songwriter Yasmine Hamdan returns with a melancholy collection of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-sung, dub-tinged style that made her a staple in the Middle Eastern independent music landscape since the 1990s. Hamdan's vocal delivery is gentle and thoughtful, singing tender melodies over 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 adopts a trembling, longing vocal technique over Maghrebi-inspired synth melodies and rattling electronic percussion. The musical backdrop is minimal and subtle, yet this simplicity provides the perfect setting for Hamdan's expressive lyricism to shine through. It is that justifies the wait.
Number Eight: The Mexican Producer Debit – Slowed Down
From Mexico electronic artist Debit excels at uncanny reimaginings of archival audio. For her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she focuses on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a decelerated, dubby take of the rhythmic Latin American dance genre. Debit decelerates this sound even further, processing its signature synths and syncopated rhythm via veils of distortion and static to create a new, menacing groove. At turns ambient and discomfiting, Debit transforms the exuberant party music of cumbia into a persistent, spectral echo.
7. The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Liberator Radio!
Sheer intensity is the operative word for the output of São Paulo producer Kaique Vieira, also known as DJ K. Inventing his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira piles a onslaught of alarms, explosive bass tones and screamed lyrics over the longstanding Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This recreates the propulsive sound of favela street parties. On his new record, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira ramps up the intensity, incorporating everything from techno kick drums to the sound of the Islamic call to prayer into his unruly bruxaria mix. The result is a notably hyperactive and overwhelmingly noisy 40-minute listening experience. Submit to the assault and Vieira's brash productions become strangely freeing.
6. Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Punjabi Disco
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's record from 1982 of disco beats and Punjabi folk melodies is a newly appreciated gem. Recorded by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an unusually compelling blend of the synthetic sound of electronic keyboards and drum machines with her melismatic classical Indian singing style. Electronic percussion echoes the undulating tones of the tabla, while synth lines doubles the traditional sound of the reed organ on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Elsewhere, Latin-inflected grooves takes center stage on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya features a up-tempo disco bass groove. It's a party blend created more than ten years before the Asian Underground explosion.
5. The Mongolian Artist Enji – Resonance
From Mongolia singer Enji's soft fourth album, Sonor, expands on her jazz-influenced sound to present some of her broadest music so far. Departing from her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's 11 tracks travel 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-tinged cover of the 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Showcasing a live band rather than her typical setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound manages to stay personal, pulling the listener into the gentle acoustics of her singular voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – Yarın Yoksa
Channeling the 60s heritage of Turkish psychedelia established by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's new album alongside her group blends the metallic twang of the electrified saz with drifting Mellotron and classic soul melodies. It's a nostalgic vibe rooted in Yıldırım's strong falsetto and shaped by producer Leon Michels' warm, tape-saturated aesthetic. Yet, on classic Turkish songs such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group finds vibrant new territory. They create sinuous, slow-burning grooves and soaring vocals that lend a fresh, off-kilter spin to the Turkish psych sound.
3. The Colombian Artist Lido Pimienta – The Beauty
Catholic requiem mass music, Czech harpsichord folksong and orchestral strings converge on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's extraordinary latest work. Orchestrating music for the sixty-member Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett explore a vast range including the Gregorian chants 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. Ultimately, it is Pim