This 10 Best Worldwide Albums of the Year 2025
Looking back on the musical landscape of international releases that pushed boundaries. Presenting a selection of ten notable albums that defined the year in music.
10. The Percussionist Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
An album consisting of a single, extended movement of cyclical drumming might not seem the most approachable listening experience. But, south Asian drummer and composer Sarathy Korwar converts this persistent pulse into a unexpectedly magnetic work. Leading an ensemble of three drummers, Korwar creates a intricate percussive vocabulary across the record's 10 movements. The album draws from Steve Reich's phasing motifs alongside traditional Indian musical phrasing, all anchored in the repetition of a persistent, driving figure. The longer one listens, this refrain begins to emulate the trance-inducing cycles of devotional music, pulling the listener further into Korwar's singular percussive world.
Number Nine: Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember
Coming off an hiatus of eight years, Arab singer-songwriter Yasmine Hamdan makes a comeback with a contemplative set of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-language, dub-tinged style that made her a staple in the Arab alternative scene since the nineties. Hamdan's voice is gentle and ruminative, delivering soft melodies atop the bowing strings of a track like Hon and the deep trip-hop groove of Vows. During more energetic moments such as Shadia and Abyss, she uses a wavering, longing vibrato over electronic lines with North African flavors and clattering electronic percussion. The production is minimal and understated, yet this minimalism provides the perfect environment for Hamdan's emotive compositions to shine through. It is well worth the long anticipation.
Number Eight: The Mexican Producer Debit – Slowed Down
From Mexico electronic artist Debit excels at eerie reworkings of historical sounds. On her new album, Desaceleradas, she zeroes in on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a slowed, dubby version of the shuffling Latin American dance music genre. Debit drags this sound down to a crawl, processing its characteristic synths and syncopated rhythm through sheets of sludge and noise to generate a fresh, menacing beat. Sometimes atmospheric and discomfiting, Debit transforms the exuberant party music of cumbia into a persistent, ghostly afterimage.
Number Seven: DJ K – Liberator Radio!
Sheer intensity is the defining principle for the records of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, AKA DJ K. Pioneering his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira layers a cacophony of alarms, explosive bass tones and screamed lyrics on top of the enduring Brazilian dance style of baile funk. This recreates the driving sound of urban celebrations. On his follow-up release, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira cranks up the intensity, throwing in everything from four-on-the-floor techno beats to the sound of the Islamic call to prayer into his frantic bruxaria mix. The result is a especially hyperactive and overwhelmingly noisy 40-minute listening experience. Surrender to the assault and Vieira's unapologetic productions become strangely liberating.
6. Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Punjabi Disco
Religious vocalist Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's early-80s release of disco music and traditional Punjabi tunes is a newly appreciated gem. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an strikingly engaging fusion of the sharp sound of early synthesizers and drum machines with her melismatic Indian classical singing style. Electronic percussion mimics the undulating tones of the tabla, while synthesiser melody parallels the classic sound of the harmonium on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Meanwhile, bossa nova rhythm is prominent on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya features a driving funky bass rhythm. It's a dancefloor fusion delivered over a decade before the global breakthrough of South Asian electronic music.
5. The Mongolian Artist Enji – Sonor
Mongolian vocalist Enji's gentle new release, Sonor, builds upon her jazz-inflected sound to deliver some of her most diverse music to date. Stepping outside her training in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's selection of pieces travel from the soft jazz-pop melodics of downtempo number Ulbar to the German-language narration lyrics and twanging guitar lines of Unadag Dugui. The album also includes a energetic, funk-inflected cover of the 80s Mongolian pop hit Eejiinhee Hairaar. Utilizing a full backing band rather than her typical setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound manages to stay personal, pulling the listener into the tender soundscape of her unique voice.
Number Four: Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – If There Is No Tomorrow
Channeling the 1960s legacy of Anatolian rock established by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's new album with her band Grup Şimşek fuses the electric jangle of the electrified saz with drifting Mellotron and classic soul melodies. It's a retro-70s aesthetic rooted in Yıldırım's strong falsetto and shaped by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape aesthetic. But, on classic Turkish songs such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 60s classic Ceylan, the group ventures into lively new territory. They craft smooth, slow-burning grooves and soaring vocals that lend a new, off-kilter twist to the Turkish psych sound.
Number Three: The Colombian Artist Lido Pimienta – La Belleza
Gregorian chants, Eastern European folk melodies and symphonic arrangements all come together on Colombian-born singer Lido Pimienta's remarkable latest work. Arranging 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 theatrical interweaving lines of Aún Te Quiero and the syncopated dembow rhythms of the brass and woodwind-led El Dembow del Tiempo. Yet, it is Pim
