This Ten Best Global Records of the Year 2025
The past twelve months have offered a rich tapestry of global music that pushed boundaries. Here is a countdown of ten notable albums that shaped the year in music.
Number Ten: The Percussionist Sarathy Korwar – There Is Beauty, There Already
The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on insistent drumming may not appear the easiest listening experience. Yet, Indian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar transforms this persistent pulse into a strangely alluring album. Guiding an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar creates a complex percussive vocabulary across the record's 10 movements. His composition references minimalist concepts from Steve Reich combined with Indian classical phrasing, each grounded in the recurrence of a continual, driving refrain. Over its duration, this refrain starts to mirror the hypnotic repetition of devotional music, drawing the listener further into Korwar's singular percussive realm.
Number Nine: The Lebanese Artist Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember
Following an hiatus of eight years, Lebanese singer-songwriter Yasmine Hamdan re-emerges with a contemplative album of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-sung, dub-tinged aesthetic that established her as a fixture in the Middle Eastern independent music landscape since the 1990s. Hamdan's vocal delivery is gentle and introspective, delivering delicate melodies over the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the rumbling trip-hop beat of Vows. During more energetic moments such as Shadia and Abyss, she adopts a wavering, longing vibrato against electronic lines with North African flavors and skittering electronic percussion. The musical backdrop is lean and subtle, yet this minimalism provides the perfect canvas for Hamdan's emotive compositions to shine through. It is truly deserving of the long anticipation.
Number Eight: Debit – Slowed Down
Mexican producer Debit specializes in eerie reworkings of archival audio. For her most recent project, Desaceleradas, she zeroes in on the 1990s variant of cumbia rebajada – a decelerated, dubby interpretation of the rhythmic Latin American dance music genre. Debit drags this sound to a near-halt, running its signature synths and off-beat rhythm via sheets of distortion and static to create a novel, foreboding groove. At turns atmospheric and discomfiting, Debit converts the exuberant dancefloor sound of cumbia into a lasting, ghostly memory.
Number Seven: The São Paulo Producer DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Sheer intensity is the operative word for the music of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, also known as DJ K. Pioneering his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira layers a cacophony of alarms, explosive bass tones and shouted lyrics over the longstanding Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This emulates the driving sound of urban celebrations. On his follow-up release, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira escalates the intensity, throwing in everything from techno kick drums to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his chaotic bruxaria mix. The result is a notably hyperactive and deafeningly intense forty-minute listening experience. Give in to the noise and Vieira's bold productions become oddly exhilarating.
Number Six: The Singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Disco Punjabi
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's 1982 album of disco music and Punjabi folk melodies is a newly appreciated treasure. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks deliver an strikingly compelling blend of the metallic sound of 1980s synthesisers and programmed drums with her melismatic classical Indian singing style. Electronic percussion mimics the wavelike tones of the tabla, while synthesiser melody replicates the traditional sound of the reed organ on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Meanwhile, bossa nova rhythm takes center stage on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya channels a up-tempo walking disco bassline. It's a party blend created over a decade before the rise of Asian Underground music.
Number Five: The Mongolian Artist Enji – Sonor
Mongolian singer Enji's gentle latest record, Sonor, expands on her jazz-influenced sound to offer some of her most diverse music yet. Stepping outside her background in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's 11 tracks travel from the gentle Norah Jones-esque melodics of slow-burning number Ulbar to the German-language narration lyrics and twanging guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a energetic, funk-tinged cover of the 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Showcasing a full backing band rather than her typical setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound remains intimate, inviting the listener into the gentle soundscape of her singular voice.
Number Four: Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – Yarın Yoksa
Drawing on the 60s heritage of Turkish psychedelia pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, Turkish-born, Germany-based singer Derya Yıldırım's third record with her band Grup Şimşek blends the electric jangle of the amplified traditional lute with drifting keyboard and classic soul melodies. It's a 1970s throwback sound anchored in Yıldırım's powerful high register and influenced by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape sound. Yet, on classic Turkish songs such as the folk tune Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group reaches lively new territory. They craft slinking, downtempo grooves and powerful vocals that give a fresh, quirky spin to the Turkish psych sound.
Number Three: Lido Pimienta – The Beauty
Catholic requiem mass music, Eastern European folk melodies and orchestral strings converge on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's remarkable fourth album. Orchestrating music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett journey through everything from the Gregorian chants of opener Overturn (Obertura de la Luz Eterna) to the theatrical counterpoint melodies of Aún Te Quiero and the syncopated reggaeton-inspired beats of the woodwind-heavy El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim