This 10 Best Worldwide Records of 2025
The past twelve months have offered a rich tapestry of worldwide sounds that defied expectations. Here is a countdown of ten remarkable albums that characterized the year in music.
Number Ten: Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
The concept of a 40-minute, uninterrupted piece built on cyclical drumming could sound like it isn't the most approachable listening experience. Yet, Indian percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar turns this driving beat into a unexpectedly magnetic album. Guiding an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar crafts a intricate percussive language over the record's 10 movements. His composition references the phasing techniques of Steve Reich as well as Indian classical phrasing, everything tethered in the reiteration of a continual, thrumming refrain. As the album progresses, this refrain starts to mirror the ceremonial rhythm of devotional music, drawing the listener deeper into Korwar's distinctive percussive realm.
9. The Lebanese Artist Yasmine Hamdan – I Remember I Forget
Following an eight-year break, Arab vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan returns with a mournful album of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-sung, dub-influenced aesthetic that made her a staple in the Middle Eastern independent music landscape since the 1990s. Hamdan's vocal delivery is quiet and thoughtful, delivering soft 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 uses a trembling, yearning vocal technique over electronic lines with North African flavors and clattering electronic percussion. The album's sound is minimal and restrained, yet this austerity provides the perfect environment for Hamdan's deeply felt songwriting to shine through. This is a record truly deserving of the wait.
Number Eight: The Mexican Producer Debit – Desaceleradas
Mexican producer Debit has a knack for eerie reimaginings of traditional music. On her new album, Desaceleradas, she zeroes in on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dub-inflected interpretation of the rhythmic Latin American dance genre. Debit slows this sound even further, filtering its characteristic synths and syncopated rhythm through layers of distortion and hiss to create a novel, sinister beat. Periodically atmospheric and unsettling, Debit transforms the exuberant dancefloor sound of cumbia into a persistent, spectral echo.
Number Seven: DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Maximalism 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 onslaught of sirens, pummeling bass tones and shouted lyrics on top of the longstanding Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This recreates the driving sound of neighborhood block parties. On his follow-up release, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira cranks up the intensity, adding everything from driving techno rhythms to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his frantic bruxaria mix. The result is a notably manic and deafeningly intense forty-minute listening experience. Submit to the noise and Vieira's bold productions become unexpectedly freeing.
6. 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 rediscovered gem. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks deliver an unusually compelling blend of the metallic sound of electronic keyboards and drum machines with her fluid Indian classical singing style. Drum machine patterns echoes the rolling tones of the traditional drums, while synth lines parallels the classic sound of the harmonium on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Meanwhile, Latin-inflected grooves comes to the fore on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya boasts a driving disco bass groove. It's a club-ready hybrid pioneered over a decade before the rise of Asian Underground music.
Number Five: The Mongolian Artist Enji – Resonance
From Mongolia vocalist Enji's delicate latest record, Sonor, develops her jazz-inflected sound to deliver some of her broadest music so far. Stepping outside her background in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's eleven songs veer from the gentle 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 1980s Mongolian classic Eejiinhee Hairaar. Showcasing a ensemble rather than her typical setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound remains intimate, drawing the listener into the gentle acoustics of her unique voice.
4. Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – If There Is No Tomorrow
Channeling the psychedelic tradition of Anatolian rock established by groups such as Moğollar, Turkish-born, Germany-based singer Derya Yıldırım's new album alongside her group merges the distinctive buzz of the electrified saz with dreamy keyboard and R&B-inflected lines. It's a retro-70s aesthetic rooted in Yıldırım's powerful high register and influenced by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape sound. However, on Turkish standards such as the folk tune Hop Bico and 60s classic Ceylan, the group ventures into vibrant new territory. They create slinking, downtempo grooves and lifting vocals that impart a novel, off-kilter spin to the Turkish psych sound.
Number Three: The Colombian Artist Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Gregorian chants, Eastern European folk melodies and symphonic arrangements merge on Colombian singer Lido Pimienta's extraordinary fourth album. Arranging music for the sixty-member 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 theatrical counterpoint melodies of Aún Te Quiero and the rhythmic reggaeton-inspired beats of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. It is Pim
