Our 10 Top Global Records of the Year 2025
The past twelve months have offered a rich tapestry of global music that defied expectations. Here is a countdown of ten notable albums that defined the year in music.
10. Sarathy Korwar – There Already Is Beauty
An album consisting of a single, extended movement of repetitive percussion may not appear the most approachable musical proposition. Yet, Indian percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar converts this insistent rhythm into a hypnotically captivating album. Guiding an group of three drummers, Korwar crafts a intricate percussive language throughout the record's 10 movements. The work references the phasing techniques of Steve Reich combined with Indian classical phrasing, each grounded in the repetition of a persistent, driving refrain. The longer one listens, this refrain begins to emulate the hypnotic repetition of ritual music, drawing the listener deeper into Korwar's unique percussive universe.
Number Nine: Yasmine Hamdan – I Forget, I Remember
Coming off an hiatus of eight years, Arab vocalist and composer Yasmine Hamdan makes a comeback with a mournful album of songs. The work builds upon the Arabic-language, dub-influenced sound that made her a staple in the region's indie music scene since the 1990s. Hamdan's vocal delivery is gentle and ruminative, delivering tender melodies atop the string arrangements of a track like Hon and the deep trip-hop beat of Vows. On livelier tracks such as Shadia and Abyss, she employs a trembling, yearning vibrato over Maghrebi-inspired synth melodies and rattling electronic percussion. The album's sound is lean and restrained, yet this simplicity creates the perfect setting for Hamdan's deeply felt compositions to shine through. The album proves to be truly deserving of the wait.
Number Eight: The Mexican Producer Debit – Desaceleradas
From Mexico producer Debit specializes in uncanny reworkings of historical sounds. For her latest release, Desaceleradas, she zeroes in on the 90s style of cumbia rebajada – a decelerated, dub-inflected interpretation of the rhythmic Latin American dance music genre. Debit slows this sound even further, running its characteristic synths and off-beat rhythm through sheets of sludge and noise to produce a new, foreboding groove. At turns atmospheric and uneasy, Debit morphs the exuberant dancefloor sound of cumbia into a enduring, ethereal afterimage.
Number Seven: DJ K – Radio Libertadora!
Sensory overload is the operative word for the music of Brazilian producer Kaique Vieira, AKA DJ K. Pioneering his own genre of "bruxaria" (witchcraft), Vieira layers a cacophony of alarms, pummeling bass tones and shouted lyrics over the longstanding Brazilian genre of baile funk. This captures the propulsive sound of urban celebrations. On his follow-up release, Radio Libertadora!, Vieira escalates the ferocity, adding everything from techno kick drums to samples of the Islamic call to prayer into his chaotic bruxaria mix. The result is a particularly frenetic and overwhelmingly noisy forty-minute sonic journey. Surrender to the assault and Vieira's brash productions become unexpectedly liberating.
6. Mohinder Kaur Bhamra – Punjabi Disco
Sikh devotional singer Mohinder Kaur Bhamra's 1982 album of disco beats and Punjabi folk melodies is a rediscovered gem. Produced by her son, music producer Kuljit Bhamra, Punjabi Disco's ten tracks offer an remarkably captivating blend of the metallic sound of early synthesizers and programmed drums with her melismatic Indian classical singing style. Electronic percussion mirrors the rolling tones of the tabla, while synthesiser melody parallels the classic sound of the reed organ on tracks such as Pyar Mainu Kar. Elsewhere, bossa nova rhythm comes to the fore on Soniya Mukh Tera, and Nainan Da Pyar De Gaya channels a up-tempo walking disco bassline. It's a dancefloor fusion pioneered over a decade before the Asian Underground explosion.
Number Five: The Mongolian Artist Enji – Resonance
Mongolian singer Enji's gentle latest record, Sonor, builds upon her jazz-inflected sound to deliver some of her most wide-ranging music so far. Moving away from her background in traditional Mongolian "long song" singing, the record's selection of pieces range 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 sprightly, funk-tinged cover of the 1980s Mongolian classic Eejiinhee Hairaar. Featuring a live band rather than her standard setup of guitar and bass, Sonor's sound is still personal, pulling the listener into the gentle soundscape of her singular voice.
Number Four: Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – If There Is No Tomorrow
Inspired by the 1960s legacy of Anatolian rock pioneered by groups such as Moğollar, German-Turkish singer Derya Yıldırım's latest work with her band Grup Şimşek fuses the metallic twang of the electrified saz with woozy Mellotron and soulful tunes. It's a nostalgic vibe rooted in Yıldırım's commanding falsetto and shaped by producer Leon Michels' analogue tape aesthetic. However, on Turkish standards such as the nursery rhyme Hop Bico and 1960s song Ceylan, the group finds dynamic new territory. They develop slinking, slow-burning grooves and lifting vocals that lend a fresh, off-kilter twist to the Turkish psych sound.
Number Three: Lido Pimienta – The Beauty
Sacred music, Czech harpsichord folksong and symphonic arrangements all come together on Colombian singer Lido Pimienta's stunning latest work. Arranging music for the 60-piece Medellín Philharmonic Orchestra, Pimienta and producer Owen Pallett journey through a vast range including the Gregorian chants of opener Overturn (Obertura de la Luz Eterna) to the theatrical counterpoint melodies of Aún Te Quiero and the rhythmic dembow rhythms of the woodwind-heavy El Dembow del Tiempo. Yet, it is Pim
